Files this under “stranger than fiction” or “Are you sure this isn’t a movie deepfake or AI creation?”: Barbra Streisand, most famous for starring in Funny Girl, the ’70s version of A Star Is Born, and Yentl, was in an Indiana Jones movie. No, she’s not in the latest Indy movie, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, but one that was made over 35 years ago. Not only did she pop up in 1986’s Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom, but she also appeared as a dominatrix, clad in black leather and sporting a chic matching black leather cap, whipping a tied-up Harrison Ford. Yes, really.
Of course, there’s more to it than that, because surely anyone who saw Temple of Doom would remember a scene like that one. It’s, of course, all part of a resurfaced blooper scene, when Steven Spielberg, who is infamous for pulling practical jokes on set, decided to pull a fast one on star Harrison Ford in a key moment in the movie when Indy is being held captive, all tied up with his back to everyone, and at the mercy of his captors.
Streisand walks in and begins to fake whip Ford, telling him each lash of the whip is either for his past failures like the now-forgotten war movies Force 10 From Navarone and Hanover Street or for how much money he is making from Return of the Jedi. Just then, someone comes to rescue him: Ford’s Star Wars co-star Carrie Fisher, who tells him she’s there to save him and kisses him on the lips. Just when you can’t think this scene can’t get any weirder, yet another person, The Empire Strikes Back filmmaker Irvin Kershner, steps in and directs the scene, with Babs giving it a few more attempts whipping Ford.
The surviving video footage is very bad, and while it’s hard to make out Fisher and Kershner, it’s unmistakably Streisand handling that whip, and Ford seemingly playing along with the joke, which is something he almost never does. This footage has been floating around the Internet for years but is again being seen and discussed on Twitter, presumably because the latest and last Indiana Jones movie just premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. The short video is good for a laugh (although it ends very badly), and makes you wish for a better-quality version, which probably exists in someone’s vault somewhere in Hollywood.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny hits theaters June 30. You can stream Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, as well as every other Indy movie and the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles series starring Sean Patrick Flannery from the early 1990s, on Disney+ starting May 31. It’s probably a safe bet this scene will not be remastered and included as a bonus extra.
