No one would have been excited about a movie called ‘Dark Skies’, would they?
Somehow, there have been six Sharknado films. Six. The original 2013 Sharknado was followed up by Sharknado 2: The Second One, Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!, Sharknado: The 4th Awakens and Sharknado 5: Global Swarming. And the final instalment, The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time debuted on US TV on Sunday night.
They’ve come along way, those sharks that have got stuck in a tornado. But it turns out not everyone was so convinced that the concept was going to become a global pop culture phenomenon.
SyFy, the channel that airs the Sharknado movies, has published an oral history of the franchise, and it reveals a few interesting tidbits. It turns out that back when the first Sharknado film was in pre-production, they were having trouble casting it – basically, no one wanted to be in a film called ‘Sharknado’.
As director Anthony C. Ferrante, explained: “I think the hardest part about it was that they had a hard time casting the movie because they were saying, ‘Hey, do you want to be in Sharknado?’ And so they changed the title when they started sending offers to Dark Skies.”
Thus, the actors were cast believing the film was going to be called Dark Skies. And when the truth came out, they weren’t happy.
He continued: “There was a day, it was like the third day of shooting, where we were in the hardware store set. All the actors called me in the back room, and I describe it like in Frankenstein, where all the villagers had torches and pitchforks. And they’re going, ‘We heard that this thing might be called Sharknado!’
“And I was like, ‘Uh… where did you hear that?’ And they’re like, ‘No, they’ve got to call it something else! Call it Dark Skies!’ And it was so funny. They were just panicked. I always knew that they were going to call it Sharknado. I had to minimize the fallout, and I remember specifically telling them, ‘Look, they change the names all the time, but if this movie is called Sharknado, it will be a good thing.'”
Actor Ian Zeiring, who plays Fin Shepard in the films, said the cast even tried to quit the film.
He said: “We all thought it was terrible. That’s when I got on the phone with my agent to see if he get me off this movie or remove my name from the credits. But once you sign on, that was the end of that. So I was just kind of bummed out knowing that they were going to call this Sharknado. I just thought it was so dumb.”
Eventually, Chris Regina managed to calm them down. “Ian thought this was going to ruin his career, but he finally was convinced that no one was going to see the film,” he said.
How wrong you were, Chris.
