LONDON:

German director Werner Herzog was scared that actor Joaquin Phoenix would blow them up when he tried to light a cigarette after a car accident.

Herzog rescued Phoenix when he overturned his car and crashed into another vehicle in Los Angeles in 2006, contactmusic.com reports.

After the accident, Phoenix said: “I remember this knocking on the passenger window. There was this voice saying, ‘Just relax.’ Finally, I rolled down the window and this head pops inside. it was Werner Herzog!’ I got out and said, ‘Thank you,’ and he was gone.” But Herzog was more concerned about Phoenix’s desire to smoke to calm him down. He says: “The danger wasn’t the accident, per se. It was the gasoline dripping from the car and the fact that Joaquin, then upside down, was nervously fumbling for a cigarette, an act I had to talk him out of. “Once I saw the gasoline, I thought the idea of smoking would be a very bad idea.”