Trivia / The Great Waldo Pepper

• On-Set Injury: Experienced stunt-pilot Frank Tallman, during filming of the aerial scenes, managed to perform two planned crashes without injury. However a third (accidental) crash occurred while landing a Nieuport biplane when a rudder bar broke at 400 feet, sending his aircraft nose-diving into a hill. Tallman survived but suffered two cracked vertebrae, required 58 stitches, and had to be taken off filming for two weeks.
• What Could Have Been:
  • George Roy Hill was worried that Robert Redford's The Great Gatsby (1974) would overrun just as The Way We Were had. In the event that Redford would become unavailable, Hill had lined up Jack Nicholson, George Segal and Donald Sutherland as possible replacements.
  • The role of Axel Olsson was originally intended for Paul Newman. He could not be persuaded to be in the film, but his son, Scott Newman, does appear in the film in the role of Duke.
  • Warren Oates was considered for Ernst Kessler.
  • In his book Adventures in the Screen Trade, William Goldman wrote that his original idea for the opening scene was cut. The idea was to open with a young boy trying to impress a young girl by holding out his arms and actually being able to fly. We then see the sky filled with young boys flying and young girls being impressed. The director felt the tone of that scene did not match the rest of the film.

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