Making The 'Vacation' Movies Was No Vacation For The Cast And Crew

In National Lampoon's Vacation, the Griswold family travels from suburban Chicago to the fictional Walley World theme park in California. To make the movie, the cast and crew went on a grueling real-life road trip not dissimilar from the one the fictional family takes.

The bonus features on the special edition Blu-ray reveal that to get the necessary footage, the production traveled hundreds of miles, stopping to film in six different states. Aside from the Illinois and California locations, they shot at the Grand Canyon in Arizona, where the Griswolds pause to briefly sight-see, and St. Louis, MO, where the Family Truckster passes the famous Gateway Arch. 

Colorado and Monument Valley, UT, also provided locations for the exhausting summer-long trek. To combat the heat in desert locations, gigantic air conditioners helped keep the car cool for the actors.

While the rest of the family goes on to so many continued adventures, Dinky the dog doesn't make it through the first Vacation. Clark inadvertently leaves Aunt Edna's pooch tied to the car, leading to little more than a slap on the wrist from a cop over animal cruelty. The grim turn of events was inspired by urban legends of real life canine road trip mishaps, but according to director Harold Ramis, life very nearly imitated art.

In a 1983 Late Night With David Letterman interview, Ramis revealed that, while production was based in a Durango, CO hotel, "Sure enough, someone saw a station wagon pulling out of the Holiday Inn with a dog tied to the bumper," he said. "It was definitely a confirmed sighting." And don't worry, because the filmmaker assured everyone, "They saved that one."

At the end of National Lampoon's Vacation, the Griswolds ride Walley World's biggest roller coaster with a security guard (played by John Candy). There was only one way to shoot the scene: by having the actors ride the coaster for real. That led to some seriously upset stomachs.

On the DVD commentary, director Harold Ramis reveals the cast had to ride the coaster seven times to get all the footage needed. Everyone ended up nauseated by the end of the seven trips. Actor Dana Barron was hit especially hard; she needed to take motion sickness medication and lie down on a bench between takes.

When it came time to test National Lampoon's Vacation, preview audiences went wild. The only thing they didn't like was the ending, which they overwhelmingly hated. The original conclusion featured the Griswolds storming Roy Walley's home after discovering Walley World is closed, then forcing him to entertain them by singing and dancing.

Because of the poor reaction, a new ending was shot four months after formal production wrapped. The update, which finds Clark compelling a security guard to let his family ride the rides at gunpoint, went over much better with audiences.

Interestingly, Vacation's original ending was re-purposed for Christmas Vacation, where Cousin Eddie kidnaps Clark's boss and drags him to the Griswold home.

The Griswolds' chariot on their first adventure, the Queen Wagon Family Truckster, was a modified 1979 Ford LTD Country Squire. It's clear in Vacation that this car is for squares, as it's not the first choice of Clark, a notorious square, and the design elements all amplify elements in commercial station wagons, from the faux wood paneling to the boxy, inelegant design. Maybe it's no coincidence, then, that station wagon sales declined over the ensuing decades, all but vanishing from modern roads?

That's what automotive writer Pete Bigelow speculates, pointing to the fact that Vacation hit theaters in 1983, the very same year Chrysler rolled out the first minivan for American drivers, hastening the wagon's demise. Of course, many other factors were at play, but Clark's unease with his new ride certainly fit with consumers' changing tastes in the '80s.

Anthony Michael Hall, who originated the role of faithful son Rusty Griswold, got into trouble on set for inappropriate behavior. In a Maxim magazine oral history, producer Matty Simmons revealed he caught Hall trying to peep on his on-screen mother, Beverly D'Angelo, during her nude scene.

Simmons recounted, "I grabbed him by the shoulder and said, 'Get the hell out of here!'" He was angry the young star would try to violate the privacy of a fellow cast member.

Years later, Hall didn't deny the allegation, saying, "I was totally trying to sneak a peek... Was I conflicted that she was playing my mom? You know what? At times I was."