Adam Sandler Reveals the Funniest Advice Carl Weathers Gave Him on Happy Gilmore
“I have so many great memories of him,” Sandler tells Inverse.
When Carl Weathers passed away on Feb. 1, fans around the world mourned the beloved actor while headlines praised him for playing Apollo Creed in the Rocky movies, as one half of an epic handshake in Predator, for his foray into Star Wars with The Mandalorian, and for that time he played a stew-obsessed version of himself on Arrested Development. But in my own group chat that day, the focus was instantly on Weathers’ performance in the 1996 comedy Happy Gilmore, where he plays Chubbs Peterson, a former professional golfer who teaches Adam Sandler’s titular everyman how to master his short game.
So when I had the chance to interview Adam Sandler for his new Netflix sci-fi movie Spaceman, I couldn’t help but sneak in a question about Carl Weathers. Thankfully, Sandler was more than happy to share some memories of working with the actor and the hilarious trick he learned from their time together on the set of Happy Gilmore.
“I have so many great memories of him just being like a gentleman,” Sandler tells Inverse. “Just a gentleman to everybody on the set. I mean, we worshiped Apollo Creed growing up, and when he came on the set of Happy and it was years after that, I don’t know how old Carl was when I met him, but he was so jacked and could knock you out still, and he just was so pleasant to everybody.”
“Man, that guy was a special guy.”
Sandler also recalls a specific moment on set where Carl Weathers’ sense of humor shined through:
“Actors always get director chairs to sit on, these high chairs,” he says. “Everyone kind of sits and talks, and I remember Carl was always like, ‘Can I just bring me the low one?’ And they’d bring out the low one, and we were all for the high chairs, and he is on the low one. And I said, ‘Carl, why the low one?’ He goes, ‘For this very reason.’ Then he crosses his legs and he goes like this [at this point in the story, Sandler closed his eyes, leaned his head back, and pretended to fall asleep]. And he says, ‘That’s the best place to sleep. You don’t want to be in a high chair when you fall asleep.’”
Overall, it’s clear that Carl Weathers left an impression on everyone he met. Sandler concludes:
“Anyways, he was just a sweetheart. We got very close, and throughout the years, we always hung out whenever we could. I got so many texts from friends that they met Carl. One of the highlights of their lives was getting to sit and talk to Carl and feel his warmth and how funny he was and how good of a guy and so into acting and directing. And he loved his two boys so much. Man, that guy was a special guy.”
Carl Weathers in a scene at the end of Happy Gilmore.
