
10 Quick Questions for Tom Arnold
- Select a language for the TTS:
- UK English Female
- UK English Male
- US English Female
- US English Male
- Australian Female
- Australian Male
- Language selected: (auto detect) - EN
Play all audios:
By
Gayle Jo Carter,
AARP Published June 01, 2023Tom Arnold, 64, reunites with his True Lies costar and real-life friend Arnold Schwarzenegger in the new Netflix series FUBAR. He tells AARP how he trimmed down for the role, how he’s
handling late-in-life fatherhood and how he’s feeling after suffering a stroke last year.
Tell us about your role in Fubar.
They wrote a great character. It’s the CIA, and [my character’s] the torture guy. Arnold [Schwarzenegger’s] character [is on the verge of retirement and] has moved on from the torture, but …
Arnold’s daughter’s child needs a bone marrow donor, and we need to track her long-gone baby daddy down. We track him down and he won’t [donate]. They call me in to get the bone marrow from
him. It’s a quite funny and sort of creepy character.
Have you kept in touch with Arnold over the years?
I have this long, very long, personal relationship with him. And sometimes I step back and go, I can’t believe I’m friends with this guy. My kids [son Jax, 10, and daughter Quinn, 7, with
ex-wife Ashley Groussman] are like, “We can’t believe you’re friends with that guy.” Because he’s done so many incredible things. I still learn things from him. My son has a poster of Arnold
Schwarzenegger posing in one of his muscle competitions in his room. I’m not gonna let [my kids] watch the [FUBAR] episode, but I’m gonna take them to the premiere, and they’re very
excited.
Aren’t you and Arnold a little old to still be playing action heroes?
I did think, Well, he’s 75. I wonder if he’s into all this action stuff. I have to tell you — he’s working on FUBAR, and somebody had gotten COVID — one of the main actors — and [Arnold] had
to work for a week, 14-hour days, by himself, doing all of his stuff. I could just tell he was really into it. The first thing he said [to me was], “Let’s go for a bike ride.” I thought
motorcycle — he’s, like, bicycle. Oh my gosh, I have been on a bicycle, but not with traffic, the way he rides it. Even though I’ve lost 80 pounds [since] I had a stroke. I said, Boy, I hope
I can. It was great. The thing about him is, he always seizes the day, every day.