Charlie Sheen is better known these days for his bad reputation more than his talents as an actor. His ouster from the CBS show “Two and a Half Men” looked to be the end of him, but he has since bounced back and done a plethora of episodes for the FX series “Anger Management.” Still, his bad boy image is impossible for him to shake, and it makes one wonder if he’s always like this on every movie he ever made.
The question of what it was like working with Sheen was brought up when American Cinematheque did a special screening of “Major League” and “Major League II” at the Aero Theatre. In those movies Sheen played Cleveland Indians star pitcher Ricky “Wild Thing” Vaughn, and it remains one of his best and most enjoyable roles. Among the guests at this screening were writer/director David S. Ward, Tom Berenger and Corbin Bernsen, and each described their memories of working with Sheen.
Ward, who wrote and directed the first two “Major League” movies, described Sheen as being “the consummate pro” on set and that he showed up every day on time.
“He knows his lines, he gives everything, he very seldom goes up on a line, he’s very generous with the actors and they all love to work with him,” Ward said about Sheen. “I can’t say enough about him.”
Ward even remembered a time while making “Major League II” when Sheen had a scene with David Keith who played the overly cocky Jack Parkman. It was a scene where Sheen was pitching to Keith, and it turns out that Keith had lost his contact lenses and was seeing two baseballs instead of the one being thrown to him.
“I was trying to get a shot of him (Keith) hitting a ball that looked like it got in the air enough to get out of the stadium,” Ward said. “Well he (Keith) was seeing two baseballs coming at him, and Charlie threw him 128 pitches. And I said ‘Charlie let’s stop, we can do this tomorrow, we can do this some other day’ and he said ‘no, no, no let’s do this. I’m warmed up, let’s do this.’ 128 pitches, never complained, and it took us that many for Keith to hit one in the air! That’s the way Charlie was. He gave everything, he loves baseball, he loves to play baseball, he’s a terrific baseball player, and he’s got a great arm and throws hard.”
Berenger, who had previously worked with Sheen in Oliver Stone’s “Platoon,” recalled playing ball with him at Santa Monica High School before “Major League” began filming.
“He threw ten pitches and out of the ten one was a little outside and nine were right on the corners of the strike zone,” Berenger said. “That’s how much control he had, and he was fast too. We went down and did batting practice with the Savannah Cardinals which was a minor league team at the time, and I warmed up one of the pitchers and he threw 94 miles an hour. And I’m guessing Charlie was about 88-89 miles an hour.”
Bernsen ended up telling this story of when Sheen was working on “Major League II.” One day Sheen found out his hotel room had been robbed, and among the items stolen were his wallet, his Walkman (remember those?) which he always had on him and his gun.
“Charlie had just flown in one of 15 women that had come in during the shoot. Charlie is Charlie, he’s still professional but Charlie is Charlie,” Bernsen said. “I got pretty close with him and I remember him saying ‘f-k! I don’t care about my wallet, I don’t care about my Walkman, they took my f—ing gun! Whatever happens I just don’t want that to get out!'”
“So he and his girlfriend and I walked from the hotel across this walkway because he’s got to find another Walkman to do tomorrow’s shoot with because he likes to have his music,” Bernsen continued. “And he’s gonna go into the appliance store to buy a Walkman and always going ‘I don’t care about the money and I don’t care about the Walkman. Don’t mention the f—ing gun!’ And we walk into this department store into the appliance section back in the old days where they had a hundred TVs on the same station. The news was on and as we entered the department, ‘breaking news: Charlie Sheen was robbed while in town making Major League. Among the things stolen was his gun…’ And I just saw him freeze.”
Whether this adds or takes away from all those crazy stories we’ve heard about Charlie Sheen over the years, it also shows him to be far more professional than we ever give him credit for at certain points in his life. Sheen’s performance in the “Major Leagues” was no fluke, and if Ward and company are serious about making another movie in the future with these characters, they would be incredibly foolish to not include Sheen in it.
Related articles:
David S. Ward Looks Back at Making ‘Major League’
Tom Berenger on Playing Catcher Jake Taylor in ‘Major League’
Corbin Bernsen on Playing Roger Dorn in ‘Major League
