ROMULUS, MI – He traveled the globe with Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo in the 1985 hit comedy, “National Lampoon’s European Vacation.” We caught up with Jason Lively, the actor who played the second Rusty Griswold in the movie franchise.
Lively is in Michigan this weekend at the inaugural Motor City Legacy horror convention taking place at the Sheraton in Romulus, located at 8000 Merriman Road, through today, March 20, 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Tickets can be purchased here or at the door. The event features a film festival, artists and vendors and celebrity guests and panels.
One of Lively’s favorite movie roles came one year after “Vacation” when he starred in the cult classic, “Night of the Creeps.” Lively says he loved making this film because he got to shoot a flame thrower.
“Who wouldn’t want to kill zombies,” Lively told us with a grin on his face. “This is way before CGI. So, it (the flamethrower) was real. It was a blast. They’re great props, great effects. Makeup. Old school.”
Lively says he loved making “European Vacation.” He just doesn’t have any trinkets from the set. Not even the infamous Rusty beret.
“They didn’t let me keep anything. Chevy, anything he got, he stole. He kept his pig costume. I wanted the white leather. I’d be rolling that right now (laughing). I did an Old Navy commercial years back. All of us did. They recreated the beret. I definitely snagged that one. I was older and wiser.”
Lively does say he has great memories filming the movie and says it was amazing to be able to travel the world as a 16-year old.
“Doing it with Chevy at that time when he was just the funniest man on the planet, it’s real easy to get spoiled. If I could travel like that all of the time, I certainly would. It’s not bad rolling with the big Warner Bros. high dollar film and being a kid. It was a magnificent experience. I got to do things that hardly anyone gets to do, no matter how old.”
If you don’t make it out to Motor City Legacy on its final day today, Lively will also be making an appearance at Steel City Con next month in Pittsburgh as part of a “Vacation” reunion with Chase, D’Angelo, Randy Quaid, Anthony Michael Hall, Dana Barron and Ethan Embrey.
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