The January issue features a new and very detailed look into the making of The Blues Brothers. Part fond remembrance, part cautionary tale, and part "Jesus H Christ, seriously. You seriously did all that," it delivers absolutely delicious — and absolutely tragic — stories from Belushi's friends, family and former coworkers about that film's troubled production. We've culled a few choicer nuggets from the online preview:
* The '70s were even more decadent than we think. According to Dan Aykroyd, "We had a budget in the movie for cocaine for night shoots" during the making of The Blues Brothers. And just like that, films like Zardoz suddenly begin to make more sense.
* Belushi's drug problem had gotten so out of hand that they actually asked Carrie Fisher - Carrie Fisher! - to keep him from consuming. I wonder if they also asked Chevy Chase to keep Dan Aykroyd from making bad decisions about the roles he intended to take during the late '80s and early '90s.
* Belushi and Robert Downey, Jr. have a lot in common: Apparently Belushi disappeared from the set one night, and Aykroyd found him at a nearby home where, the homeowner told him, Belushi had just showed up, raided the man's fridge like it wasn't even a thing, and passed out on the couch.
Obviously, this thing just became required, end-of-the-year reading. It goes without saying also that we're very glad this kind of addiction is no longer enabled so blatantly.
[Source: Vanity Fair]