The Waterboy
Short description
The Waterboy centres on Bobby Boucher, a thirty-one-year-old water boy for a college football team who has spent his life under his mother's control. Mocked by players and overlooked by coaches, Bobby loses one job and finds another with the Mud Dogs, a team stuck in a long losing run. When he finally stands up to the players tormenting him, his pent-up anger turns him into a ferocious tackler, and the team's new coach, Klein, wants him on the field. Bobby's mother is firmly against it, and his past and academic record complicate any chance of playing.
Frank Coraci directed the film, his second feature after The Wedding Singer, both released the same year. Adam Sandler stars as Bobby and co-wrote the screenplay with Tim Herlihy; the cast includes Kathy Bates as Mama Boucher, Henry Winkler as Coach Klein, Fairuza Balk, Jerry Reed and Lawrence Gilliard Jr., with 53 credited cast and 98 credited crew. Produced by Touchstone Pictures, it runs 90 minutes.
Made for a budget of 23 million dollars, it earned 186 million worldwide, a strong return for a comedy of its scale. On IMDb it holds 6.2/10 from about 191,000 votes and on TMDB 6.1/10 from around 2,100 votes, while a critics' rating stands at 4.5/10 from 74 reviews, so audiences rated it more generously than critics did.
What's left behind the scenes
- Henry Winkler was offered the role of the coach after Adam Sandler mentioned him in his song "The Chanukah Song" (1994) alongside other actors of Jewish or half-Jewish descent. Sandler stated (and was correct) that the role of Arthur Fonzarelli in the series "Happy Days" (1974-1984) was played by a Jew, and Winkler called him to confirm that this was indeed the case. Sandler asked him to read the script for the upcoming film to see if he would agree to play the coach, Winkler read the script and immediately agreed.
- Filming of the football field took place on the school stadium in Deland, Florida. The school administration agreed to allow the field to be used for filming on the condition that director Frank Coraci would pay for an update of the entire stadium upon completion.
- According to LaVar Arrington of the New York Giants, Adam Sandler observed his training sessions while preparing for the role.
- Adam Sandler wanted to cast a well-known country singer as the main villain. For some time, director Frank Coraci considered offering the role to George Strait, however, Disney Studios immediately rejected this idea because Strait had already starred with Christopher Cain in the melodrama "Pure Country," which was a box office flop. As it happened, Sandler – a long-time fan of Burt Reynolds (1936-2018) – re-watched Hal Needham’s (1931-2013) action-comedy "Smokey and the Bandit" with Reynolds during pre-production and suggested casting Jerry Reed (1937-2008), who played Reynolds’ partner in the film. The studio did not object.
- When Bobby is shown on television, the song "The House of the Rising Sun" is playing in the bar.
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