The 'Revenant' actor was supposed to play David Hasselhoff's on-screen son, but the older actor nixed Leo's casting.
- Jul 3, 2016
AceShowbiz - Ahead of the upcoming "Baywatch" movie, original producers Michael Berk and Douglas Schwartz revealed some behind-the-scene stories about the 90s TV show. They told The Hollywood Reporter that 15-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio was initially cast on the show but David Hasselhoff vetoed the casting.
Leo was supposed to play Hasselhoff's on-screen son. "We actually had DiCaprio ready to be cast," said Berk. "But David thought he was too old to play his son," Schwartz explained. "David thought it would make him look older. He had a lot of concerns of that type." Jeremy Jackson, then 9, eventually landed the part.
Hasselhoff also didn't want Pamela Anderson on the show, but the producers were persistent. "David said, 'I don't want a girl that's been in Playboy,' " Berk recalled. "He said, 'Children watch this show.' " However, Schwartz believed the actor was just afraid the busty blonde would steal the show. "She had these enormous breasts," he said, "and David thought he would be upstaged by everyone looking at her breasts. Which is what happened."
Another cast member who felt intimidated by Anderson was Nicole Eggert. "She felt a little bit competitive with Pam," Berk opened up. "She had a beautiful athletic body but didn't have big boobs at all. Maybe she was feeling a little bit of pressure. There was a holiday weekend and for a couple of days she called in sick afterward. Then she showed up back on the set having gotten a boob job."
"I had already shot scenes with her with small breasts," Schwartz chimed in. "She came in and was wearing a jacket. I said, 'Nicole, you can't wear that. We already shot part of that scene before and you don't have a jacket on, remember?' She wanted to wear that jacket and I couldn't figure out why. And then finally, when she took off the jacket, she had these giant double Ds. I didn't know what to do. I had to put things in front of her and hide her for the rest of the episode."
Last April, Eggert appeared on an episode of "Botched" to get a breast reduction. "If I had to run in that [Baywatch] bathing suit with these boobs, they would be, like, hitting me in the face," she said.
