2020 brings the thirty-fifth anniversary of the action classic COMMANDO, and to mark the occasion Forbes got in contact with Vernon Wells, the actor who memorably played the film's villain Bennett. During their chat, Wells revealed that he wasn't the first choice to play Bennett, but things didn't work out with the person was originally cast and – thanks to producer Joel Silver, who worked with Wells on WEIRD SCIENCE (which also turns 35 this year) – Wells was brought in as the replacement.
I get to set, I’m exhausted and feeling all out of whack, I’m looking sleepy, so Arnold Schwarzenegger looked at me and then told Joel that he didn’t think I was going to work out, he thought I looked like a bit of a pussy. Anyway, we went ahead, and the first scene we did was one where Arnold was chained to a table, and I have to say that line that if I had my way, I’d have cut his throat. Afterwards, the director (Mark L. Lester) walked up to Arnold and asked what he thought and whether they should close down the set and find someone else. Arnold just looked at him and said, ‘Never, ever give him a real knife,’ and that was the end of it. We became very, very good friends from that moment on."
Wells was so impressive as Bennett, he has even been contacted about bringing the character back:
Somebody in the business said to me a while ago that they’re thinking of doing another COMMANDO. I thought they meant a reboot, so I was like, ‘They can’t redo COMMANDO. It’s a classic. It’s so kitsch,’ but they said they’re not planning on redoing it, they’re thinking of doing a prequel and putting me in it. That would work. They were thinking of doing the prequel about where it all started, how the relationship soured between us, how I became the villain, and how Arnie’s character Matrix became the good guy. Rumors are flying around all the time, but it was interesting that somebody was seriously talking about it. And we don’t know for sure that Bennett died. He might not have."
If someone was talking about having Wells and Schwarzenegger reprise the Bennett and Matrix roles in a prequel "a while ago", I have to imagine that it was quite a while ago… unless they want to do the digital de-aging trickery on them.
COMMANDO isn't the only classic property Wells was involved with that he would like to return to. Even though his MAD MAX 2 / THE ROAD WARRIOR character Wez was wiped out pretty hard by the end of that movie, Wells wants to work with MAD MAX franchise mastermind George Miller on another entry in that series.
I’d love to do a part in one of the two MAD MAX movies that he’s written. I spoke to the George about it, and he said, ‘The only problem with putting you in anything is that you made such a success of the character in THE ROAD WARRIOR that it doesn’t matter what you’re doing, people would look at it and see Wez. They would never see whatever the other character was. You kind of spoiled it for yourself that way.’ I guess that means I did a good job, though, right? Anyway, I would love to do even just a little part in it. I adore George because he took a punt on somebody who was a nobody when he could have had anybody on this planet in that film. He plucked me from obscurity and gave me my career. He won’t admit that, by the way, but here we are."
Well, Hugh Keays-Byrne played the villain Toe Cutter in the original MAD MAX and came back to the series thirty-six years later as Immortan Joe in MAD MAX: FURY ROAD, so I don't see why Wells couldn't play a different character in another MAD MAX movie, as long as that character is as different from Wez as Immortan Joe was from Toe Cutter.