James Cameron Admits To Being High On Ecstasy While Writing The Plot For 'Terminator 2'

Do you ever wonder how some of the greatest screenwriters get their inspiration? Everyone has something that works for them. Authors and screenplay writers alike have been known to work until very late into the night. There are some people that like to be outdoors. There are certain plot lines though where audiences come out of the theater thinking the writer must have been high when writing this.

It turns out that was exactly the case for famed director James Cameron. The Titanic and Avatar director had a sit down with The Ringer, to commemorate 30 years since the release of the Terminator 2 movie. He talked candidly about how we came up with the screenplay.

DEA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

In the interview, Cameron detailed that a pivotal character in the movie, John Conner, came about when he was writing notes for the film while high on ecstasy. Picture this, Cameron is super high writing notes for the film, and all of sudden Sting's song "Russians" comes on. Cameron details that a particular line in the song that reads, 'I hope the Russians love their children too.' is what inspired him to add the boy's character in the movie. On the out of body experience, he mentions,

"I thought, 'You know? The idea of a nuclear war is just so antithetical to life itself, ... that's where the kid came from."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHylQRVN2Qs

When most fans remember Terminator 2 they probably recall Arnold Schwarzenegger saying "Hasta la vista baby." What Cameron recalls though is that he wasn't going to go forward with the second installment in the franchise if Linda Hamilton who plays Sarah Conner was not on board. Possibly already with the idea of bringing John Connor into the film in place, Cameron mentions this about his conversation with Hamilton.

"I called her up and I said, 'Look, they want to pay us a lot of money to make a sequel. Are you in or are you out? But just between you and me, I don't really want to do it if Sarah doesn't come back"

TriStar Pictures, Paramount Pictures, and/or the graphic artists, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Cameron did not make it clear in the interview if he still goes on those trips to a land far far away sponsored by Ecstacy and Sting. He did take some time though to talk about the "deeper meaning" behind the films in the Terminator franchise. In the interview, he recalled that the films were not about the machines, but the people. While adding that the main idea was to talk about people's tendency to become machines. If he was thinking about that in the late '80s and early '90s he probably thinks we're way past Judgment Day today!

Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

If someone is admitting that they thought of an idea that ultimately made them millions of dollars while high the tendency should be to believe them outright. As to why Cameron wanted to bring back Linda Hamilton, that was probably due to the fact that he had a major crush on her way back when.

The two worked together on the film franchise in the early '90s, it wasn't until 97 though that they got married. The couple divorced in 1999. It's not quite clear if Ecstacy or Sting had a hand in the way that this story ended!