If you managed to catch our recent post that gave you ‘20 Things You May Not Have Realised About Crocodile Dundee’, then you’ll already know that here at Eighties Kids, we’re massive fans of this classic Australian/American comedy film. Crocodile Dundee (1986) starred Paul Hogan as Mick Dundee, with his real-life future wife Linda Kozlowski playing reporter Sue Charlton.
If you’ve never seen Crocodile Dundee before then you should rectify that as soon as possible, because it’s by far one of the funniest films to come out of the late 1980s.
Paul Hogan’s fish-out-of-water performance is hilarious, securing him a Golden Globe for Best Actor.. The supporting characters are universally brilliant, and the hit movie made us completely fall in love with a certain ‘land down under’ – a spectacular worldwide boost for Australian tourism. Who hasn’t dreamed of visiting the outback after seeing Mick Dundee in action?
Crocodile Dundee was made on an extremely modest budget of $10 million, and it was designed to have mainstream appeal that would be loved by people the world over (not just Australians). It’s safe to say that they definitely succeeded in that goal, because it ended up being the 2nd highest grossing movie in 1986, not just in America, but in the the whole wide world!
The massive success of Crocodile Dundee meant that there were two sequels, both of which saw Paul Hogan return as Mick Dundee. The first was Crocodile Dundee II which was released in 1988, and that was followed a number of years later by Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles in 2001. The former did pretty well at the box office but was not at all popular with critics, and the latter was a critical and commercial failure, drawing way less impressive audiences. Since its release, Los Angeles has received such poor reviews worldwide, it received a Razzie Award nomination.
So what do the cast of Crocodile Dundee look like today?
Do you know what Paul Hogan and his co-stars look like now? Please join with us now as we pack our massive knife, head off to the Australian outback, and take a nostalgic look back at the cast of this classic 80s movie…
Before its release, Paul Hogan predicted that Crocodile Dundee would be a big success, and was quoted as saying that he expected it would make millions of dollars. He also thought that it would be a great advertisement for his home country of Australia, saying “I’m planning for it to be Australia’s first proper movie. I don’t think we’ve had one yet, not a real, general public, successful, entertaining movie.”
Not only did he come up with the movie’s story, but he also, along with his business partner John Cornell, provided $600,000 of his own money on top of the funds received from over a thousand other investors!
Before starring in the award-winning Crocodile Dundee, Paul Hogan had his own comedy sketch program called ‘The Paul Hogan Show’ where he played various comedy characters. The show was extremely popular, not only in Australia but also in South Africa, and it ran for a total of 60 episodes. But Hogan isn’t only a comedian. In 1985 he went on to star in an Australian television series on World War 1 called ‘Anzacs’, playing a ‘digger’ called Pat Cleary. The series also featured a who’s who of Australian actors of the day, including Jon Blake, Andrew Clarke, Megan Williams, Tony Bonner, Bill Kerr, Ilona Rodgers, Vivean Gray and Robert Coleby.
However, the first step toward Paul Hogan’s career-defining performance as Mick Dundee came when he appeared in British television adverts for Foster’s Lager, playing an Australian living in London. One of the adverts featured Hogan’s classic line “Strewth, there’s a bloke down there with no strides on!” Do you remember it? Here’s a quick reminder!
Hogan also found international fame in a series of ads for the Australian Tourism Commission, including one in which he famously urged viewers to “throw another shrimp on the barbie”. Hogan appeared in these ads beginning in 1984.
But then came Crocodile Dundee in 1986, a role which Hogan will of course forever be remembered for. As we’ve already mentioned, he came up with the film’s story and also co-wrote the screenplay, winning the 1987 Golden Globe Award for ‘Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy’. The movie was also nominated for, but failed to win, in the ‘Best Original Screenplay’ category at the Academy Awards.
After Crocodile Dundee’s release, Paul Hogan starred in a number of other (mostly lesser known) movies including Almost an Angel in 1990 (which again saw him starring alongside Kozlowski), Lightning Jack in 1994, Flipper in 1996 (a big screen remake of the classic TV show which also starred a young Elijah Wood) and Floating Away in 1998. He also stars in advertisements for the Subaru Outback.
The latest news is that she has basically left the acting business, as it was draining to both her professional and personal life. She has been quoted as saying, “these straight to video, schlocky films I was getting were giving me an ulcer, basically because I was the only one on the set that cared about anything. Between that and my biological clock, I decided to give it all away.”
And then there’s the even more personal issue of her real-life marriage to Paul Hogan…
Paul Hogan divorced and remarried his first wife Noelene Edwards, with whom he has five children, before they divorced for the second and final time in 1990. He then went on to marry Kozlowski in 1990…
Hogan and Kozlowski have one child together, a boy going by the name of Chance, but in October 2013, Kozlowski filed for divorce from Hogan due to ‘irreconcilable differences’ walking away with a one-off payment of $6.25 million. She has recently opened up about her marriage to Hogan, revealing that she was fed up of him constantly taking all of the attention in their relationship, and saying that after 23 years of marriage she was ready for her own turn in the spotlight…
Kozlowski revealed that the main issue in their marriage was the fact that the stars didn’t share many interests, saying “Honestly, we just naturally grew apart.”
One of our problems was we really had nothing in common and, over time, that happens to a lot of people. I lived in Paul’s shadow for many, many years and it’s nice to feel my own light right now.”
Hogan agreed, saying “We were opposites and we were attracted to each other for a long time. Opposites in everything. From the food we ate, the music we liked, the entertainment we liked, the colours, the clothes, the places, everything, It worked anyway. It was 20 wonderful years, two or three that were sort of like worn out. I’m very flighty, a woman lasts for about a quarter of a century and then they get bored with me.”