Actor Bruce Willis teamed up with Michael Bay for the ensemble hit feature Armageddon. But Willis admitted he didn’t have the best time with the director, and didn’t see the two ever collaborating afterwards.
Armageddon was one of Willis’ most successful films. The blockbuster saw the outspoken actor work with people in the film industry he’d never had before. Among them were superstars like Ben Affleck, and Billy Bob Thornton, and Liv Tyler.
It would mark the first time Willis worked alongside filmmaker Bay as well. But Willis assured that their first time together would also be their last.
“Few people will work with him now, and I know I will never work with him again,” Willis once told Ain’t It Cool (via FemaleFirst). “It was a great crew, but a screaming director does not make for a pleasant set experience. But look, we were all big boys, and we got through it.”
Although put off by Bay’s antics at the time, Willis remained a fan of the director and his films. Still, the star stood by his remarks.
“I don’t have any regrets. I don’t have any regrets. What I say is what I say, I don’t always say the right thing, I don’t always say the politically correct thing…but yeah, I don’t have any regrets about that,” Willis once told Rotten Tomatoes.
Bruce Willis had his criticisms about ‘Armageddon’
Willis had a couple of other gripes about Armageddon beyond just Bay’s habits as a filmmaker. There were two reasons why Willis originally signed onto the project.
“I said yes to this one because the script made me laugh, and at the same time I thought it was ambitious,” Willis once told The Morning Call.
But looking back on it, the Die Hard star felt the film had as many cons as it did pros.
“A little too MTV-camera cutty for my taste, but the shots of meteors crashing into the [World Trade Center] was pretty prescient. Billy Bob was under-used for my taste, the spacesuits continually malfunctioned and one night, Ben Affleck was seen bashing the front glass on his helmet with a rock because he couldn’t breathe,” Willis remembered.
But his friend Liv Tyler helped add some much-needed levity to the set. Willis also quipped that the film made Disney a lot of money, illustrating that doing Armageddon at least wasn’t a waste of time.
Michael Bay claimed Bruce Willis tried to break into a shuttle while filming ‘Armageddon’
In a recent 2022 interview Bay did with Variety, the Transformers director looked back fondly at his time with Willis. He commended the star on his movie star presence and his ability to lead a set.
“He takes control of the cast, and he’s got a great fun energy and I had a great time. He was tough at first, and by the way, Armageddon was a total fun set. … It was almost like camp,” Bay said.
Bay told one story where Willis had gotten a little mischievous behind-the-scenes by plotting to break into a shuttle.
“They stopped prepping it for one hour, for us. We are on the gantry [the Orbiter Access Arm, which allows access into the shuttle], and Bruce was able to walk in,” Bay remembered. “He goes to me, ‘Mike, we’re gonna do one take; the second take, I’m going to make a run for it and I’m going to go inside the shuttle.’”
But the two would get in trouble before they could go any further.
“Bruce is about to break into the space shuttle … and these guys, all in suits, fully masked up, they’re like, ‘Uh, uh, uh,’” he said.
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