Arnold Schwarzenegger Gets To The Choppa In This Excellent Jimmy Fallon Skit

By Nick Venable | Published

This article is more than 2 years old


No one is going to stand around here at GFR and claim that Arnold Schwarzenegger isn’t a Hollywood icon and a flag waver for our genre of choice. But we’re also not going to challenge the fact that he’s never been nominated for an Academy Award. However, I will go on record saying Schwarzenegger puts on the performance of his life in the above clip from The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, in which he pays hilarious homage to what are arguably his two most memorable movie quotes. I don’t think I’ve ever unironically laughed as hard at something that either man has ever been a part of.

Schwarzenegger appeared on the program last night to promote his upcoming bullet-soaked actioner Sabotage, from director David Ayer, and he also talked about a fundraising project he’s backing that involves driving over things with a tank — the same tank he drove in the Austrian army as a teenager. But somehow the most badass part of his appearance included the fake QVC segment “Now We’re Cooking,” in which Schwarzenegger plays a foodie who is interested in seeing what Fallon’s Zach Striker has to show him by way of offers on products that chop up food. There’s the blender, of course, but then there’s also the Slap Chop, and I think it’s pretty easy to guess which one the Predator star is more interested in.

It’s so well played that the joke isn’t immediately obvious, especially to the audience, even as he says “choppa” to himself. He then tries to distract the blender-favoring Fallon by telling him that we all know what a blender does, so “Let’s get to the choppa.” A more direct reference, sure, but it isn’t until the second time he says it that the audience really catches on, which of course allows him to really go nuts and forcefully scream “GET TO DA CHOPPA!” after Fallon turns the blender on. It isn’t exactly helicopter blades, but it’s a damned fine substitute. Of course, he then turns monstrous and flips the table over while hollering the oft-memed phrase.

As the segment is meant to “go into commercial” before the interview continues, Schwarzenegger ends it all with the three words most often associated with him: “I’ll be back.” It would have been nice to see another reference from The Terminator, but I feel lucky this skit worked so well in the first place. The bit after where Fallon calls him out for still having his apron on is just as funny, as it looks like Schwarzenegger is having quite a good time. It’s nice.

Would you rather see him pissed off and sweating? Check out the trailer for Sabotage, which also stars Avatar‘s Sam Worthington and Lost‘s Josh Holloway.