Nicolas Cage walked so Will Smith could run.
The 59-year-old Hollywood actor has finally revealed the reason he would often be slapped by fans whenever he was at an airport.
Cage, whose real name is Nicolas Coppola, said the bizarre trend was inspired by his 1987 film “Moonstruck,” in which he starred opposite singer Cher.
In the film, Cher slaps Cage’s character.
“For the longest time, back from ‘Moonstruck,’ I would walk to the airport and people just had a habit of saying: ‘Snap out of it!’ from Moonstruck – the Cher ‘Snap out of it’ [line] – and I did get slapped a few times,” he told Entertainment Tonight.
“Oh yeah, I did! And that, you know, it’s part of the job,” he added.
When asked why fans felt the need to raise a hand against the Oscar winner, Cage suspected it was because fans believed there could have been something in it for them.
“I think maybe [they think] I’ll cast them in something. Who knows?” he quipped.
Cage previously revealed that he almost turned down the role — but ultimately agreed to it after making a deal with his agent.
“I made that movie on a deal with my then-agent Ed Limato. I was desperately trying to get him to say yes to me doing ‘Vampire’s Kiss,’” he told USA Today in 2021.
“He said, ‘No, you’re not going to wear those stupid plastic things. I want you to look handsome! Do “Moonstruck!”‘ And I said, ‘I don’t want to do Moonstruck!’ I wanted to be punk rock – I didn’t want to do a schmaltzy movie about opera,” he explained.
“But I said, ‘If I do “Moonstruck,” will you let me do “Vampire’s Kiss?”‘ And he said ‘OK.’”
“The truth is, I love ‘Moonstruck.’ Now that I’m older, I see the value in [it]. I haven’t seen ‘Moonstruck’ in a million years, but I think it’s powerfully romantic and I love all the performances,” Cage added.
Last year, it was revealed that Cage didn’t actually get paid for starring in the 1995 film “Leaving Las Vegas” — a project that earned him an Academy Award.
The film’s director Mike Figgis revealed that he, as well as Cage, didn’t see so much as a cent hit their bank accounts after the film.
“Nicolas and I never got paid,” Figgis said on The Hollywood Reporter’s It Happened in Hollywood podcast in October 2022.
Figgis claims he was due $100,000 for his directing fee, which he never received.
“They said the film never went into profit,” he said of the now-defunct Lumiere Pictures, which financed the $4 million film.
“Whatever,” he said. “I mean, my career then took off again, and the next film I did, I got really well paid. And within a year (Nic) was earning $20 million a film, so that was quite good.”