Cameron Diaz almost backed out of doing the ''hair gel'' scene in 'There's Something About Mary'
It was one of the most iconic movie scenes of the '90s, but turns out, the world almost missed out on seeing Cameron Diaz's most famous hair style.
In a recent interview with Variety, Peter and Bobby Farrelly, directors of 'There's Something About Mary', revealed that Cameron Diaz nearly changed her mind about the scene which saw her sweep Ben Stiller's sperm through her hair believing it to be hair gel.
The brothers had asked Diaz beforehand if she was comfortable with everything in the scene. "She said, 'Absolutely.' But on the day, she's like, 'I'm having second thoughts about this. This could derail my career.'"
"At first, I had questions because you never know how something like that can go since it had never been done before," noted Diaz in an e-mail interview with Variety. "I trusted Bobby and Peter, obviously, because they are so hilarious, but when we came up with the visual to the joke, it made me realize how right they were."
Besides, she added, "Peter and Bobby have such heart in all of their movies. No matter how shocking the comedy is, there is so much that is inherently good about the story and the characters that really appeals to people and it makes the laughter at the jokes a little more forgivable."
Peter went on to say: "When we made the movie, we didn’t think it would be for everybody". However he remembers after the movie's premiere in Rhode Island a long-term friend of his mother's said her favourite part was "When the girl has the [semen] in her hair".
"I remember thinking this could be a big hit", added Peter.
That it was. Diaz won a New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress and she was also nominated for a Golden Globe, while the 1998 comedy often ranks high on lists of the greatest American comedies of all time.
