Zac Efronmay be the kind of actor who has no problems working alongside a live bear, but he still was pretty uncomfortable co-starring with a giant centipede for one particular scene in his upcoming dramedyThe Greatest Beer Run Ever. Directed by Peter Farrelly, the film is written by Farrelly, Brian Currie, and Pete Jones. Aong with Efron, the film stars Russell Crowe and Bill Murray.
In the movie, which is set in the late 60s, Efron plays a U.S. Marine Corps vet who agrees to sneak into Vietnam to deliver some beer along with some messages of support to their military buddies in combat. It’s no easy task, and on this journey, Efron encounters a giant centipede. This was not CGI as a real centipede was brought in for the shoot. There were some problems, however, as Efron felt like he was taking a big risk of getting stung.
“That was real. I’ve actually been stung before. They’re very, very painful. Very poisonous. We had a guy who was a centipede wrangler, so there was a gentleman who came in and had three or four of these different boxes, and they were all separated. He goes, ‘So, you’re putting a real one on your skin?’ I said, ‘Yeah, sure, as long as it’s defanged.’ And he goes, ‘Uh, yes, I defanged one.’ And I said, ‘Which one, there’s four?'”
Efron then explains that the centipede wrangler continued to question which of the four he had really defanged, changing his mind a couple more times as Efron continued to ask. He ultimately settled on one centipede, though he still seemed like he wasn’t 100% sure he had the right one. Fortunately, Efron was not stung, though the nervousness he felt when the centipede was near his face meant he didn’t really have to feign his fear.
“He starts checking it out and looking at it and going, ‘I think it’s this one.’ And I’m going, ‘Oh, my gosh!’ It ended up being really fun. After a couple takes, we got him to go right up next to my face, and it was just perfect. I didn’t really have to act.”
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Zac Efron Was Very Impressed With the Screenplay
“I receive a lot of scripts to read these days and it’s pretty rare that you get through them in one sitting without being able to put them down,” Efron also recently toldDeadlineabout the script for the film. “And I kept flipping back to the front just seeing that it was based on a true story and going, ‘This is absolutely incredible.’ There’s this flow to the writing and to the progression of the story that’s just really well paced and I don’t know, it’s gripping.”
He added, “Before you know it you’re on this journey, and you’re experiencing something that you never dreamed in a million years you’d get to be a part of. And I thought it was about something really powerful you know and the character of Chickie was just so likable and so, you know, had so much compassion and passion to accomplish his goal and to see his friends and to support them. So I mean I read it and just thought ‘This is too good to be true, sign me up.'”
The Greatest Beer Run Everwill premiere on Apple TV+ on Sept. 30, 2022. You can check out the official trailer for the film below.
Chickie (Zac Efron) wants to support his friends fighting in Vietnam, so he does something wild—personally bring them American beer. What starts as a well-meaning journey quickly changes Chickie’s life and perspective. Based on a true story.
