Over the course of his career, Dwayne Johnson has become one of the biggest action stars on the planet with an Instagram game to die for, and some fans even want him to run for president. But it wasn’t always like that — at the turn of the century, he was but a humble professional wrestler. Okay, he was never a humble one, because anyone who saw The Rock in his WWF and WWE heydays will know that he was brash and bold with the power to back it up.
That charisma got him a part in The Mummy Returns, and the potential in Johnson was clear for all to see, especially for directorChuck Russell, who helmed Johnson’s first-ever leading role in that movie’s spin-off, The Scorpion King. Speaking with Collider for the 30th anniversary of Eraser as part of our retrospective series Collider Rewind, Russell reflected on directing Johnson and said he knew from their very first meeting that the performer had what it took to carry a film.
“Oh, I knew that just meeting him for the first time. He was very passionate about doing a great job. Dwayne is a real champ. He’s a sweetheart. Everyone will tell you that. Even at this point in his career, he has big heart. I can’t say enough good things. Also about Arnold [Schwarzenegger]. Arnold’s more naturally competitive. [Laughs] It’s true. Look at his documentaries and things: that’s Arnold. Dwayne is an incredibly passionate actor and performer. He’s got a very good heart. He always has time for everybody on a set.”
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz Which Action Hero Would Be Your Perfect Partner? Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn’t work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
01
You’re dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
03
You’re pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
07
Things go badly wrong and you’re captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn’t replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn’t know you had.
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
10
It’s the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
Dwayne Johnson Was Already Performing Before He Became a Movie Star
Russell told Collider that part of what convinced him was that Johnson’s wrestling work had already shown he understood performance, presence, and dramatic rhythm. The way Johnson would cut promos as The Rock in the middle of the ring showed that he had command of an audience, and that would easily translate to a scene.
“So, we were doing rehearsals, Dwayne and I, just in a conference room, ‘What will it be like when red ants are coming at you?’ He would literally do these crazy improvs with me,” laughed Russell. “I just wanted to warm him up, and ‘This is what we’re doing.’ The truth is, what he was doing for WWE, or WWF at the time, was so dramatically performative — his monologues were mind-blowing — so I knew he was capable. And the fact that he had a desire to be a good actor and a good lead actor in a movie, I was very confident in him, and he lived up to it 100%.”
The Scorpion King wasn’t a massive box office smash, but given that it was led by — at the time — a relatively unproven lead actor, and was a spin-off from a much bigger franchise, without that franchise’s stars, it proved to be a very solid first leading vehicle for Johnson, earning around $178 million off a budget of $60 million. It may not have set records, but The Scorpion King proved Johnson had the star power to lead a movie.
Stay tuned for more on Eraser‘s 30th anniversary and our full chat with Russell for Collider Rewind.
