"Everyone was stoned" during Robin Williams' Popeye movie

Barry Diller, current IAC Chairman, was once CEO of Paramount Pictures. He served the studio from 1974 to 1984, overseeing major hits like Grease, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Saturday Night Fever. He also oversaw the creation of Robert Altman's Popeye.

Via Entertainment Weekly, Diller was asked during a recent interview what the most "coked-up" film set he ever visited was. "Popeye," he said. "If you watch Popeye, you're watching a movie that — you think of it in the thing that they used to do about record speeds, 33 [RPM], whatever. This is a movie that runs at 78 RPM and 33 speed."

"You couldn't escape it," he continued, talking about the drug use on set. "They were actually shipping in film cans at the time. Film cans would be sent back to L.A. for daily processing film. This was shot in Malta. And we found out that the film cans were actually being used to ship cocaine back and forth to this set. Everyone was stoned."

So, as my esteemed colleague David Caballero puts it, perhaps it wasn't spinach after all that gave Popeye his strength and energy. Robin Williams starred in the 1980 movie, alongside Shelley Duval. It drew $60 million at the box office, more than double its budget, but didn't exactly impress critics at the time.