Cast of classic comedy film reveal maple syrup production secrets

With Super Troopers 3 released this month in cinemas across the United States, the cast of the original cult film have been quizzed on the famous ‘maple syrup scene’, and what exactly it involved.

The Broken Lizard comedy troupe – including Jay Chandrasekhar, Steve Lemme, Kevin Heffernan, Paul Soter and Erik Stolhanske – were the stars of the first movie, which included a memorable maple syrup drinking contest between state troopers at a diner.

Now, the actual contents of the bottles the cast were drinking from have been revealed. According to director Chandrasekhar, iced tea was used for filming from a distance, but the drink wasn’t thick enough to replace maple syrup when shooting close-up. For this reason, the actors were required to ‘chug’ maple syrup in large quantities.

Describing the effect of knocking back what appeared to be straight amber maple syrup, Heffernan fondly recalled:

“After lunch, we had to start shooting and we went looking for these guys, because they didn’t come to the set. And we found them in their trailers with, like, the lights off, shivering on the ground. Going through some sort of sugar shock.”

Released in 2001, Super Troopers featured five boisterous police officers; Farva, Foster, Mac, Rabbit and Thorny. When the troopers are threatened with losing their job due to budget cuts, they are handed the task of solving a drug smuggling case to keep their station alive. What follows is a race between the troopers and local police to crack the case first.