The bear scene in ‘Anchorman’ was a lot more dangerous than it should have been

Writer-director-producer Judd Apatow stopped by for a thorough and enlightening appearance on Christina Applegate and Jamie-Lynn Sigler’s MeSsy podcast this week, and spun many yarns about his life and career. (He and Sigler bonded about growing up out on Lawn Guyland, and such cultural treasures as the Walt Whitman Mall.)

Naturally the conversation turned to Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, the legendary 2004 comedy in which Applegate costarred, and the first powerhouse Apatow production of the era. Early in the chat, he teases, “We really should tell the bear story” and, after some conversational culs-de-sac, they claw their way there.

As you probably recall, there’s a scene in Anchorman where Applegate’s character is shoved into a bear enclosure at the zoo, and Will Ferrell and the gang charge in to rescue her. Much ursine comedy ensues. But it wasn’t all laughs while they were making the movie.

After Applegate said she actually got in trouble with the animal trainers for telling a version of this story to David Letterman, Apatow declared he was ready for any blowback, then explained that he hates putting any stunts in his projects.

“Most things I’ve done, it’s just two people talking in a restaurant,” the This Is 40 director said.

“We’re doing Anchorman,” Apatow continued, “and it’s supposed to be that you are in the bear enclosure. We’ve been told that these bears, you know, have worked a lot, and they’re very safe, and how they train them is they have this little wire that’s electrified. So when they’re where they live, they won’t ever cross into this wire because they know it’s been electrified.”

Sounds good so far, but then comes the twist.

“On set,” Apatow said, “they don’t bring the electric wire. They bring string because they think it’s the wire.”

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That’s where Applegate interjected, “I thought it was f—ing wire. You’re telling me now it was just string??! I’m suing. I’m suing everyone.”

Apatow continued, saying that even on the day, he wondered why they needed to actually put his actress in the enclosure. Couldn’t they just cut around it, match it in the editing? But everyone said the lighting wouldn’t match and he confessed, “We’re morons, you know? We haven’t made a lot of movies. We don’t know how to handle these things.”

When it came time to shoot, Apatow said, “Suddenly one bear just starts scratching the ground, like, I’m not happy right now. And then another bear on the other side starts doing the same thing, and they both look like they’re gonna charge you or each other. It’s bubbling up. And then suddenly, the one bear, like, takes a step to do whatever it’s going to do — and the trainer stepped in, and it instantly jumped back. It was the scariest thing just to witness.”

Applegate was more blunt.

“The trainer picked me up over his shoulder and ran me out of the enclosure because he was afraid the bear was going to kill me,” she said.

Apatow then explained how, after a great deal of freaking out, Applegate finished her day’s shooting like a champion.

Meanwhile, Applegate said she’s somewhat blacked the whole thing out, but she does remember getting one of the first video flip phones as a gift from the production, and it came bundled with jokey apologies of bear attacks.

Apatow then shared that some years later, Ferrell made the basketball comedy Semi-Pro, and that, too, had a scene with a bear in it.

“It’s like a halftime show thing, but they have a bear,” he explained, before adding, “A year or two later, that bear killed its trainer.”

He concluded, “Life is crazy, and we’re all morons.”

For all the “don’t work with bears” messaging of the podcast, Apatow did confess that he had to fight like hell with the studio to shoot the bear scene in the first place.

“We had to have a meeting with the head of of DreamWorks,” he said. “[He] didn’t understand the concept of the joke. [Director Adam] McKay and I had to go in and do a 45-minute meeting explaining why bears are funny, and bears’ role in the history of comedy. And at the end, we didn’t convince him. He just ran out of gas at fighting us and and allowed Adam to do it.” 

For more strange tales from Hollywood, check out Apatow’s chat on MeSsy at the link below.