John Travolta Fans Attacked Him on the Set of ‘Saturday Night Fever’
Saturday Night Fever made John Travolta a movie star, but he was already a celebrity when he filmed it. Welcome Back, Kotter would have been in its second season and he’d already played a villain role in Carrie. The cast and filmmakers of Saturday Night Fever remember how fans would attack Travolta on the set of the classic dance movie.
Paramount Home Entertainment released Saturday Night Fever on 4K UHD, bringing the grit of 1977 New York into new focus, and Tony Manero (Travolta)’s sharp threads into a bright new shine 45 years later. Bonus features recorded for the 30th anniversary in 2007 also reveal the harrowing encounters Travolta had making the film.
John Travolta fans invaded the locations for ‘Saturday Night Fever’
Today, Marvel movies film on closed stages to keep their stars and plot points secret. Saturday Night Fever couldn’t substitute the streets of New York. So they had to deal with Travolta fans who found out he was filming a movie nearby.
“Initially, when we started outside on the streets of Brooklyn, we were hit by a riot of 15,000 people who were just so excited to see him and wanted to get in and completely stop our filming,” director John Badham said. “I don’t think they were malicious but there was just a big party on the street. We literally had to shut down and go home because we couldn’t get anything done.”
When Tony and his boys, Joey (Joseph Cali) and Bobby C. (Barry Miller) hit the road, the road hit back.
The third day of shooting, and this is all a little overwhelming, because there’s gotta be 3000 kids behind barricades at the end of the street. There we are in this ridiculous yellow and red Chevy. So Barry’s behind the wheel of this car and the barricades break. The kids rush the police and they break through like we’re in Cuba in some foreign country with political unrest. They’re beating on the car and John’s screaming let’s get outta here. We’re all freaking out. He’s laying down low and we’re yelling at Barry to get going. He hits the gas and we take off, we end up hearts beating, adrenaline pumping, kids grabbing on the car trying to run after us.
Joseph Cali, Saturday Night Fever bonus features
‘Saturday Night Fever’ needed security from John Travolta Fever
Donna Pescow played Annette in Saturday Night Fever. She remembered an incident that got out of hand just in the makeup trailer with Travolta. Fortunately, the film ramped up security after that.
“I do remember one particular time we were in the trailer,” Prescow said. “John had gone in there a little earlier. I think he had his hair and makeup done and was waiting to start, I went in after him. The kids in the neighborhood knew he was in there and they started calling him. Obviously, he couldn’t go out because that would’ve been a mob scene. They started to shake the trailer which was really scary. Suddenly this trailer started to rock like a boat. I think they pushed up the security at that point. Even though it was really nice that they liked him and wanted to see him, it was really frightening to be inside that trailer.”
Just shopping for clothes was dangerous
It wasn’t only on the set that Saturday Night Fever encountered rabid Travolta fans. Costume Designer Patrizia Von Brandenstein remembered one shopping trip that got out of control.
“I went shopping with John Travolta one day,” she said. “We were in the store about 45 minutes and John tried on a couple of things. Everything was very pleasant and we began to realize there was a big crowd forming outside. So to get us back into the limo and through the street, we had to make a call to the local precinct and get escorted because within that 45 minutes a huge crowd of kids had gathered outside.”
