Emilio Estevez says Laurence Fishburne saved him from drowning in quicksand during ‘Apocalypse Now’ shoot

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Emilio Estevez said this week that Laurence Fishburne saved his life when he was 14 years old after he fell into quicksand in the Philippines. 

"I was sinking, and I just saw Fishburne just looking at me going, ‘Grab my hand!’ and he pulled me back onto the boat," he told Jennifer Hudson on her talk show Tuesday in an interview with his dad Martin Sheen. 

The "Breakfast Club" actor said he had only known Fishburne for a "couples of days" before the life-threatening incident. Estevez had just arrived on-set with Sheen, who was starring in 1979's "Apocalypse Now" along with Fishburne. 

"He says, ‘Hey there’s this little boat, let’s go out on it.’ I said, ‘Sure.’ We were both 14 at the time," Estevez said of Fishburne. "So we were out on this boat together, and we started getting too close to the shore and I said, ‘Well, let me jump out, I’ll push us offshore. I jumped out, and it was like quicksand mud."

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Laurence Fishburne, right, saved Emilio Estevez's life when they were teenagers. (Getty)

He added that the two actors "were bonded ever since." 

Sheen said he did not find out about the incident until he and Estevez wrote their father and son memoir "Along The Way: The Journey Of A Father And Son," published in 2012. 

Laurence Fishburne in "Apocalypse Now." ( CBS via Getty Images)

"I called Mr. Fishburne to thank him for saving my son’s life," he told Hudson. 

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In a 2020 interview with Vulture, Fishburne said the two of them became "best friends."

Martin Sheen, left, said he thanked Laurence Fishburne for saving his son's life when he finally found out about it decades later. (Michael Kovac/Getty Images for myCinema)

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"I saved his life and he saved mine just by virtue of the fact that we were friends because there were no other 15-year-olds around," Fishburne said. "Having the company of somebody who was my own age and male and from America was also a lifesaver for me."