Kathy Bates Joining The Waterboy Took Some Convincing From Her Niece, Not The Devil

In the 1998 comedy film "The Waterboy," Bobby Boucher, a sheltered and socially challenged 31-year-old "water distribution engineer," earns a spot on the last-place South-Central Louisiana State University Mud Dogs football team. Channeling pent-up aggression stemming from being bullied, Bobby becomes an unstoppable tackling machine, single-handedly turning the team around. However, he does this behind the back of his mama, Helen.

Played by Kathy Bates, Helen wants to do nothing more than keep Bobby hidden away with her in the house. Instead of committing forcible kidnapping and torture, like Bates' character does in the 1990 horror/thriller "Misery," Helen manipulates Bobby by telling her ill-informed son that football, or in her words, "foosball," — along with college, little girls, astronomy and anything else she sees as a threat — "is the devil."

During a 2019 episode of the Vanity Fair series "Career Timeline," Bates said she initially turned down the chance to play the overly prudish, extremely religious Mama. "I remember picking up this script, 'The Waterboy,' and I read the first 12 pages. It was really silly. It was a football movie, and I thought, 'Eh,' and I threw it in the trash," she said. At that point in her career (and life), Bates admitted that taking things far too serious had become her Achilles heel. It took some convincing from her niece for her to reconsider the comedic role.

Kathy Bates's niece worked with her and spotted the script for "The Waterboy" sitting in the trash and asked what was it. "And I said, 'Eh, I don't know. It's some movie by some kid, Adam Sandler,'" Bates told Vanity Fair. "And she just exploded, and she said, 'Adam Sandler!'" Bates' niece went on to tell her about the then-rising movie star and his popular "The Chanukuh Song," which he first performed during a 1994 "Saturday Night Live" sketch.  

Seemingly without judging the script for herself, her niece told Bates she had no choice but to do the movie; that's how big a deal Sandler was to her. As such, the "Misery" actor gave the script a second read. "And I still was kind of doubtful; I didn't know what to expect," Bates added. Eventually, though. she agreed to do the movie. She described the experience as follows:

"It was just, I don't know how to explain it. It's just somewhere a character just comes out, and she was such a fun person to play ... This was an opportunity to just let it all hang out, and just play and be silly, and it turned out to be one of the most wonderful experiences of my whole life. I felt so free, I could do anything."

As fun as it was for Bates to make, "The Waterboy" was just as fun for me to watch. It's a childhood favorite that still cracks me up today, and Bates' performance as one of the film's main antagonists played a big part in making the movie a comedy classic.