Kevin Bacon seems to have cleared up a mystery surrounding the ending to Footloose.
Bacon played the lead role in the 1984 film, which follows students in a Chicago town that bans rock’n’roll music and dancing.
The uplifting final scene sees Bacon’s rebellious Ren lead the characters in a prom dance together to the film’s title song, performed by Kenny Loggins.
However, in a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, Bacon revealed that Footloose’s original ending was far less joyous and had to be completely changed – and the revelation seems to have resolved a long-standing mystery about the final scene.
Describing the original ending, Bacon said: “I run into the place, I say, ‘Let’s dance!’ and there’s like a moment of dancing, and then right away, it goes into slow motion.
“There’s glitter falling from the sky, and everyone is just moving in slow motion. This was the original ending.”
Bacon continued: “The studio tested the movie, and they were like, ‘This doesn’t work at all; everyone wants to get up and dance at the end of this movie.’”
The actor revealed that it was almost a year before the cast got back together to reshoot the scene, which might explain the absence of Sarah Jessica Parker. Fans fo the cult film have long wondered why she isn’t a part of the final sequence.
“We still kept the ‘Let’s dance!’ and me running down the stairs,” Bacon said, adding: “But from that point on, it was choreographed and L.A. dancers were hired. Chris Penn was out there, and me and Lori [Singer].
“We had to gather the cast together and try to get the hair to match. That was a completely re-shot ending.”
The film was Parker’s second film credit. In the film, she played Rusty, the best friend of Penn’s character, Willard.
