Former President Bill Clinton requested a private screening of the 1996 sci-fi hit Independence Day at the White House—and fled the screening room after the film’s most iconic scene. Director Roland Emmerich recalled the bizarre moment in an oral history of the film recorded by The Hollywood Reporter for its 25th anniversary and re-shared as the real-life White House is under attack from bulldozers ordered up by President Donald Trump. “When we got to the moment the White House blows up, Roland and I are looking at each other going, ‘We’re in the White House watching it blow up,’” writer-producer Dean Devlin told THR. “Then, who runs out? Bill Clinton!” Emmerich added. The pair noted that, during test screenings, audiences wouldn’t leave for a bathroom break until after the iconic scene, because they were so engrossed in the film. “One minute later, [Clinton] comes back, shaking his hands dry,” Emmerich said. “Dean and I looked at each other and nearly started laughing.” The screening took place in the White House Family Theater, which was opened in 1942 under Franklin D. Roosevelt in the East Wing of the complex—the same structure Trump ordered be turned to rubble this week to make way for his $300 million ballroom.
Read it at The Hollywood Reporter
