Al Pacino is a legend, and already had been for 20 years by the time “Scent of a Woman” came along. The man was Michael Corleone, for goodness sake. (Although, given he first got the part when he was a young unknown himself, even that was touch and go for awhile.) He’s an icon and a hero in Hollywood, to the point where even Keanu Reeves took a multi-million dollar pay cut just for the chance to work with him. Obviously, getting the second lead in a Pacino headliner was a dream job for every young actor working on “School Ties.” Naturally, basically everyone in the film read for “Scent of a Woman,” and as Robert Mandel noted, it led to some friction on the set. As the director told Yahoo! in a September 2022 interview:
“I did sense a certain friction because they all knew they were up for it. I think they knew who the finalists were and I think there was some friction. I remember they did have to leave the set and come back and we didn’t talk about it a lot, but I could sense something was happening there. And I’m sure they were all testing with Pacino, so that was a big, big deal for them.”
The role in question eventually went to Chris O’Donnell, essentially anointing him the next big Hollywood star. Of course, to some degree, you almost have to wonder if some of the other actors in the cast feel like they might have dodged a bullet by not being launched into the showbiz stratosphere so quickly. After all, O’Donnell may have had the early success, but at least none of the rest of the “School Ties” cast ever had to wear Bat-nipples.
