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Elisabeth Shue on Back to the Future, Cobra Kai, and Finding Joy in Acting | Fan Expo Dallas 2025
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Jun 26, 2025
Elisabeth Shue joined fans at Fan Expo Dallas 2025 for a heartfelt and humorous Q&A that touched on some of her most beloved roles — from The Karate Kid and Back to the Future to Cobra Kai, Adventures in Babysitting, and beyond. She opened up about: Returning to the role of Jennifer Parker in Cobra Kai What it was like stepping into Back to the Future Part II Why she stepped away from acting to finish her Harvard degree Her thoughts on The Boys and doing bold, unexpected roles The importance of balancing work, family, and joy 🎤 Recorded live at Fan Expo Dallas 2025 📲 Subscribe to @talesfromthecollection for more fan-focused celebrity interviews and panels
View Video Transcript
0:00
[Applause] hello just watch yourself because I've got tendency to wobble and fall on these
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things just watch yourself guys hey this is just me i thought it was going
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to be a Back to the Future panel so I was like what am I actually going to say i was asleep for both of the
0:18
movies so this is kind of shock all right you
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guys happy nonetheless thank you for being here Elizabeth thank
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you of course like do you get a chance when you're doing conventions to blunder the floor yourself well it's funny just
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walking over here i was amazed because we got to walk through the whole convention center and to see everybody
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in costume and how many people show up i mean I'm just so impressed that you guys love movies so much really it's fits on
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for the future of movies that you guys care that much really and and even the movies from the 80s the fact that you
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care about those movies hopefully hopefully make more of those type of
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movies i can't 80s babies any ' 80s babies [Applause]
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'90s movies
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i wanted to ask though when people come up to me of course we're going to talk about Back to the Future i'm sure you
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guys will have some Back to the Future questions but I wanted to ask when you're meeting fans are there any fans
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that talk about roles that actually surprise you from your past any I mean you've been in so many things
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um I'm always impressed when they know the more obscure movies
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like how many of you guys have seen Hamlet 2
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all right so Dish [Music] [Applause] Um yeah so I I'm always impressed that
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uh people care about the movies that are not as popular so that that's always very meaningful to me oh another movie
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that I made that that really matters to me is called Gracie has anyone ever seen that gracie yeah see that was a movie
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based on a little bit based on my life um playing soccer with a bunch of boys in New Jersey um my my husband directed
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it so yeah so there's one person who came up to that that movie meant something to them and then of course them that's crazy yeah it's like it must
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be you know when you start off and you start out as an actor you're not you know starting in the industry going I'm
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going to make a famous movie that is not what you're there to do but you find
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yourself years later talking about certain roles over and over again how does that feel to revisit those roles
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over and over well um it's what's interesting is that my first part was The Karate Kid
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so I kind of slowed it down for about five years doing commercials i was a Burger King girl with Leah Thompson
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um the two of us were dueling Burger King girls for about two years we
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literally would show up and do the same commercials and then they would decide which one was better isn't that terrible
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um anyway so yeah so I did commercials for a very long time thinking that I
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would never actually make it into a movie um and yeah Karate Kid was my first
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like looking back is it like looking at an old photograph on horse is that how it feels when you Yeah well it's so
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incredible just the the journey especially the kid in Cobra Kai um
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that's amazing um the one of the most special
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moments was seeing Ralph Montio for the first time in I think 20 years when I showed up on the set of Corporate High
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standing down the hallway and I saw him and we both went "Oh my god."
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Um so yeah that that was very special it was kind of like a high school reunion and I don't know how many of you guys
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saw my part in Cobra Kai um it's also very emotional there was
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one scene I forget maybe I was saying goodbye or saying how much it meant to me our relationship or something and I
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got teary eyed and I thought "Oh my gosh I didn't I didn't plan that at all it
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was just literally a spontaneous moment." And so we just realized that it is it is an emotional journey all these
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years that you take with these people that mean so much to you so I randomly
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um and I knew I was interviewing you this weekend and uh this popped up on my Amazon Prime it was Hollow Man oh wow i
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was like I got to watch this again i saw it in the cinema when it came out i love Paul Verhov and I wanted to ask him what
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it was like working with Paul Verhov because he's got such a flavor style to
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his films and I I love him what was that like oh he was awesome he's such a good
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director um and I love the cast of Hollivan kevin Bacon is incredible i was
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finding one degree kevin Bacon um Josh Brolan was in it and actually
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the movie that I'm about to start filming um is called Whale Fall and Josh
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Brolan is is one of the the leads in it great so we're going to have a reunion
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that's amazing yeah I just I loved your character in that film when I was re-watching it again I thought you're
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such a badass like such a badass and so like sassy and smart and like going
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watching again but now I actually watched an interview with you where you were talking about being a mother and I
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was wondering if becoming a parent changed just the way you look at roles and being a storyteller basically yeah
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um it definitely taps into your lioness fierce side I would say um one of my
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favorite parts that I've played in the last few years is the boys have
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my desire for revenge I had no idea was very deep inside of him and I very much
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enjoyed all the men that I took down in that
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no I'm just joking but But yeah you definitely there's a fierceness of protectedness that obviously you guys
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all know being parents the way we all love our children so yeah I think it it makes you grow up really fast and it's
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very helpful when you're playing more angry fierce determined people yeah so
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they must be something very cathartic yeah it's very cathartic yeah is there a sort of type of role that you haven't
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played yet that you think I'd like to really get into that and maybe exercise
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some things or exercise something yeah good question i don't know i mean I I
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really feel like I missed out on staying on The Boys although the last season I'm in one scene and um I have a big impact
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on Homelander in my one scene so I did get my revenge on him for killing me
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possibly maybe i don't know um but yeah I think another part like
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battling would be really fun yeah for sure so I feel like you really have a lot of fun with it i really did that was
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one of my favorites do you still because you've been doing this for so long you
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know and when I moved to LA I just I just started doing some acting lessons to understand interviewing people like
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yourself i thought it would give me a sight but I found it like it was like therapy in a way um and you learn a lot
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about yourself when you're doing it do you still learn about yourself even now yes definitely yeah I don't really think
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it's hard to be a a good actor if you're not in some ways pulling from who you
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are and what you've learned and you know I think all of us we all have so many different colors inside of us and so
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many different qualities and each character is just sort of picking like five and really like digging into those
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five and um I think that that's everybody's instrument really how many
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of you guys have acted yeah i mean to be honest to be able to
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come to your parts with authenticity you really have to draw from what makes you
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feel the things you feel towards the people that you know and the relationships you've had and the kind
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the conflicts that you go through and and that that's what makes you most honest I think do you think you would
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still have the same or similar journey now if you were you know a younger actor
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trying to make it now it's quite an interesting landscape now really is I don't know whether yeah you could just
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have your own YouTube channel and or you could act on your own you don't really have to like go through the five years
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of trying to uh get a foothold but I also think that it's changed a bit in
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some ways that I think is too bad for actors is that um when we first started out we would go in and audition in a
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room with the director with the casting director and when I started I didn't get any parts for five years but I made all
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these relationships with people and I think now there's a it's tough because you just self tape and you send these
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tapes and you don't get to benefit from the relationships of people fighting for you um even if you don't get the part so
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definitely it's a little tough now and there's something kind of nice I think about doing something live in front of
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one person or in front of lots of people which is why theater or stuff is is so
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great yeah it's sad that we're all kind of disconnected in the way i know i know
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i know our phones our phones are I know so tough but do you think you if you're
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in your 20ies and I start off do you think you would go down the content creator route and go "Okay I'm going to
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try and create some I I know I would be too shy i was very very shy i I couldn't
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even be in a play i was too nervous to get on stage." So so I know and I I uh I
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think well I grew up with three brothers um I was the only girl and
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I think on a very like primal level I think I needed some attention um and and
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then to be differentiated from my brothers and to be seen as as as my own
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person um so yeah it was just it was so slow you know so that I got comfortable
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and I think that after I learned the art of acting then it really took hold but
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before that it was just fun you know and I think that you have to remember that it is still just fun versus I have this
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career of an actor you know what I mean um so yeah I'm trying to remember that as I get older because it gets tough
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when you get older too different different challenges it is scary pursuing something that you genuinely
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love cuz we are so I think society goes "No don't do that that's scary don't do that." Yeah so you're not really
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encouraged to follow your dreams no it's true and one thing my father always said which is always good advice for
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everybody is um when we were younger if he ever heard us say "I can't do
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something," he would always say "Don't say that don't say that don't ever say you can't do something you just have to
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learn how to do it." I love that yes i love that so um we're going to go to fan
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questions i want to give you guys some time so a round of applause for the first part of this panel
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and we're going to try and get through them all but there is a mic right here and there is a mic all the way over here
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um at the other side of the room um please mind your fellow fans and please stand up and don't be shy if you want to
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ask a question um hello my dear what is your name and what is your question hello my name is Christine glad that
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you're here thank you um my question is you you have been in a lot I I I do
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theater so it's interesting to hear you say you were too shy to do theater but um my question is you have worked with a
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lot of people and I don't know if everyone knows but you you did cocktail with Tom Cruz and you did the same over
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and so um I just wonder is did you learn something uh from all of the co-stars or
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any of the co-stars that you took with you into the next show or or learned a
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behavior and you don't have to say who it was that you said "Oh I'm never going to do that." Or you know was there
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something that you you took from someone else um well working with Tom Cruz was
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definitely a highlight of my career um it was right after Top Gun top Gun had
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just come out my brothers three brothers were obsessed with Tom Cruz my oldest brother Will looked kind of like him so
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um I had major cred when I was working with Tom Cruz but they never came to the
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set very often they were always on the set of Cocktail um so he was lovely he
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was such a committed actor i would say what I learned from him was that he was allin and his dedication to movies and
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giving himself in every scene is like off the charts i don't think anyone can compare to the way he commits um So I
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think that was a great lesson for me and also kindness um he's a very kind person
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um generous so yeah the first few actors you work with if there are people that
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you look up to and respect it kind of keeps motivating you to keep going thank
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you for your question let's go over here what's your name friend hi I'm Tiffany
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um hi Elizabeth hi very nice to meet you nice to meet you um I just wondered
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about your role in leaving Las Vegas um just such a great I mean great film
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great acting great Nicholas Cage and I just wonder if there was any preparation
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that you did to take on that role is seeing that it was so different from anything that you've done before yes um
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yeah that was another very important part of my life for sure um I was so
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blessed that Mike Figus actually could see me in that part which is kind of crazy to think about adventures and
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babysitting and He's leaving leaving Las Vegas but he said that he
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saw something in Adventures in Babysitting that he thought that could do it i don't know i don't know um but
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yeah one of the funny stories from leaving Las Vegas is that I never wear high heels so you can see I still don't
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um and I had to learn to walk in 6inch heels so I would do all of the like
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mopping of the floors in six inch heels like all day long I had to wear them and my husband would come home and see me at
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home with my 6-in heels and go "What is going on?" Um but I I watched a lot of
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movies i was really moved by Jennifer Jason Lee in Last Exit Brooklyn um her
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performance was so stunning and I watched Clute i watched all the women who had done parts that were similar um
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and got a very deep understanding for the kind of like the desperation um inside of of people and also the the
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need for attention as dark as it is um there was a desperation in that to be to
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be seen and I thought that core quality inside of Sarah was was very important
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and Nicholas made it so easy because he was so present and so so um caring and
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so it was so easy to fall in love with him as my character to be able to like
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have the dark dark kind of desperate side of her life and then the need for
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actual human love and the two of them together really was what pulled it what pulled both sides yeah thank you so
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watching that movie there is Andy yes it is hi Andy what's
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your question hi Elizabeth hi you've been in so many different movies I've loved over the years but one of the ones
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I wanted to bring up was Adventures of Babysitting
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can you tell me any like funny stories from the set or anything went on that was fun at the time looked like you had
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a lot of fun was a movie you did have fun wow most of the things I can't really talk about
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no I'm joking um yeah well that movie that was my first starring role um that
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was a very exciting moment to actually get that it was very competitive all the8s girls were up for that movie and
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actually Claudia Wells just told me that she was it was up uh she was up for it and so was BB Kates
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yeah we were all screen testing so there was a big drama trying to get that part
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um oh singing the blues yeah that's up there is uh one of my
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best experiences um yeah not really a singer as you could tell in the movie um
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but to have to play someone who's just singing for the first time was so fun to to have to just perform on the fly
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survive oh I have a funny story too my my father was very upset that I was
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going to say "Don't f with the babysitter." He was so upset he wrote me a long
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letter about why he couldn't say it because kids all over the country would think it
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was okay and we used to have to pay 5 cents for every curse in our family so
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then cut to my first um my my son Miles was five and he saw the movie for the
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first time and what did he do he ran around and said don't ask for the babysitter don't ask for the babysitter
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thank you thanks Aldi hello what's your name my friend girl I am so sorry for a
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Jamie um I'm from Oklahoma but um I drove all the way down here to see my Back to the Future uh people but to
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bounce off of adventures and babysitting um
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I'm not even crying i'm just crying you thought this kid will a Um the song when
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you're at the very beginning when you're singing Oh yeah to do that all the time
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i hear that song i want to drag something over me and just start walking like that to say thank you
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thank you you're a sweetheart applause for G [Applause]
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that really means a lot to me it's really It's very sweet when when any of you guys have any emotional reaction to
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any movie I've ever been in it really means a lot to me thank you
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[Applause] hello there what served me my love hi
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I'm Alicia um in the classroom they call me Miss and I just want to ask you have
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you been in a Pinterest babysitter for stay on the topic um how do you select
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your babysitter and do you Oh my gosh um well I was not a very good
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babysitter first of all really not very good and I think it's because of the pay the pay was so low back then a$150 an
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hour okay i used to like eat everybody's food sneak in and like eat all the good
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cookies um as long as the kids didn't die I was happy
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oh um I'm thinking about my babysitters I've chosen
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wow um I I I basically trust my kids the most
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i've definitely obviously had great great nannies who are babysitters as well but yeah I don't think I've really
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paid much for like the$150 an hour type babysitter possibly because I know the
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adventures that they Okay and your
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dad's tagline from that movie also became um my mother is the oldest of
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nine and so she's got seven sisters and my brother and One of them is the family
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babysitter and they call that the boot camp before preschool so their tagline
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was repeated several times when children got out of hand no way
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that's awesome i love that oh my god that would have been helpful when I was babysitting
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i'm keeping in mind you let's go over here hello my friend
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what's your name jerry drove up from Austin this morning hi hi Jerry hello elizabeth and the
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Saint we really admired the com combination of strength and intellect
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and sweetness throughout that character just wanted to see if there were any stories you remember from Phil
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well you know I originally died in that movie did anybody know that how many people saw The Saint
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[Applause] i originally died halfway or yeah a
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little bit further along about yeah halfway through the movie I was poisoned by the Russian Russian bad guys and then
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Val had to avenge my death for the whole end of the movie and and fans said they
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didn't like that I died well of course that would be so sad but then they're like yeah good thing you took her out so
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then we reshot the whole movie so that I could live which obviously I'm
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very flattered that that happened but I created a character that was supposed to die so she was supposed to be very
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innocent and kind of like this was her big moment and she you know I think on some level when people die young I think
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they live their life as if they don't need all the years that most of us are still here slugging it out you know like
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they they learn the lessons they need to learn so it was just interesting that then I had to live um but yeah but I'm
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still grateful that I lived yeah thank you let's go over here okay um
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name and question please my name is Sam and I got to meet you yesterday and I was I was stupidly starruck and I've
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been coming to these things for 10 years and you're literally the only person I've ever kind of clammed up and didn't
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so I'm curious who you've ever worked with that kind of had you kind of climb up
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wow um Robert Janeiro i was very nervous when I met him um Tom
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Cruz but I got to kiss him right away
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that really helped although that was so surreal i literally auditioned with him and then in the scene
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so that kind of broke the ice um but yeah I would say Tom and Robert Shane
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were and then oh god Nick Cage when I first met him I was very nervous because I I thought "Oh he's not going to think
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that I can play that part." Um who else
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yeah oh Meryill Streep i went to one scene with Mel Street and I was so
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nervous to to meet her yeah she's she's an icon and somebody I've always looked up to thank you we got to leave because
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we're going to be late for some company okay thank you for explaining thank you very
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much um what's your name and what's your question uh my name is Craig and uh I'm
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from Denver so I just wanted to say when before you officially came back on Cobra Guy when we learned that you were a
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doctor in Denver all of my friends thought that was really cool but the question that I had is with all
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the years of acting that you've done is there a particular role that you really wanted that you didn't get oh nice or
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one that you regret turning down um yes
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i I turned down six cents what a stupid idea
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a collectible i love that movie and Tony Klette is
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perfect for that movie so I kind of feel like I turned it down just so that she could be better than I would have ever
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been but that's one movie yeah I think that was I was tired i I I wanted to
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stay home i was in Philadelphia i had all these kind of stupid reasons um but yeah that's that that's the one I think
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of the most and then the most important question Johnny or Daniel
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oh my goodness well Johnny really you know I I was surprised because he's really evolved over the years um so I
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was I was curious about what that might be like so I don't know i don't know if I needed to choose necessarily but I was
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impressed with Johnny's evolution thank you so much i know we have a I
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know you've stood up over there but I just want to We're running out of time so I just want to make sure we get to this friend's question that's okay hello
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my love hi hi I'm so impressed that you want to ask me a question what's your name loud and clear hi my name is Elliot
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Kenfield nice hi Elliot and I really love Karate Kid i actually
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wanted to ask uh how did you actually join the movie
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well um I had to audition with everybody else and then I had to screen test there was like I don't know 20 people or
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something that screen tested um so I was really lucky that I got the part um but you know what my favorite
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part of that movie is breaking when he breaks my radio and I was so angry about
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that my brothers still make fun of me because they said that like I was sort of not acting in that whole part because
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I was punching him really hard and and um Billy still says it was ridiculous how hard I was punching him in that
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scene so that's my favorite part of the whole movie for me because I I feel like I didn't really understand I was acting
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so I always think about that um I think okay that's probably why I got the part because you know when it came down to it
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Ally was very sweet but thank god she had that one moment right where she was
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really really angry i'm so glad you love that movie
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so that you like it now is amazing amazing well I watched to like part two
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i need to watch part three now yeah well I'm not in part two as you know which is
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a little disappointing but um actually the reason why I was not in part two was that I had gone back to
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get my education and I was in college and I didn't want to stop going to
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classes so that's why I didn't show up but the way they wrote me out was not
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cool thank you it looks amazing as well
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now we've got time for two quick questions there is a lady here at the front that's been asking she can't get
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to the mic so I'm going to get to you so if you don't mind Elizabeth I'm going to You know what i'm going to risk it why
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not these middle-aged bees okay hello my dear i'll hold the mang you just you
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just met see what you want to say what's your name um I'm Jane um I'm Yes yeah
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yesterday and um one of the things I didn't say is that in in Karate Kid you
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know that when you guys were at the Family Fun Center I assume that's what it was yes um as an elementary kid
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watching that that was always my ideal date
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and then then when it actually happened in high school somebody took me to the family fun center and we had our
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pictures in the photo booth and everything that was that was the ideal moment so I love I I just wanted to
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share that with you oh thank you thank you those are those are days where you don't even um you don't feel like you're
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going to work you know you're just playing on golf carts or um playing golf
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and stuff yeah those are the days you're like "This is crazy that they pay you to do this right
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thank you very much." Right back okay oh my god hello my friend you have been so
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patient yes it's you um yeah hi what's your name my name is B um I just want to
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ask you you said you you worked with your husband as as the director how was that relationship on the set you know
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were any big names being mentioned or you know um well it went very well thank
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goodness because I was so grateful that he was actually directing a family story and that it was going to be taken such
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good care of so um we only fought every once in a while cuz I don't like when he
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tells me what to do in real life like I'm not up for that so it was hard to get used to the fact that Matthew's the
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director i had to listen to him um but yeah you know a really
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interesting um cool little connection is that my husband Davis
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directed the documentary still about Michael J fox so I was really lucky
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though over the last like three years I've had an excuse to to see Michael uh
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all the different screenings and all the different events and if you haven't seen
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that movie um and you guys obviously love Back to the Future and love Michael you really should see it it's very
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beautiful [Applause]
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elizabeth it's been an absolute pleasure to sit next to you and have a chat thank
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you it's been absolutely wonderful and the fan questions were so wonderful thank you so much thank you so much i'm
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really glad that it was just me attention [Applause]
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elizabeth it's just me i know i had no idea i literally thought it was all the future guys well it's been wonderful you
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sharing your stories and your experience if you didn't get a chance to ask a question it's okay to ask at your table
31:05
yeah of course of course of course yeah I see many of you i can already I recognize a lot of you guys so yeah come
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on over guys please put your hands together go hey hey
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