Actor Brendan Fraser appeared at the Mill Valley Film Festival over the weekend to promote Darren Aronofsky’s “The whale” and accept the annual event’s lifetime achievement award.
Talking to media on the red carpet beforehand, the actor issued an amusing apology to the nearby city of San Francisco in relation to something that happened over 25 years ago – a traffic cam caused by filming of his 1997 comedy “George of the Jungle”.
In the film, George goes to rescue a parachutist tangled in the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge. Turns out there was a problem which Fraser describes (though erroneously refers to it being the Golden Gate Bridge) to SFGate:
“I have almost an apology to make… Disney put a mannequin hanging by a parachute from the uprights. It brought traffic to a standstill on either side of the bridge. My trailer was on the other side in a parking lot.
I just remember watching the Golden Gate Bridge. There’s this dummy parachutist hanging from it. I had the TV on, and ‘Oprah’ got interrupted because there was a special news report with helicopters saying a parachute is dangling on the bridge.
And I’m going – wait a minute, I’m looking at the helicopters and TV – somebody didn’t pull a permit, somebody’s going to get in trouble with the mayor’s office. So I can only apologize for that… So, that said, my bad. It won’t happen again.”
Leslie Mann and Thomas Haden Church co-starred in the “Tarzan” spoof which became a box office hit that earned $174 million worldwide. Fraser’s “The Whale” opens in cinemas on December 9th.
