Robert Redford and Paul Newman had an all-time prank war over a Porsche

Sadly, this week the world lost the legendary Robert Redford at the age of 89. But there might be some solace knowing that he and Paul Newman – who passed away in 2008 at 83 – may be reunited yet again. And judging by their storied history, they’re going to be having one hell of a good time. To honor Redford, we’d like to share with you an all-time prank war between the two stars.

Considering both Redford and Newman were avid car lovers, it’s probably no surprise that their greatest bit revolved around them. In fact, Redford takes credit for turning Newman onto racecar driving; but this may have bit him on the ass because every time the two got together, all Newman wanted to talk about was cars. As Redford told Maureen Dowd during a 2014 interview, it was time to get a little revenge on his pal. So for his 50th birthday, he called a towing company and found out they had a seriously banged up Porsche on the lot. As Redford put it, “Hold it, I want to wrap that in paper and put a ribbon around it.’ And I called the towing service and said, ‘Would you deliver this to Paul Newman’s house and put it on his back porch?’”

But Newman didn’t give in, refusing to acknowledge the prank. “A couple weeks later I went into my rented house in Westport, Connecticut. In the foyer was this big box, big wooden box. And it took me about an hour-and-a-half to crowbar it open. And inside was this big block of metal, just a big square block of metal.” Yep – Paul Newman had the Porsche baled.

With the ball in Redford’s court, he phoned up a sculptor friend of his. Next came the delivery of the metal block back to Newman’s house. “So I then called the guys back and said, ‘Okay, guys, take it back to Newman’s place and put it in his garden.’ The guy says, ‘Hey, we hope this keeps going on and on.’ Anyway, they took it. I said, ‘Did you do that?’ They said, ‘Yes, we did.’ And to this day, neither Paul nor I ever spoke about it.’”

That’s a truly hilarious anecdote, one that shows just how much Redford and Newman had fun with each other. That they didn’t even have to acknowledge it is the icing, because so much is said between the words themselves.

Perhaps surprisingly, Robert Redford and Paul Newman – despite being considered one of the greatest onscreen duos ever – only made two films together: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Sting.

The post Robert Redford and Paul Newman had an all-time prank war over a Porsche appeared first on JoBlo.