Will Ferrell is known for his hilarity on screen. But if fans thought that his funniest roles could be attributed to the writing team behind him, that seems to not be the case.
In fact, one of Will's most well-known films involved him taking a ton of risks with the script as it was written. The thing is, it was probably meant to go down that way. After all, Busy Phillips, who had the original idea, notes Vulture, even imagined Will in the role of Chazz Michael Michaels from the beginning.
Of course, it evolved a lot from that initial concept, and Ferrell's contributions were the icing on the cake in 'Blades of Glory.'
Though Will was permitted to flex his creative muscles as Chazz, he has been told no by Hollywood before. That didn't stop him from accepting and evolving the role in 'Blades of Glory,' though, and improvising about 88 percent of his lines, according to the writing team behind the script, says IMDb.
They permitted the 2007 film's dialogue to be "improvised or changes in some way to suit his persona," which seems fitting. It's probably pretty hard to come up with Will's characters without the actor himself contributing some quirky things to the roles.
He's also taken some chances, either on purpose or by accident (like that time Eva Mendes almost stabbed him). In terms of creative decisions on 'Blades of Glory,' the risk of letting the actor just wing it paid off. The film did well overall, with critics giving it mostly solid reviews.
Fans loved it, of course, although Will Ferrell does offer a specific brand of comedy that is in a category all its own. That's not to say he totally led the film though; his skating partner Jon Heder ("Jimmy") took some risks to nail his role, too. Heder even broke his ankle on set while practicing his ice skating moves (though it's Will's character who breaks his ankle in the film).
The only downside to the whole story is that before Will even came on set, his script was probably mostly trashed. Imagine being a writer on the crew, and after spending hours writing out a character's lines -- and really just developing that character -- and then having Ferrell tear it all down.
That's not to say he ruined the script by any means; who knows what 'Blades of Glory' would've been like if he had stuck to what was written down? Besides, anyone who works with Will is probably more than willing to bow down to his creativity. After all, his resume speaks for itself.