Arnold Schwarzenegger got ripped off on his Conan the Barbarian contract due to language barriers and inexperience. He made a rule after that: read and understand every line of every agreement he signs. As California governor, he applied the same habit to legislation, frustrating staff who had to explain clauses he questioned.
Chapters
Arnold Schwarzenegger came to this country barely able to speak English and became the governor of the state in the country. One thing that happened along the way, that played into his role as governor, and this is where the story would show itself, is when he first came to America and he was down on muscle B. He got recruited to start doing some acting classes, and muscle superstars weren't a big deal. All of a sudden he got a contract for Conan the Barbarian, and that was his first big breakout role. Well, because of his language barrier and lack of experience, he just signed the deal. It was a great movie, great deal, but a bad contract. And he ended up getting paid a p. It was not good. And he got taken advantage of by the production company and everybody along the way. But he had a bad experience in one of those first movies. And he said to himself, I'm never going to let that happen again. I'm going to read every line of every agreement I ever sign for the rest of my life. And if I've got a language barrier issue, I'm going to stop until I understand the issue. And he committed to that. So fast forward 25 years later, he's governor of the state of California. And his staff hated this because before he'd sign a bill, before he'd do anything, he's like, I don't understand that provision. Explain it. And he would be meticulous about understanding, understanding every provision before he would sign agreements or contracts or, of course, legislation.
