20 facts you might not know about 'A Few Good Men'

When he wrote A Few Good Men, Aaron Sorkin was not yet an established screenwriter. He had never written nor produced a film, and this story did not start as a movie. Instead, Sorkin wrote it as a stage play based on conversations he had with his sister, a naval lawyer.

Employed as a bartender at the time, Sorkin would write ideas for his script for A Few Good Men on cocktail napkins. Then, he would go home and type out the script based on those napkins into the rudimentary 1980s computer he and his roommates had bought.

While Sorkin had never written a screenplay, he had previously seen his plays get produced. One of them, “Hidden in This Picture,” had gotten a write-up in The New York Times. This got producer David Brown interested, and he bought up the film rights to A Few Good Men before it even hit the stage.

Brown got Castle Rock on board to produce A Few Good Men, and Castle Rock honcho Rob Reiner decided to direct. He and Sorkin began turning the stage play into a movie script. Legendary screenwriter William Goldman did an uncredited rewrite, but Sorkin did not mind. He took ideas from the reworked screenplay and inserted them into the stage version.

Among the actors who fought for the meaty role of Colonel Jessup was James Woods, who came close but lost to Nicholson. Nicholson was decidedly well-compensated for his work. Though he shot only 10 days on the film, he was paid $5 million for his performance.

While Nicholson can’t complain about his payday, he found one thing to be annoyed about. The release date for A Few Good Men was December 11, 1992. This happened to be the same day that the movie Hoffa was planned for release. Nicholson starred in Hoffa, so this film effectively became a direct competition to a Nicholson vehicle, which he did not appreciate.

Moore was a known name by the time they were casting A Few Good Men, but she still had to wait for her audition. Waiting is one thing, but Moore was also eight months pregnant. Still, Moore wanted the role of Jo Galloway, and she got it. By the time they were shooting, she was no longer pregnant.

Reiner couldn’t find anybody he liked to play the part of Lance Corporal Dawson, but there was a guy the director felt had the right presence for that role. That was Wolfgang Bodison. The only hangup? Bodison was the film’s location scout who had never acted before and had never thought about acting. Reiner asked him to read for the part, so Bodison got an acting coach. He won the role of Dawson and acted in several other films after that.

Pollak ended up playing the role of Lieutenant Weinberg, and he did a fine job. The original choice, though, was Jason Alexander. Alexander and Reiner figured he’d be free for the part because his TV show would surely get canceled. Then, Seinfeld was renewed, and Alexander could not play the part. Seinfeld would become one of the iconic sitcoms in history, so everything worked out just fine.

For years, there would be murmurings about the inspiration for Tom Cruise’s character of Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee. This includes former JAG lawyers like Don Marcari and David Iglesias. However, in an interview in 2011, Sorkin said that Kaffee is entirely fictional and has no real-life inspiration.

Cruise quoting Colonel Jessup was in the script, but the actor decided to do a Nicholson impression on the spot. Nobody was expecting it, so Moore and Pollak’s reaction in that scene is genuine.

A Few Good Men is laden with big stars and character actors. We haven’t even named Kevin Bacon, Kiefer Sutherland, and Kevin Pollak. However, only one person from the stage play reprised their role in the movie. That is Josh Malina, who plays Jessup’s clerk.

Sorkin would eventually become famous enough that he could play (and parody) himself in shows such as 30 Rock. Of course, as a guy making his debut as a screenwriter, Sorkin wasn’t exactly famous at the time of A Few Good Men. He still got a small cameo in the film as a bragging lawyer in the bar.

Cruise’s Kaffee may not have been based on a real person, but his performance had a real-life inspiration. Apparently, he based his performance on his good friend, David Miscavige. Miscavige is the chairman of the Church of Scientology and is, to put it lightly, a rather controversial individual.

The Department of Defense wouldn’t allow the movie to shoot at Camp Pendleton, the largest Marine Corps base on the West Coast. However, they could get 200 off-duty Marines to perform as extras in the film.

People often like to talk about how often the “f-word” is said in a film. There’s some swearing in A Few Good Men, but the world that gets a real workout in this movie is “sir.” That word, often used by military members, is reportedly said 164 times during the film.

An actor of Nicholson’s stature did not need to provide coverage for his fellow actors, which is to say, read his lines for the takes where the other actors were being filmed, and he was not on screen. He could have done coverage but gone through the motions. Instead, according to Reiner, Nicholson did his iconic monologue several times so Reiner could get coverage on the other actors in the courtroom. Not only that, he gave it his all every single time, and his own coverage was shot last that day.

A Few Good Men debuted on top of the U.S. box office, and it would stay there for the next three weeks. The movie made $243.2 million worldwide from a budget of somewhere in the $30 million to $40 million range.

Out of the impressive ensemble cast, only Nicholson got an Oscar nomination (Best Supporting Actor). A Few Good Men was also up for Best Film Editing, Best Sound Mixing, and Best Picture. It didn’t win any of those awards, though.

Even if you have never seen A Few Good Men, you almost surely know the line, “You can’t handle the truth!” It has permeated pop culture and the world in general. When AFI put together its list of the 100 best movie quotes, that line finished 29th.