Durkin says the decision to cut the youngest and smallest Von Erich from the film was born out of narrative necessity, as the unyielding tragedy of the Von Erich story proved to be too heavy for the traditional screenplay structure.
“I’ve never had a more difficult decision to make as a writer,” Durkin told Uproxx. “I care so deeply, so it was painful … You have to separate and say, ‘Okay, well, this is a movie, these are characters, and the movie just cannot withstand another death at that point.'”
The director also noted that the deaths of Chris and Mike were so similar that it made more sense to combine the two characters, meaning Stanley Simons’s portrayal of Mike Von Erich has become a composite of the two ill-fated brothers. Durkin believes that the similarities between the two don’t end at their suicides, as both of them were rushed into the wrestling industry following a death in the family, with Mike joining the business following the death of David and Chris joining the business following the death of Mike.
“[They] were both the younger brothers of these three huge, larger-than-life characters,” Durkin told Entertainment Weekly. As the film is mainly focused on David, Kerry, and Kevin, Durkin felt that having Mike and Chris play such similar foils to the three main characters could muddle the family dynamics that he meant to highlight.
“You can see it in the videos you watch of [Mike]: He’s obviously super supportive, and wrestling was such a big part of his life,” Durkin continued. “But he also took the brunt of David’s passing and was shoehorned into [wrestling] by his father, a little bit.”
While Durkin felt that the story required Chris to stay on the cutting room floor, he still needed to pitch the story to Chris’s brother, Kevin.
