Sacha Baron Cohen takes a walk down memory lane as he rewatches scenes from his classic works including 'Borat,' 'Brüno,' 'Borat Subsequent Moviefilm,' 'Les Misérables,' 'Talladega Nights,' 'Disclaimer' and 'Da Ali G Show.' Sacha opens up about cracking his head open while working with Pamela Anderson in 'Borat,' shooting 'Borat Subsequent Moviefilm' through COVID, his "intimidating" experience interviewing Donald Trump and so much more.
All episodes of Disclaimer are available to stream exclusively on Apple TV+.
All episodes of Disclaimer are available to stream exclusively on Apple TV+.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00So it took these guys a long time
00:02to actually storm the stage.
00:04Eventually they did.
00:05One of them pulled a gun
00:07and I was lucky enough to have a security guard
00:10that grabbed the arm of the guy
00:14and whispered in his ear,
00:15it's not worth it, buddy.
00:17Which is apparently what you do
00:17when someone's about to shoot you.
00:19This is your normal Vanity Fair behind the scene though.
00:22Hello, my name's Sacha Baron Cohen
00:24and today I'm gonna be watching some scenes
00:26from my career with Vanity Fair.
00:28["Dangerous Woman"]
00:43My name is Borat Sagdiev.
00:45I'm the son of Bala Sagdiev
00:48and I'm a botox therapist.
00:50In the movie Borat,
00:51the only person who was in on it was Pamela Anderson.
00:56The first time we shot with her,
00:58she had a dog wedding between her
01:00and another celebrity on the beach in Malibu.
01:04And Borat interrupts the dog wedding.
01:07I'm on a raft,
01:08I get pulled in by a jet ski
01:11and I'm playing keytar,
01:13singing this song.
01:14♪ You'll be my wife, I treat you nice. ♪
01:18♪ We will make love whenever I like. ♪
01:22We shot that movie,
01:23he interrupts,
01:24she tells him,
01:25she doesn't know who he is,
01:26he gets bundled.
01:28Again, in a real scene with real people.
01:29And we looked at it and we thought,
01:31we can do better.
01:32That last scene isn't good enough for us.
01:34So we went to the studio,
01:35we asked for more money.
01:37Amazingly, they gave us some.
01:38We came up with this idea of
01:41Borat has this marriage sack
01:44and he's going to stick it over Pamela Anderson
01:46and that will mean that she is married to him.
01:48Will you marry me?
01:50Oh, no thanks, I'm sorry.
01:52No, agreement not necessary.
01:54Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
01:58Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
02:02And everyone is real in this,
02:03obviously apart from myself,
02:05Ken DeVitian playing Azamat,
02:07and Pamela Anderson who are all in on it.
02:09Everyone else, they're real fans.
02:11We shot the scene twice in one day.
02:13The first time, the fans didn't do anything.
02:15I stick her over my shoulder,
02:17no one did anything.
02:18And this time they get involved
02:20and I've got her over my shoulder
02:22and actually I bumped into Pamela Anderson
02:24on Saturday night at some event
02:26and she said, I got to tell you something,
02:28which was when you span around,
02:30I hit my chin
02:33and there's a bit of bone floating around since that day.
02:36She told me one time, she goes,
02:37I'm going to show the movie to Kid Rock
02:40and I said, all right, tell me how it goes.
02:42It was a little private screening in Malibu
02:43with a bunch of Hollywood types.
02:45I said, how did it go?
02:46And she said, we're getting divorced.
02:48And I went, ha ha.
02:50She said, no, we're actually getting divorced.
02:52She filed for divorce the next day
02:54and put reason for divorce.
02:56She wrote Borat.
02:57Pamela, where?
02:59Pamela, I will give you your own flower.
03:02When we run out, there were some security guards.
03:05They'd just come back from Iraq
03:07and they were told to just take me down.
03:09They tackled me and I cut my head open, actually.
03:12So that was the only real time that I got injured.
03:15So in retrospect, me and Pamela
03:17both got injured in that scene.
03:19It was a little worse.
03:20Pamela, I am not attracted to you anymore.
03:25Not.
03:26["Straight Day"]
03:32Straight day, straight day.
03:40Yes, so Bruno was a dangerous movie to make.
03:44First time we shot this, my assistant comes in, Lutz.
03:48I say, does any of you want to fight?
03:50Come on.
03:51And he comes in to fight Straight Dave.
03:54And we have a fight and I start beating him up.
03:56He's got blood capsules.
03:58It looks pretty realistic.
03:59We'd rehearsed the fight.
04:01And the audience stopped booing.
04:02Why?
04:03Because I looked like a tough guy
04:05who knew about ultimate fighting.
04:06He looked like a nerd who comes in
04:09and I beat him up fair and square.
04:11And I got too into character.
04:13I kind of lost sense of what I was meant
04:15to be doing legally.
04:16And I challenged anyone in the audience to a fight.
04:19Come on.
04:20And if you want to fight, come in here.
04:22I'll kick the shit out of you.
04:23I was instructed by my lawyer,
04:25whatever you do, do not incite a riot.
04:27And I see this huge guy stand up
04:29and he runs towards the cage.
04:31And I'm like, this is fine.
04:32I'm going to be protected.
04:33You know, I got the security guards.
04:34I go, wait a minute, where are the security guards there?
04:36Where are they?
04:37Where are they?
04:38Where are they?
04:39I see they're right down at the other end of the arena.
04:41The fight had been broken out.
04:43This guy jumps, grabs hold of the cage,
04:46does a flip, lands in front of me.
04:48He's like a six foot eight, super tough UFC fighter.
04:53And he roars.
04:54And luckily, we had built a trap door in this cage.
04:58There was debate as to whether we should build a trap door.
05:01And I had a bodyguard who'd just come back from Afghanistan
05:04and the code word was go, go, go.
05:06And I realized with Larry Charles,
05:07the problem was that it looked like I was too dominant.
05:10And we shoot the same scene another time.
05:13This time, we put fake barbed wire at the top of the cage
05:19because that would psychologically inhibit people
05:21from jumping in.
05:23And also we zip tie all the chairs down.
05:27I redid the scene.
05:28And so what happens was I turn around
05:30and Lutz attacks me from behind.
05:33He plays dirty.
05:34And so the crowd are on my side.
05:36Then I fight him.
05:37Then I beat him up.
05:38There's blood pinning back.
05:41The crowd are on my side.
05:43Then I kiss him.
05:50What I noticed was when people were homophobic
05:53and they found out my character was gay,
05:55they would often threaten violence
05:58and sometimes become violent.
06:01And so we're making out on the floor
06:04and suddenly I see one metal chair fly in.
06:06I'm thinking, how the hell did that happen?
06:08Somebody brought in a knife
06:09and started sawing through the zip ties.
06:13And I hear, go, go, go.
06:15I go, run out.
06:17And we fortified the sides of this trap door
06:19in this tunnel that we'd built.
06:21And you see in the wide a bunch of the crowd
06:25trying to break into the tunnel.
06:27There's a car with the door open that's running.
06:30We drive and we get out of there.
06:32We basically wrote this movie as if it was a rom-com.
06:37And instead of it's being a ball game,
06:39you know, where everyone's cheering when they kiss,
06:41the idea would be to make them rather upset.
06:50I wrote this song with my two best buddies.
06:56Yeah, very nice.
07:01Obama was a traitor.
07:03America behaved.
07:06For the band in this scene, we hired.
07:08They knew what we were going to do.
07:10And for this scene, actually,
07:13is one of the two times in Borat's subsequent movie film
07:17that I wore a bulletproof vest.
07:18This was a gun rally.
07:20A lot of people had semi-automatics.
07:22And so I was advised by my security guard
07:25to wear a bulletproof vest.
07:27I said to him, well, what happens
07:29if they start using these semi-automatics?
07:32And so he built an amplifier,
07:34which you can see on the left
07:36that is basically pretty much bomb-proof.
07:39And the idea was, if they really started shooting,
07:41I would jump behind the big amplifier
07:44and then security would come and get me,
07:46take me to a waiting ambulance and get me out of there.
07:48Dr. Fauci, what we gonna do?
07:51Infected with the flu.
07:54Infected with the flu.
07:56Infected with the flu.
07:58This was in the middle of COVID.
07:59We were the first movie to go out during COVID to shoot.
08:02So we were experimenting
08:04with how to stop the virus spreading.
08:07And actually the second day of filming,
08:09half the crew had COVID.
08:10Despite us taking around, we had a testing machine
08:13that was like a huge 1980s photocopier,
08:17but they'd forgotten to supply us with two parts.
08:19So it would take three days for a result.
08:22So we'd shoot and then three days later we realized,
08:24oh, five people had COVID in there.
08:27And pretty soon we were just shooting
08:29with regular TV cameramen from the local area.
08:33And these people here didn't believe in COVID.
08:35They believed it was a liberal hoax
08:37and they believed that it started in China.
08:39They called it the Wuhan flu,
08:40which was a phrase that Trump had used.
08:43And the reason I did this scene was I wanted to demonstrate
08:48that these lies and conspiracies ultimately
08:51would lead to violence.
08:52So this kind of fun country and Western song
08:56that's actually written by my brother,
08:57it was all about injecting people with the Wuhan flu.
09:01And it was warning really about that,
09:04saying that lies fed to good people
09:07will actually lead to good people committing heinous acts.
09:12Who wants to chop them up like the Saudis do?
09:14Yeah!
09:17Journalists, what we gonna do?
09:19Chop them up like the Saudis do!
09:22There was a member of Black Lives Matter
09:26who went undercover into this crowd
09:28because there was a rivalry between these two groups.
09:31And that person recognized me
09:32and went, oh, Sacha Baron Cohen, it's Borat.
09:35People started storming or trying to storm the stage.
09:39What they didn't realize was we had actually paid
09:42for the security for the event
09:44through a right-wing super PAC that we'd created.
09:49And so it took these guys a long time
09:52to actually storm the stage.
09:53Eventually, they did.
09:55One of them pulled a gun and I was lucky enough
09:58to have a security guard that grabbed the arm of the guy
10:03and whispered in his ear, it's not worth it, buddy,
10:06which is apparently what you do
10:07when someone's about to shoot you.
10:09And then I was escorted out, went into a waiting ambulance
10:13and the security guard said, let's go, go, go, go!
10:16Shut the door, let's go!
10:17And I see the director, Jason Walliner, running
10:20and he's being chased by some of these guys with guns.
10:24And my security guard said, we can't,
10:25I said, let's wait for him.
10:26He goes, we can't, let's go, go, go, go!
10:28And I decided to wait for him.
10:31Jason jumps in, we close the doors and we're surrounded.
10:35And I say to the security guard,
10:36I say, the doors are closed, right?
10:38You've locked all the doors.
10:39He goes, yeah, absolutely.
10:40At that point, one of the doors gets pulled open
10:43and they start trying to pull me out.
10:45Through pure physics, I grab onto the door
10:47and use my legs to push against their pulling
10:51and managed to close the door,
10:54then chased by a bunch of guys.
10:55I was hiding out in an Airbnb nearby in Tacoma
10:59and they found out where I was.
11:02And then really I was changing venue every night
11:06because these guys who were very connected in the area
11:09were looking for me.
11:10So that was the last kind of week of Borat 2.
11:14It was quite intense.
11:22Welcome, monsieur.
11:23Sit yourself down and meet the best innkeeper in town.
11:30As for the rest, all of them crooks,
11:34rookings, guests and cookings and books.
11:38This is Master of the House from Les Miserables.
11:41I loved this musical from when I was a kid.
11:44I saw it in the West End in London
11:46and Tom Hooper asked me to do this movie.
11:49I couldn't because I was shooting
11:51Dictator at the time.
11:52So I said, the only way I'll do it
11:53is if you do it right at the end of the shoot.
11:56And he says, all right,
11:57you've got this big scene, Master of the House.
12:00It's a really complicated scene.
12:01And he said, listen, would you choreograph it
12:05while I'm filming and at the end of every day,
12:07show me what you've got.
12:08So I kind of worked as a kind of assistant for him
12:11and he'd shoot, I'd show him what we had.
12:14It was a really complicated scene of how we steal stuff
12:18and we had to actually affect the set
12:21and where stuff would go into.
12:23And then we kind of worked together.
12:24He was completely into collaboration.
12:26I'm better if I collaborate.
12:28If I surround myself with great people
12:30who are a lot smarter than me,
12:32they'll think of great ideas.
12:33They'll come up with stuff.
12:35And it's that creative process.
12:37I'm not a auteur.
12:39I'm not a solo guy who sits in a room.
12:41I'm someone I need to vibe off people.
12:43Master of the House,
12:45keeper of the zoo,
12:46ready to relieve them off a zoo or two,
12:49ordering the wine, making up the way,
12:52picking up their knickknacks when they can't see straight.
12:55It got to a week before this scene
12:58and because Tom Hooper insisted on everyone singing live,
13:02you know, most musicals are prerecorded.
13:05This one was sung live.
13:08And I'd done that once before on Sweeney Todd,
13:12where I sang a few takes live and then used it.
13:15I told Tom Hooper that and he was like,
13:17let's do that for the whole movie.
13:18We were singing 10 hours a day and I lost my voice.
13:21So I went on voice rest.
13:23That means you don't speak for a week, anything.
13:26You don't even whisper.
13:27This was the first time I opened my mouth
13:30and the first time I'm singing
13:31and my voice is really croaky and I kind of hate it.
13:35And I said to Tom Hooper, I go, I'll record it today,
13:38but obviously we're going to redo my voice.
13:41Unfortunately, he used the croaky Husky voice.
13:45I suppose it gives me this kind of criminal feel to it.
13:48♪ Everybody raise your glass ♪
13:51♪ Raise it up the master's ass ♪
13:54♪ Everybody raise your glass to the master of the ass ♪
14:08You have set me free.
14:11And for that, I thank you.
14:15I will never shake your hand, ever.
14:21But I will give you this.
14:32So this is an interesting scene.
14:33This kiss here was actually an idea that I had.
14:37I went up to Adam and I said, listen,
14:39I've got this idea that they kiss at the end.
14:42And then I say, sir, you taste of America.
14:45And he said, I don't know.
14:47And I go, please, I think, can we try it?
14:49He goes, all right, we'll try it.
14:50We'll give you one.
14:51So we did it.
14:52Adam loved it.
14:53The crowd actually booed at the time because we had,
14:56I think we actually shot it in Talladega
14:58and they were like, what the hell?
15:00You know, which actually just egged me on to do it longer.
15:03Adam McKay always says,
15:05this is why it's always worth shooting an alt,
15:08an alternative to a scene.
15:10I was so happy that this got in.
15:13Sir, you taste of America.
15:19And just a little thing.
15:20That voice that I'm doing,
15:22it's based on my old clown teacher,
15:24Philippe Golier, who speaks like this.
15:26You are on the chair of the bad student.
15:29You are not funny.
15:31You sit on the chair of the bad student.
15:34I was like, I need an accent for this guy.
15:36And I used Philippe's.
15:38So Philippe, that was yours.
15:43Hey.
15:44Hey.
15:45Get off him.
16:04Oh God.
16:06And this scene here was a 14-page scene,
16:10which is a lot, particularly for someone like me,
16:14who hasn't done that many scripted movies.
16:17And Alfonso Cuaron, the incredible director
16:20who's done Gravity, Tumama Tambien,
16:23and one of the better, Harry Potter's,
16:25he said, you know, I want this to be shot in one.
16:30In other words, no cuts, you can't stumble.
16:33And so I was a little bit intimidated.
16:35I said, do we really need, can't we cut around?
16:37And he said, no, cutting, I can't do the accent,
16:39and cutting is an act of violence.
16:42We basically shot this scene in one go each time,
16:4514 minutes, again and again and again.
16:49After about 11 takes of it, that's 11, 14,
16:53I don't know, what, 154,
16:55two and a half hours of performance,
16:57he says, today was a rehearsal,
16:59tomorrow we do the scene.
17:01So it was exhausting, because you're seeing this,
17:03I'm crying, I'm shouting, and now I'm looking at it,
17:06and there are edits, so Alfonso,
17:09what was this bullshit about not editing,
17:11and it being an act of violence?
17:12Should have told me.
17:14I would have done the scene
17:15in one and a half minute sections.
17:17Anyway, I'll carry on watching.
17:18Who else has them?
17:20I don't know.
17:21You don't know?
17:23These could soon be all over the internet.
17:24Sit down.
17:29Look at them.
17:31Who gave you those?
17:32Look at them.
17:33For me, with all the characters,
17:36it always comes from the language.
17:39What words do they use?
17:40What do they say?
17:41What ideas does that indicate about the character?
17:44What's their rhythm?
17:46And then you go into the performance.
17:49What's the accent?
17:51What is the pitch of the voice?
17:53What's the rhythmical style?
17:55Then it's the costume.
17:57What do they wear?
17:58How do they walk?
18:00Are they authentic?
18:02How do they change?
18:03With Robert, when I first read it,
18:05I didn't really understand him.
18:06I didn't understand why he went on this journey.
18:09So I said to Alfonso,
18:11let's work on the character
18:12because I can't play him at the moment.
18:13Together, we went back and forth a lot with the language.
18:17And so I started having a lot of dinners
18:19with upper class guys.
18:21There were people I went to university with
18:23who I'd say who were upper class.
18:25I said, can you organize a dinner
18:26with a bunch of posh twats?
18:29And then I'll observe them get to the dinner
18:33and the guys would say, okay, so we're the posh twats.
18:36What do you want to know about us?
18:37And yeah, that was at the beginning of the process
18:39of trying to find out who he was.
18:41♪♪
18:48What is the most popular thing in the world?
18:52Music.
18:54No.
18:56Tell me.
18:57Ice cream.
18:58This was shot before Donald Trump was president,
19:00long before Donald Trump was president.
19:02I always wanted to interview him.
19:04We go into Trump Towers
19:05and I'm waiting in a room with the director
19:08who you hear off camera, a guy called James Bobin.
19:11And I can hear Trump screaming at the mayor.
19:14We hear him shouting at Giuliani
19:16in the other room on the phone.
19:17And it was kind of intimidating.
19:19And actually, having read up about Trump,
19:23I think he often would do that.
19:24I don't know if Giuliani was ever actually on the phone.
19:27But he came in, you know, he's an impressive guy
19:31and it's intimidating.
19:32And I knew I didn't have long.
19:34He had said to this director, James Bobin,
19:36who's like this good-looking, blonde,
19:39seemingly upper-class guy, he said,
19:41you know, are you interviewing me?
19:42And he said, no, this guy is.
19:44He looks at me, Ali G in the corner,
19:47and I can see Trump's face.
19:48He does not want to be interviewed by Ali G at all.
19:51And so he goes, all right, let's get this over with.
19:54So me idea is what?
19:56To make a drip-proof ice cream.
19:58No, that's a fucking brilliant idea, this.
20:02And so this didn't last long.
20:03It was really about me trying to get funding
20:05for this business scheme of an ice cream glove.
20:07He was pretty upset after it.
20:08Trump came out and criticized me a number of times
20:12after that, and we actually used clips of it
20:14to publicize and promote another TV show I did
20:18called Who Is America?
20:19And we used some of his clips talking about me
20:22and how talentless I am.
20:23And yeah, I had no idea that he was gonna become
20:25president of America.
20:27Okay, is you win or is you win?
20:28Okay, well, it sounds like a good idea
20:30and I hope you make a lot of money.
20:32Good luck, folks.
20:33It's been nice seeing you.
20:34You take care of yourself, okay?
20:35When are you gonna be in on that?
20:36This is fun.
20:37I'm laughing at some of this stuff.
20:38I haven't seen a lot of this stuff since it came out.
20:46Thank you very much for watching.