Nicolas Cage had a major run-in with a horse that he had to work with on his upcoming Western film, Butcher's Crossing.
According to Cage, the horse - named Rain Man - wanted to kill him.
"Rain Man kept trying to knock me off and would try to run my head into roofs, and then I'd get off and try to be nice to him, and he would headbutt me. It was not fun," Cage revealed during The Hollywood Reporter's actors' roundtable chat.
"I've always had good experiences with animals," he told fellow actors Andrew Garfield, Peter Dinklage, Jonathan Majors, and Simon Rex. "I always had great experiences with horses, but Rain Man wanted to kill me."
The other actors in the roundtable were taken by Cage's story. Majors believed he might have also worked with the horse, too; while Garfield told Cage to keep talking about Rain Man.
Cage went on to say there was another moment when he was on Rain Man in a scene that featured a herd of bison and the actor wasn't confident he'd get away from them because Rian Man was so difficult to ride.
But the biggest scare came during the final shot he did for the movie.
Watch the full actors' roundtable episode right here:
"The director's name was Gabe [Polsky]," Cage said. "The last shot, it was just like, 'Gabe, I'm not getting on a horse again.'"
Finally, after some discussion Cage agreed to get on the horse for the last shot.
"So I got on the horse and literally, again, he kept trying to throw me off,' Cage continued.
"I was like, 'That's it. That was my last shot, and you had to make it almost like a stunt. You did make it a stunt. You almost killed me on my last shot in the movie.' As you can tell, I've got post-traumatic stress disorder from Rain Man."
It comes as Cage said he would like to be called a "thespian" rather than an "actor".
He explained his perceived difference between the two words, and why he was more inclined to self-identify as a thespian, in a new interview with Variety.
On the latest episode of Variety’s Awards Circuit Podcast, which was released on Thursday, December 30, Cage said: "For me it always implies, 'Oh, he’s a great actor, therefore he's a great liar.'"
So, Cage said, he prefers the term thespian despite the risk of sounding like a "pretentious a**hole".
"Thespian means you're going into your heart, or you’re going into your imagination, or your memories or your dreams, and you're bringing something back to communicate with the audience," he added