When Benny Safdie started casting for The Smashing Machine, the indie director faced an interesting problem: who plays Bas Rutten? After all, it’s one thing asking an actor to portray a famous fighter – Dwayne Johnson did precisely that with Mark Kerr. But it’s quite another asking that very fighter to essentially play himself, something Rutten himself found far more complicated than it might seem on the surface.
Bas Rutten Learned Acting Lesson the Hard Way – Being Yourself on Camera Isn’t Easy
The UFC Hall of Famer stepped into his younger self on set, joining Johnson and Emily Blunt for the film based on the 2002 HBO documentary about Kerr’s turbulent rise and fall in late-’90s MMA.