Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - James Cameron Was Drugged

Episode Date: July 13, 2026

1996, during a midnight dinner break on the Halifax, Nova Scotia set, an unknown culprit spiked the cast and crew's clam chowder with some substance. Director James Cameron was among the roughly 80 people hospitalized.

Do you know that James Cameron was super high on the set of Titanic? Now, the story starts, of course, with this guy, James Cameron. You know, famous director, he did some of the Terminator movies and the Avatar movies and also Piranha too. So no doubt he's a creative genius, but he's also known for being a real jerk on set. Like he gets super pissed off if anything disrupts the shooting schedule or gets in the way of his creative vision. and he'll like yell at people if anything goes wrong. And one day in 1996, he gets really mad on set because he's in Canada filming his current movie, Titanic,

and they're shooting some of the modern day scenes. You know the scenes with the actor Bill Paxton? Well, allegedly, James spots one of the caterers near the set smoking a little Zaza. So he tells a crew member, go have that guy fired. And so, boom. the guy ends up getting fired, which means that James has just pissed off the caterer,

someone who has access to the crew's food. And allegedly, this caterer is not going to let this slide. He now wants to get revenge on James Cameron. Because right around this time, someone, we can only speculate who, but someone has some PCP, and they pour an entire pound of it into the seafood chowder that's about to be served to the cast and crew. PCP is, of course, a very serious drug

that causes hallucinations and, you know, makes people go crazy. And if someone wanted revenge on James Cameron, making sure that his cast and crew can't work because they're hallucinating would definitely be the way to do it. So now, it's the last night of shooting the Bill Paxton scenes, and James and the crew, they work late into the night. Then, around midnight, they all take a break to eat.

and a huge seafood buffet is being served, including the spiked chowder. So about 80 members of the crew sit down and they eat it. But James, he eats with Bill Paxton in his trailer, where they each have a bowl of the chowder. And afterwards, James returns to set, ready to continue filming. But he immediately notices something is very off, because not a single member of the crew has returned from break. And so James is just sitting there in the director's chair all alone, like, what is going on? Where is everyone? Then, boom, the PCP suddenly hits him.

And his vision starts tunneling and he feels woozy and his arms go numb. And he's like, oh shit, I must have food poisoning. So he goes to find an onset medic. But along the way, he finds his crew in total chaos. Like all 80 people who ate the chowder, which includes half the cast and crew, are all feeling exactly how James is feeling. They're getting confused and they're disoriented and they're starting to freak out about what's happening to them. So production members try to organize the chaos.

Like, whoever feels sick, get in this line. And they line them up to load them into vans to take them to the emergency room. And since James and Bill Paxton are both feeling it too, they get in the vans as well. And at this point, it's around 1 a.m. And the vans arrive at this tiny local hospital. And suddenly, the emergency room at this place is full of 80 new patients, all severely disoriented. And the hospital staff, they're like panicking over how to handle this many people at once.

And so the staff starts asking questions. And they find out that all these sick people have one thing in common. They ate the chowder. And to the doctors and nurses, this looks really bad. I mean, they don't yet know that someone drug the food. So they believe it's something much worse. And so the doctor explains to everyone that shellfish can cause neurotoxin poisoning. He says, this kind of shellfish poisoning can be fatal.

Some of you may not make it through the night. Everyone should call their families and say their goodbyes. And so now people are hysterical. I mean, the drugs are already making them freak out, and now they think they're about to die? And so some of them are like crying and panicking and calling their families like, I just have to tell you that I love you. Some of them are starting to hallucinate so they hide in a corner on the floor and they're like,

what the hell is happening to me? But as the night goes on, some members of the crew who aren't strangers to drug use, they get to talking like, you know, I don't feel poisoned at all. I actually feel kind of good. And they start laughing and having a good time. And that is when they realize, Hey, wait a minute, we're not dying? We're high.

Then a crew member says, Hey, we passed a fast food join on the way here. I want a root beer float. And other people join in like, Hell yeah, root beer floats, let's do it. And so the assistants go get them root beer floats, and they bring them back. And now some of the crew are sitting in the emergency room like,

man, this is the best root beer float I've ever had in my life. And then someone somehow gets a guitar. and starts playing Caribbean music. Then someone else shouts, You know what we need? A conga line. And then the cinematographer, Caleb Deschanel,

who just happens to be Zoe DeChanel's dad, shouts, everybody, Konga! And he starts leading a Konga line down the hospital corridor. And so now the hospital staff, they're like trying to keep everyone in their hospital beds, but everyone keeps wandering off to join the party.

And so, at this point, the hospital is full. of hallucinating people singing and dancing around, and the grips steal some wheelchairs, and they start doing wheelchair races down the halls. It is absolute chaos. And so Bill Paxton is sitting there like, man, I know I'm super high,

but you know what would be great with this? Some alcohol. So he walks a couple of blocks back to set, back to his trailer, to get some beer. Now, all this madness has made it absolutely impossible to film. Like now, they're going to be by, behind schedule on a film that's already way over budget. And normally James Cameron would be upset at these setbacks,

but today he doesn't seem to care. He's just way too high. And so he's just chilling, listening to the Caribbean music, and having a good time like everyone else. But then, suddenly, out of nowhere, one of the crew members who's been hallucinating takes out a pin and boom, he just stabs James Cameron in the face. And James, he starts,

bleeding, but he's so high that he thinks it's funny. And at this point, the hospital staff have finally figured out exactly what's going on. Like, dear God, they're all high. And they start handing out cups of liquid charcoal to try to get the drugs out of their systems. However, then they run into another problem. The liquid charcoal can cause diarrhea and nausea. So now you have dozens of people with sudden diarrhea in a tiny hospital with very few bathrooms. And so pretty quickly, all the toilets are full of people. And once those are taken, people start using the sinks. And some people just like sit on top of trash cans to go.

And this chaos continues all night. Until around 8 a.m. in the morning, when people finally start to sober up. And, you know, the show must go on, so production tells all of them, okay, we need you back on set today, we have to finish filming. And so, after being up all night hallucinating, they returned to set to finish shooting the modern day scenes. And after that, they fly to Mexico to start on the big ship scenes with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet.

While back in Canada, police start investigating who could have possibly put the drugs in the chowder. And there's a ton of theories about who did it, including the one about the pissed off caterer. However, police don't have enough evidence to charge anyone. So after years of investigating, the case is ultimately closed. And to this day, it remains one of the bigger mysteries in Hollywood. But ultimately, they do finish filming the movie, and Titanic goes on to become one of the most successful films of all time.