While Guardians of the Galaxy is no where short of outlandish moments, Marvel‘s summer blockbuster may wave its freak flag most vehemently on Blu-ray. Yes, the most wonderfully weird scene in the film is also its climax: when Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) distracts Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace) from destroying a planet by singing from and dancing to The Five Stairsteps’ “O-o-h Child.”
Check out the surprising turn this scene takes in one of the arguably best outtakes I’ve ever seen:
When asked about the outtake by Buzzfeed News, Pratt is said to have burst into laughter – throughout the entire interview. “We were filming the climax of the entire movie… and I was dancing,” he said, still laughing. “I was standing there… in front of 200 extras in full alien makeup. And none of them knew what the hell was happening either. They thought they were on a serious movie because of all the time and the effort that had been put into their makeup. So I just had this energy of, like, What am I doing?!”
Pratt said that he did not work with a choreographer on the scene. The script didn’t really specify how exactly he was supposed to be dancing, either. “But I did have a really good sense of the era from which I would be drawing dance movies, given that Quill draws all of his pop-culture references from a certain time frame of basically 1985 and earlier,” he said. “So I thought he wouldn’t necessarily be doing the Dougie because he wouldn’t know what that is. … I did some research on [’80s dancing], and it happens to be right in my dance wheelhouse anyways.”
Pratt said he even ad-libbed passing of the dancing to Gamora (Zoe Saldana). “I was just trying different things, because I was just so nervous that what we were doing wasn’t going to work. I’m not even sure whose idea is was, but they just sprung into the idea that we would [all] do the entire dance-off. … At that point, [we thought] if this whole thing doesn’t work, at least we’re going to have a helluva time and lot of fun doing it.”
Suffice it to say, I think things worked out for Pratt. Guardians of the Galaxy is Marvel Studios’ most successful franchise launch since the first Iron Man in 2008. It is the highest-grossing film in the U.S. so far this year with $330.5 million at the box office, and the seconded highest worldwide with $770.1 million. Marvel has green-lit a sequel, with co-writer-director James Gunn returning, set for May 5, 2017.
“James has my utmost respect and trust,” said Pratt. “I don’t even pretend to think I would be the one who could best say what’s next for Quill. It’s so absolutely born out of his brain that I’m just looking forward to doing whatever he wants me to do, basically.”
Boy, is this writer excited to see where Gunn takes the franchise next!
Are you looking forward to the sequel? Which dance move from the outtakes won your heart? Sound off in the comments below!
