Mel Brooks Got John Hurt To Recreate ‘Alien’s Chestburster Scene in ‘Spaceballs’

The Big Picture

• The infamous chestburster scene in
  Alien
  shocked audiences and turned the slow-burn sci-fi into a gory, horrific nightmare
• John Hurt and Mel Brooks worked together on
  The Elephant Man
  and
  History of the World: Part I
  , leading to Hurt’s cameo in
  Spaceballs
  .
• John Hurt reprises his
  Alien
  role, Kane, in
  Spaceballs
  and recreates the chestburster scene with a hilarious dancing alien.

There have been plenty of shocking scenes in horror history, but few have withstood the test of time like one from Ridley Scott‘s Alien in 1979. If you’ve seen it, you know exactly which moment we’re talking about. The infamous “chestburster” scene, where an alien rips through the ribcage of John Hurt‘s Kane, took a slow-burn sci-fi movie and suddenly turned it into a gory nightmare where anything was possible. John Hurt was unable to escape this scene, even as he went on to be nominated for an Oscar for The Elephant Man the next year. Finally, Hurt gave in and came back for a hilarious cameo in Mel Brooks‘ Spaceballs that parodied the Alien moment, but how did it happen?

The Cast of ‘Alien’ Hadn’t Seen the Chestburster Before Shooting the Scene

Ridley Scott’s Alien is a rather slow film in its first act, with the dread of what might happen next reeling you in. The first clue that everything is going to turn bad is when Kane, a crew member on the Nostromo spaceship, is attacked by a “facehugger” when the crew steps off the ship to explore a nearby area. The crab-like creature wraps around Kane’s face and refuses to let go until it finally falls off on its own and dies. Everyone is relieved when Kane regains consciousness and seems to be okay. However, later at dinner, he begins to cough violently before a puddle of red bursts from his chest and a small alien creature slithers out of his intestines. It’s one of horror’s best jump scares, but part of the reason why it’s so effective is that the crew hadn’t practiced the scene beforehand. Sigourney Weaver and the cast knew what was in the script, but they couldn’t be prepared for the grossness that played out in front of him in a moment so intense that one actor passed out and another threatened to quit.

Mel Brooks and John Hurt Met While Making ‘The Elephant Man’

A year after Alien, John Hurt had the lead role in what is arguably his best film when he starred as Joseph Merrickalongside Anthony Hopkins in David Lynch‘s The Elephant Man. It was on the set of The Elephant Man that John Hurt met Mel Brooks. John Hurt told The Talks, “Everybody knows now, but they didn’t know at the time that he was the producer.” Because Mel Brooks was a big-time name in comedy and The Elephant Man is as serious as it gets, Brooks kept his name off the credits, but Hurt said, “After that film, he kept ringing me up saying, ‘I want you to do History of the World.'” Brooks promised to put Hurt in a nice hotel and give him a whopping $2,000 to appear in his 1981 film History of the World: Part I. Hurt agreed, and they would work together again on Spaceballs six years later.

John Hurt Has a Hilarious Cameo With a Dancing Alien in ‘Spaceballs’

1987’s Spaceballs, starring the likes of John Candy, Rick Moranis, and Bill Pullman is a parody of the original Star Wars trilogy. During one scene, Lone Starr (Pullman) and Barf (Candy), who are parodies of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Chewbacca, enter a space diner. As they sit at the counter ordering from the flirty waitress, the camera cuts to another group of diners at a table. The moment we see them, the joke immediately registers, as John Hurt is in a white space suit eating at a table with a bunch of other people who all look like representations of the actors from Alien. Right on cue, Hurt begins to choke and flail about on the table. Barf asks the waitress what the guy ordered, and when she says he got the special, Barf freaks out because he ordered the same thing, so he asks for soup instead.

Back on John Hurt, a small, slimy alien bursts from the actor’s chest. He looks at the little creature and mutters, “Oh no, not again,” before dying. This would be the point in Alien where the baby xenomorph scurries away, but this is Spaceballs, so instead, the alien pulls out a top hat and cane and proceeds to sing and dance across the diner. “Check please,” Lone Starr and Barf say in unison.

Cameos have become commonplace in comedies (just try to keep up with all of them in Deadpool & Wolverine), but sometimes they’re just there to be fan service. Spaceballs was a time when the joke worked perfectly because, just like those poor actors in Alien, we never saw the setup or the punchline coming.

Alien is available to watch on Hulu.

WATCH ON FUBO