Cary Elwes 'recovering well' after being bitten by rattlesnake and airlifted to hospital

The Princess Bride star was hospitalized after encountering a Rattlesnake of Unusual Size.

Cary Elwes has plenty of history with Rodents of Unusual Size, but a different kind of R.O.U.S. gave him a scare over the weekend.

The Princess Bride star was airlifted to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and hospitalized after a rattlesnake bit his finger Saturday. He had been working outside his home in Malibu when the injury occurred.

Elwes shared an update Monday on Twitter letting everyone know he is "recovering well" thanks to the "wonderful folks" who helped him. He even made the R.O.U.S. joke himself when revealing what bit him.

Cary Elwes
Cary Elwes. Ian West/PA Images/Getty

Fair warning, the photo he shared of his injured finger is gnarly, giving a close-up view of the blue, extremely swollen digit. (Check it out at the bottom of this article, if you dare.)

While Elwes didn't deal with any actual rodents or rattlesnakes while making The Princess Bride in 1987, he did get injured a few times during production. During a Reddit AMA in 2014 to promote his book As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride, he revealed that his costar André the Giant convinced him to ride an ATV and he ended up breaking his toe. "It was three weeks before we were due to film the sword fight scene, and so I hadn't fully healed by the time they shot that," he said of his infamous scene with Inigo Montoya (Mandy Patinkin).

Elwes also revealed that he accidentally got knocked out when Christopher Guest hit him in the head with a sword "just a touch harder than either of us anticipated," which ended up being the take used in the movie.

"And that, folks, was the last thing I remember from that day's shoot," Elwes said. "I woke up in the emergency room, still in costume, to the frightening sound of stitches being sewn into my skull… and of course Chris felt absolutely terrible about the whole thing, even though I kept telling him it wasn't his fault. It was my dumb idea… When you see Westley fall to the ground and pass out, that's not acting. That's an overzealous actor actually losing consciousness."

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