In 1992, a class of unknowns enrolled in an elite 1950s prep schooland graduated as stars.
Like the fictitious all-boysSt.
Matthew’s Academy it depicted,School Tieswas a formative training ground for the best and brightest.
Credit: Everett Collection
His viciously bigoted tormentor: Matt Damon.
Caught in between were Chris O’Donnell and a slew of other baby-faced future stars, including Ben Affleck.
Twenty-five years later,School Tiesis a worthy time capsule of 1990s young Hollywood.
Everett Collection; George Pimentel/WireImage
But it also resonates in 2017 for its depiction of insidious bigotry.
“Anti-Semitism is rampant.
It’s not even hidden.School Tieswas deliberately dated when it was made, but it hasn’t aged.”
School Ties: Photofest
Here, Jaffe, Wolf, Fraser, and others look back at a film that continues to reverberate.
Fortunately, he finally found a studio exec to greenlight the projecthimself.
In 1991, he joined the brass at Paramount, which fast-tracked the project.
Everett Collection; Emma McIntyre/Getty Images
Casting the young men who attended St. Matthew’s meant auditioning just about every up-and-coming actor in Hollywood.
I sat on the board of a number of schools, and there was a quiet problem with anti-Semitism.
That’s why I wanted to doSchool Ties.
School Ties: Kobal Collection
PAT McCORKLE(co-casting director):I saw over 5,000 young men.
Those were videotape days.
Anyone who is now between the ages of 40 and 50 auditioned forSchool Ties.
Everett Collection; Jean Claude Dhien/Getty Images
We looked for a year and a half for the David Greene part.
Noah Wyle, Kyle Chandler, Matthew Perryall those kind of guys read for it.
ROBERT MANDEL(director):Brendan Fraser hadn’t done a movie.
They found him in Seattle.
We liked him because he felt other than everybody else.
He was a little taller, a little bigger.
He was not Jewish, but he felt “other than.”
A couple of people [we cast in supporting roles] wanted to do Davidvery much.
But you put Brendan in a group of 10 other guys, he clearly was David.
JAFFE:Matt had a quality that was extraordinary.
BRENDAN FRASER(David Greene):I was appointed to meet with Sherry after doing a reading.
I was wearing an awful shirt by today’s standards.
I read with Matt Damon.
I got the job because of Matt.
I believed everything that came out of his mouth.
I remember having this moment of thinking, “Just match [his] pitch.
Don’t put curlicues on this.
Don’t swing for the fences.”
I felt great after that.
I had so much admiration for him.
RANDALL BATINKOFF(Rip Van Kelt):I actually screen-tested with Kyle Chandler.
He read for David.
He obviously wasn’t what they were looking for, but he did a great job.
He and I went and had a couple cocktails at this dive bar in Hollywood afterwards to unwind.
I haven’t seen him since, but things worked out for him quite well regardless.
They were interested in me for Matt’s part [Charlie Dillon] and my part.
In hindsight I think Matt’s character was more interesting.
But at the time I gravitated to wanting to play someone who was more likable.
O’DONNELL:Nobody really knew who any of us were at the time.
It’s so funny.
He was a man-child.
It was a thrill that I got to meet him after all those years.
We kept saying the Breck Girl, that perfectly coiffed Breck Girl.
AMY LOCANE(Sally Wheeler):I was a girl in the center of all these heartthrobs.
For a girl who went to an all-girls school, it was interesting.
There’s nothing like being in your early 20s when you’re just getting into your career.
There’s so much excitement.
BATINKOFF:Bob had us rehearsing and doing all these acting games.
It never happened, but everybody was bringing their A game to the rehearsals.
Matt was always the strong kid.
MANDEL:Many mornings were spent at football practice.
They had a coach; we worked out plays.
Some were more athletic than others.
FRASER:Oh, I faked most of the football.
I wasn’t that kind of guy with rough-and-tumble sports.
I didn’t like it.
I didn’t like getting hit.
He could have done it for the character, but I just remember that was sort of interesting.
But if the wind blew the wrong way, the smell was so bad.
Brendan stayed at the hotel.
In my memory, Chris was a bit of a clown.
He would make a lot of funny choices.
BATINKOFF:We all bonded.
I mean, we were all very close.
RAPP:I couldn’t see out of the glasses McGoo had to wear.
Have you ever looked through a prism?
That’s what I could see.
I couldn’t see anybody’s face when I was acting with them.
I read for it.
Matt read for it.
Chris, of course, got it.
He lives in Sweden now.
He’s the one I’ve kept up with the most.
RAPP:We filmed the tribunal scene all day long.
Part of my role as an actor is to shine a light on darkness.
If you’re playing a racist or a bigot, you have to go there.
By the end of that day, I really had to go home and stare at the wall.
It just felt so bad to evoke that over and over again, all day long.
Like the line “When you kiss him, does his nose get in the way?”
The film opened at No.
5 and quietly slipped out of theaters a few weeks later after grossing only $14.7 million.
Probably not, so I’m not going to see it."
JAFFE:I was hoping it might’ve opened bigger.
But I didn’t complain.
Sometimes they’re not all winners.
BATINKOFF:We just lacked star power.
If we released that movie today, you know what a monster hit it would be?
But you know what they say: Classic movies never go away.
But I always thought it had real power to it.
But one inch below the surface is the same horrific crap, and that’s what this movie shows.
I’d love it if they rereleased it.
MANDEL:[Before the movie] I took a trip to Andover and Exeter and Choate.
But then I noticed that he sent his children there.
So I said, “How could you send your children to the same school?”
I wanted my children to have those associations."
It’s a story that stuck with me all these years.
These prep schools had skeletons in the closet, which they do now, too.
She told me that she was working in Israel in an outreach program for Israeli kids and Palestinian kids.
And damned if I didn’t feel like I earned a stripe of some kind that day.
