I Am the ‘Penis and Vagina’ Kid from the Arnold Schwarzenegger Comedy: An Interview.

Arnold Schwarzenegger is best known as an action movie legend. But, at the height of his cinematic dominance in the late 20th century, he also delivered several genuinely hilarious comedies. The standout film is Kindergarten Cop, which marks its three-and-a-half decade milestone this holiday season.

The Story and An Iconic Moment

In the 1990 movie, Schwarzenegger plays a tough police officer who goes undercover as a kindergarten teacher to catch a killer. Throughout the film's runtime, the procedural element serves as a basic structure for Arnold to have charming moments with his young class. The most unforgettable involves a child named Joseph, who out of nowhere announces and declares the actor, “Males have a penis, females have a vagina.” The Terminator responds dryly, “I appreciate the insight.”

The young actor was portrayed by youth performer Miko Hughes. Beyond this role included a character arc on Full House as the schoolyard menace to the famous sisters and the haunting part of the youngster who comes back in the 1989 adaptation of Stephen King’s Pet Sematary. He still works in film today, with multiple films on the horizon. Furthermore, he frequently attends fan conventions. Recently discussed his recollections from the production 35 years later.

Behind the Scenes

Question: Starting off, how old were you when you filmed Kindergarten Cop?

Miko Hughes: I believe I was four. I was the smallest of all the kids on set.

That's remarkable, I don't recall being four. Do you remember anything from that time?

Yeah, a little bit. They're snapshots. They're like mental photographs.

Do you recall how you landed the job in Kindergarten Cop?

My mother, mainly would accompany me to auditions. Sometimes it was a mass tryout. There'd be 20, 30 kids and we'd all simply wait around, enter the casting office, be in there less than five minutes, read a small part they wanted and that's all. My parents would help me learn the words and then, once I learned to read, that was probably the first stuff I was reading.

Do you have any recollection of meeting Arnold? What was your feeling about him?

He was very kind. He was fun. He was nice, which arguably stands to reason. It would have been odd if he was mean to all the kids in the classroom, that likely wouldn't create a productive set. He was fun to be around.

“It would be strange if he was mean to all the kids in the classroom.”

I was aware he was a huge celebrity because that's what my parents told me, but I had never really seen his movies. I sensed the excitement — it was exciting — but he didn't frighten me. He was merely entertaining and I just wanted to play with him when he had time. He was occupied, of course, but he'd occasionally joke around here and there, and we would cling to his muscles. He'd show his strength and we'd be holding on. He was really, really generous. He bought every kid in the classroom a Sony Walkman, which at the time was the hottest tech. That was the must-have gadget, that funky old yellow cassette player. I used to rock out to the Power Rangers soundtrack and the Ninja Turtles soundtrack for a long time on that thing. It eventually broke. I also received a genuine metal whistle. He had the teacher's whistle, and the kids all were gifted copies as well.

Do you remember your days on set as being fun?

You know, it's amusing, that movie became a phenomenon. It was a huge film, and it was a wonderful time, and you would think, in retrospect, I would want my memories to be of working with Arnold, the legendary director, the location shoot, being on a professional set, but my memories are of being a finitely child at lunch. For example, they got everyone pizza, but I didn't even like pizza. All I would eat was the meat from the top. Then, the Nintendo Game Boy was just released. That was the coolest toy, and I was pretty good at it. I was the smallest kid and some of the older kids would hand me their devices to beat difficult stages on games because I knew how, and I was really proud of that. So, it's all youthful anecdotes.

The Line

OK, the infamous quote, do you remember how it happened? Did you understand the words?

At the time, I wasn't fully aware of what the word taboo meant, but I knew it was provocative and it got a big laugh. I understood it was kind of something I wouldn't usually utter, but I was given approval in this case because it was comedic.

“My mom thought hard about it.”

How it came about, according to family lore, was they hadn't finalized all the dialogue. Certain bits of dialogue were written into the script, but once they had the whole cast on the set, it was more of a collaboration, but they developed it during shooting and, I suppose it's either the director or producers came to my mom and said, "We're thinking. We want Miko to deliver this dialogue. Are you okay with this?" My mom didn't agree right away. She said, "I need to consider this, let me sleep on it" and took a day or two. It was a tough call for her. She said she was hesitant, but she believed it would likely become one of the iconic quotes from the movie and she was right.