Tim Allen Recalls How He Won Alan Rickman Over: "I Don't Think He Liked Me All That Much"

The 'Galaxy Quest' co-stars ended up becoming "very fast friends" after an initially rocky first meeting, Allen tells THR.

I don’t think he liked me all that much when we first started shooting Galaxy Quest. I was a stage performer, a concert comic, and I was coming into this group of very polished thespians — Sigourney Weaver and Sam Rockwell and Tony Shalhoub and then Alan adding his English roots.

All of them had this process and method — voice stretching and all that kind of prep — and it was so different from mine. I was doing penis jokes right up to action.

I went to a very different school, shitty clubs and basements and big arenas. But then, one day on the set, Alan came to me and apologized. He said he mistook my behavior for lack of commitment. And we became very fast friends.

I used to joke he had studied with Uta Hagen. I’m just bullshitting like I know any of this. I said well that’s where I went. I went to the Uta Haagen-Dazs School. On the day we turned into friends he came to my house with a bottle of wine and chocolate Haagen-Dazs as a peace offering and said, "This is for you because whoever taught you taught you very well."

He was just an amazing person and an amazing actor. We had these dinner parties [during the Galaxy Quest production] and Alan always brought gifts whenever he came to the house. He was that kind of guy — he had class and style and manners. But he was also gentle and funny and wonderful.

Galaxy Quest probably wasn’t his best work from his point of view because he was a classically trained actor and had a huge repertoire of information and here he was playing a guy who’s got to wear a rubber head. But he played that very well.

He was very serious about his craft. I’m not supposed to say anything — I’m speaking way out of turn here — but Galaxy Quest is really close to being resurrected in a very creative way. It’s closer than I can tell you but I can’t say more than that. The real kicker is that Alan now has to be left out. It’s been a big shock on many levels.