The Real Reason Arnold Schwarzenegger Fired His Agent Over The Terminator
James Cameron finally lays out why Arnold Schwarzenegger fired his agent during The Terminator casting—and how one early sit-down flipped his vision of the killer machine, reshaping the role and the film’s fate.
James Cameron just filled in a missing piece of Terminator lore: how Arnold Schwarzenegger ended up playing the machine, and why he briefly fired his agent over it. It starts with a meeting that was supposed to go one way and then totally changed Cameron's idea of what the movie could be.
The meeting that flipped the movie
Talking to Vanity Fair, Cameron said he sat down with Schwarzenegger after the actor had read the script. Arnold kept zeroing in on the Terminator scenes — not pitching himself, exactly, but walking through action beats and set pieces from the killer robot's perspective. Meanwhile, Cameron had originally written the Terminator as a stealth infiltrator: human skin, able to blend in, the kind of presence no one would look at twice. Obviously, that is not Arnold.
Listening to him, Cameron started recalibrating in real time: if this guy walks into a room, he is bigger, wider, different — he looks unstoppable. That would make it a different version of the story, but a version that could actually work.
From Reese hopeful to perfect machine
After that meeting, Cameron went to producer John Daly — head of Hemdale and the film's executive producer — and leveled with him. The initial plan had involved Schwarzenegger for Kyle Reese, the human lead. But Cameron told Daly that wasn't going to fly, and then pitched the pivot.
But he'd make a hell of a terminator.
Daly moved fast. He called Schwarzenegger's agent and offered Arnold the role of the Terminator. The agent said no.
The agent situation
Then things got spicy. According to Cameron, Schwarzenegger fired his agent after that pass. The very next day, he rehired the same agent and told him he wanted the part. Deal done. Sometimes the cleanest path to an iconic role is a 24-hour internal HR nightmare.
- Cameron meets Schwarzenegger, who zeroes in on Terminator set pieces
- Cameron realizes Arnold won't blend in, but could be an unstoppable machine
- Cameron tells Hemdale's John Daly: not Reese, but perfect Terminator
- Daly offers the role via Arnold's agent; agent turns it down
- Arnold fires the agent, rehires him the next day, and takes the part
That quick pivot reshaped the movie's tone and gave Schwarzenegger the role that defined his career. It all worked out, to put it mildly.