rewrite this content and keep HTML tags Nicolas Cage holds a flare in a scene from the film “The Rock.”Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesIn the 1996 action blockbuster “The Rock,” Sean Connery plays an Alcatraz escapee enlisted by the FBI to defuse a hostage situation on the notorious prison island. “I have a unique knowledge of this prison facility. I was formerly a guest here,” Connery’s character John Mason tells the FBI.Directed by explosion aficionado Michael Bay and co-starring Nicolas Cage as biochemist “superfreak” Stanley Goodspeed, “The Rock” is one of the greatest San Francisco action movies ever (and second-highest-rated Michael Bay film according to Rotten Tomatoes). It has developed a lore of its own over the years, but it turns out that one of the most fantastic stories from its filming, which has floated around the internet for nearly 20 years, “might’ve been some exaggeration,” Nic Cage told SFGATE on Monday. And according to the National Parks Department, and a member of the film crew, it was a downright fabrication.AdvertisementArticle continues below this adConnery’s character John Patrick Mason is a former British intelligence officer who was recaptured after his Alcatraz escape in 1963, and has been spending the past decades living in maximum security (some have theorized his character is actually James Bond, an idea that producer Jerry Bruckheimer rejected). When the FBI tries to coerce Mason into breaking back into the prison, he has a few demands: “I want a suite, a shower, a shave, the feel of a suit.”Mason gets all of the above, which results in a fantastic barber scene on the top of the Fairmont Hotel, but according to IMDB.com, Connery had some demands of his own.“Sir Sean Connery insisted the producers build a cabin for him on Alcatraz, as he didn’t want to travel from the mainland to the island every day. He got what he asked for,” reads an entry on IMDB’s “The Rock” trivia page.AdvertisementArticle continues below this adSean Connery and Nicolas Cage in a scene from the film “The Rock.”Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesTracing the lineage of this rumor has proven challenging, with archival newspaper articles and video interviews offering no clues. But that specific verbiage from IMDB has been lightly plagiarized by roughly 1 thousand internet listicles, and no article points to a primary source. The Wayback Machine’s first archived version of the IMDB page from April 21, 2004, includes reference to the cabin, the second listing under a note that Quentin Tarantino was an uncredited script writer. Today, the cabin entry is at the top of the page, with 744 upvotes and only three downvotes. IMDB did not respond to a request for comment.Nic Cage receives a lifetime achievement award from SFFILM on Dec. 4, 2023, and attends the premiere of “The Rock” with Patricia Arquette at Pier 41 in Fisherman’s Wharf on June 3, 1996.Steve Jennings / Getty Images, Ron Galella Collection via GettyNic Cage receives a lifetime achievement award from SFFILM on Dec. 4, 2023, and attends the premiere of “The Rock” with Patricia Arquette at Pier 41 in Fisherman’s Wharf on June 3, 1996.Steve Jennings / Getty Images, Ron Galella Collection via GettyStanley Goodspeed comes cleanOn the red carpet for the SFFILM Awards Night in which Cage was honored with a lifetime achievement award, SFGATE asked Cage about Connery’s fabled cabin — what did it look like, did Cage ever hang out with him there, what happened to it after filming? Unfortunately Cage couldn’t answer any of these questions. Because the cabin didn’t exist.AdvertisementArticle continues below this ad“I don’t think he had a cabin built, I think he just stayed,” Cage told SFGATE. “Rather than going across back and forth on the ferry, he would like to stay in his trailer. He would say things to the first AD (assistant director) like, ‘My instinct tonight is to stay here.’ I can’t do Sean’s voice, but — ‘I believe I’ll stay here’ is what he would say.”In a deep dive of interviews Connery gave during the promotion of “The Rock,” it’s clear that the island wouldn’t have been his first choice of lodging anyway. “Nothing quite prepares you for its isolation. The look of the place. And same once you touch shore. It’s very impressive, and eventually very depressive, I think. It’s quite sinister inside. A marvelous piece of real estate, I wouldn’t mind owning it,” Connery said.Cage expressed fairly similar sentiments in an interview from that era, describing the island as dangerous and using the nickname “Tetanus World.”AdvertisementArticle continues below this adAlcatraz Island tours today focus on the main cellhouse, where Alcatraz inmates lived out their sentences when the site operated as a federal prison from 1934 to 1963. Caroline Purser/Getty ImagesThe truth, according to AlcatrazFurther investigation confirmed Cage’s contention that the cabin did not exist was true, although it turns out Connery had some requests of the producers that were even stranger than makeshift prison-adjacent lodging.“I know of no cabin built on Alcatraz,” Jonathan Shedd, film location manager on “The Rock,” wrote in a text message shared with SFGATE. “Sean did have a trailer on the island, and if he slept there it was during the day, but he ‘Lived’ at the Hyatt in the financial district. We scouted hotels for him. Main criteria, multiple bathrooms, I have no idea why, but that was our directive.”AdvertisementArticle continues below this adSetting aside the mystery of why James Bond needed multiple toilets, the story gets even stranger. The National Park Service, which governs Alcatraz Island and continued to operate it as a tourist site during the film shoot, also denied the existence of any cabin. Former Alcatraz ranger John Cantwell was working on the island while the movie was filming, and recalled that Connery had a trailer at the north end of the island just like the other actors. However, if Connery had his way, he wouldn’t have needed those multiple bathrooms in the Hyatt.“As I remember, Sean Connery originally wanted to anchor his 100-foot yacht off the dock of Alcatraz, but the Coast Guard said it was a shipping lane and did not allow that to happen. No cabin was built for Sean Connery on Alcatraz,” Cantwell wrote to SFGATE in an email.Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage in a scene from the film “The Rock.”Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesConnery did reportedly make some demands that were obliged, notably in a meeting where he surprised Disney executives and secured Bay additional funding to complete the film. But unfortunately for fans who might imagine the iconic British actor stoically spending his nights in a cabin on the Bay, that much is fiction.AdvertisementArticle continues below this adAs Connery’s character says in the film, the iconic actor surely did gain a unique knowledge of the prison facility during the shooting — but he may not have ever formerly been an overnight guest.
Nicolas Cage debunks San Francisco movie myth
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