Does singer Huey Lewis really play one of the terrorists in Die Hard – here’s where the confusion stems from. There’s a long-standing rumor Die Hard started life as a sequel to Commando, the 1985 Arnold Schwarzenegger shoot-em-up. While an unused sequel script did feature Arnie’s John Matrix fighting a bunch of bad guys in a building, it had nothing to do with Die Hard. Die Hard is actually an adaptation of the novel Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorpe. The book was a sequel to his novel The Detective, which was adapted into a movie starring Frank Sinatra in 1968. A contract clause meant Sinatra was offered the lead role in Die Hard first, but he quickly passed.

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Die Hard is actually a pretty close adaptation of the original book, featuring many of the same setpieces and characters. The novel is a lot more downbeat, however, and appears to end with the main character dying of his wounds after failing to save his daughter. For Die Hard the character of John McClane was made much younger, and it was his wife Holly he had to rescue. Actors such as Burt Reynolds and even Schwarzenegger turned the movie down until Bruce Willis was hired based off his work in Moonlighting.

Die Hard became an instant classic thanks to its great screenplay, casting, and action sequences. It also spawned a long-running franchise, with Willis set to return for planned sixth movie McClane, which will be a prequel/sequel. The movie’s main villain Hans Gruber was played by the late, great Alan Rickman, which was shockingly his first movie role after years of TV and stage work. Hans also has a memorable supporting group of thieves, including vengeful Karl and sarcastic hacker Theo. One of the last surviving henchmen is Eddie, who fronts the reception at Nakatomi Plaza to make it appear everything is normal inside.

Eddie bears a passing resemblance to singer Huey Lewis (Back To The Future), which has led some fans to just assume it actually is “The Hip To Be Square” singer. That’s not the case, however, since Eddie is actually played by actor Dennis Hayden. Hayden also appeared in Action Jackson with Carl Weathers (Rocky), in addition to Walter Hill movies like Another 48 Hrs and Wild Bill. It can’t be denied Hayden and Lewis have a strong resemblance to one another but that’s where the connection ends.

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Huey Lewis himself has acknowledged this with a fun guest voice appearance in The Cleveland Show episode “Die Semi-Hard,” which was a loving tribute to Die Hard. In the episode itself, Lewis voices a parody of Eddie literally credited as “Guy Who Looks Like Huey Lewis.”

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About The Author


Padraig Cotter
(3484 Articles Published)

It’s pronounced Paw-rick, not Pad-raig. Now that’s out of the way, a brief introduction. Padraig has been writing about film online since 2012, when a friend asked if he’d like to contribute the occasional review or feature to their site.

A part-time hobby soon blossomed into a career when he discovered he really loved writing about movies, TV and video games – he even (arguably) had a little bit of talent for it. He has written words for Den of Geek, Collider, The Irish Times and Screen Rant over the years, and can discuss anything from the MCU – where Hawkeye is clearly the best character – to the most obscure cult b-movie gem, and his hot takes often require heat resistant gloves to handle.

He’s super modern too, so his favorite movies include Jaws, Die Hard, The Thing, Ghostbusters and Batman. He can be found as i_Padds on Twitter making bad puns.

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