Four decades after its release, director Francis Ford Coppola took to Instagram on Thursday to share audition tapes from his 1983 film, The Outsiders.
The film, based on the 1963 novel by S.E. Hinton, is known for, among other things, launching the careers of many of its young stars, including Rob Lowe, Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Ralph Macchio, Diane Lane, C. Thomas Howell, Matt Dillon and Emilio Estevez.
In his post on Thursday, Coppola recounted his unique casting process for the endeavor. “We had all the actors together on a soundstage and would alternate different actors reading for different roles,” he said. The process is reflected in the accompanying footage of Coppola’s post, where various actors read lines from characters they did not play. At one point, the clips include several different performances of the line, “Hop the 3:15 freight to Windrixvill.”
Like its namesake book, Coppola’s film tells the story of rival teen gangs in rural Oklahoma: the poor Greasers against the wealthy Socs. Howell played Greaser protagonist Ponyboy, with Macchio as his close friend Johnny. Filling out the cast was Lowe’s Soda Curtis, Swayze’s Darry Curtis, Dillon’s Dally Winston, Estevez’s Two-Bit Mathews and Lane as Cherry Valence.
The director continued: “It was interesting because each of them was watching their competition, so while it could’ve been a volatile situation, it turned into a very positive one. There emerged the natural respect and sense of colleagueship among them. The result worked beautifully and reminded me of my days as a camp counselor.”
