Director Adrian Lyne Reflects On 'Flashdance' 40 Years Later
It’s been 40 years since Jennifer Beals made the whole world gasp by dumping an entire bucket of water on herself in Flashdance. That means it’s been four decades of both men and women wishing they were that bucket, four decades of the world bopping to that iconic soundtrack, and four decades of immeasurable influence. While Paramount Pictures is eager to celebrate the occasion, director Adrian Lyne is still trying to wrap his head around how one of the most taboo stories became a cult classic.
Speaking to FilmSpeak, Lyne actually said that there was initially little to no excitement about the film from moviegoers. “The studio sold off 30% of their interest in the movie just before it came out,” he said. The studio thought the film would be dead on arrival. As we all know now, the film would become the furthest thing from a failure. In fact, it would become the highest-grossing film of 1983, with a worldwide box office gross of over $200 million - all on a $7 million budget.
As Lyne explained, in a matter of weeks he went from not being able to get anyone on the phone at Paramount, to getting non-stop calls from his colleagues about how much people were enjoying the film. “People would ring me up and say, ‘Your movie is up in Times Square, and [everyone] is dancing in the aisles of the theater,’” he said.
It was exciting for him, but he doesn’t credit that excitement to his direction, the music, or even the dancing. To Lyne, it was all thanks to Beals. Despite its adult themes, Beals was only seventeen at the time of filming. Her innocence and her enthusiasm are what he believes truly sold the film.
Funny enough, Lyne didn’t even want to do the film. And he revealed that he had told the studio “No” more than once. “I didn’t want to do it because I thought the script was a little silly,” he admitted. There was one executive, however, who was a fan of his work and insisted on having his vision at the helm. So what changed Lyne’s mind? The main reason was that the film actually started to get made. Hollywood then was no different than Hollywood now in the sense that until cameras began rolling on a project, there was a chance studios could change their mind. “I think you can't be too precious about waiting for the one you really want to do,” he said. Despite the “silly” story, he came onboard believing he could make the dances “interesting and fun.”
One of those dances ends in the aforementioned sequence with the bucket of water. While it stands as one of the most iconic scenes in cinema today, Lyne revealed that initially he had no idea how to pull it off. In fact, he explained that the idea was born from a whim to make a literal splash on set. He revealed that it wasn’t until he had a meeting with Paramount executives about the logistics of the scene that it actually started to come together.
“There was about 20 or 30 of them looking down at me [on bleachers],” he said. “I didn’t have a clue.” He added that he was “worried” about the amount of water that was falling on the dancer’s head, and he explained that there were very real concerns that all that water could break her neck.
“It was trial and error, trying to light the water solely came off like sort of sparkling jewels,” he said. What made the shoot even more complicated was that he could not figure out what color worked best for the backdrop. Before settling on that (now) unforgettable blue hue, he admitted he tried to make the scene work with white for the longest time.
Despite the world being fooled into thinking it was Beals under the bucket, Lyne also admitted that it was actually a stunt dancer. “She improvised a lot,” he added. Although one might think the shattering of that particular illusion would make it harder to appreciate the film, it actually puts into perspective just how serious Lyne took the story he once called “silly” after all. Similar to the audience, however, he’s grown a deeper appreciation for the film over the years, but not for the reason you might expect.
In the decades since, Lyne told us that he remains surprised at how many people have told him that the film pushed them to achieve their goals. “I was surprised [at] how many people sort of rang me up and said ‘It made me stick with what I really wanted to do,’” he said. “It's like a fairy tale story.”
To hear Lyne share even more behind-the-scenes details about the film and his career, be sure to check out the full interview below:
