Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is well known for his acting roles outside of his Hall of Fame basketball career, and one of his most notable gigs was playing Murdock in the classic comedy “Airplane!”
Though Kareem is tied to the movie, he actually wasn’t the athlete the film’s creators initially had in mind for the role.
In an oral history of the movie written for AV Club, directors David Zucker, Jerry Zucker, and Jim Abrahams reveal that they wrote the part for Pete Rose.
David Zucker: That was another lucky break that we got, because Kareem himself was not the first choice for that role.