David Hasselhoff first strapped into the driver’s seat of a talking car 26 years ago. The concept seemed ridiculous then. It was outrageous. It was absolutely cool. The Knight Industries Two Thousand, or KITT, became the co-star of an action series that ran for four years before burning out.
Last February, the franchise got a fresh coat of paint. A two-hour movie resurrected the property with a supercharged KITT and a new lead in Justin Bruening. He played Mike Traceur, the son of Hasselhoff’s iconic Michael Knight. The movie pulled in 12.7 million viewers during sweeps week. That number made a spin-off the obvious next step. The network gave it the green light.
Then reality set in. Nostalgia might have sold tickets for a movie. It wouldn’t hold a weekly audience. A talking car wasn’t enough either. “Everybody’s car talks now,” series producer Gary Scott Thompson reminded everyone. Thanks to OnStar and GPS, cars are chatty by default. Thompson, a fan of the original, knew better. He needed to catch a generation raised on Transformers, the Batmobile’s evolution into the Batpod in The Dark Knight, and endless video games.
“Audiences won’t sit still for people just talking anymore. There are too many options out there… Our competition is Xbox and Playstation.”
To win over new fans while keeping the old ones, KITT had to be spectacular. The action needed to be fast and furious. Thompson scripted that movie, so he knew what he was talking about. The pacing had to shift. Stories had to entertain.
“We had to make it faster paced,” Thompson noted. The goal was simple. Deliver a 43-minute movie every single week. He argued it could be the biggest show on TV. Stunts. Cars. Visual effects. Special effects. That was the pitch.
Bruening and his team operated out of a high-tech KITT Cave. Deanna Russo, Yancey Arias, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Paul Campbell, Smith Cho, and Bruce Davidson rounded out the squad. The vibe was Mission: Impossible. More tech. More gadgets. More stakes.
But the car remained the star. Undeniable. A lot of work went into turning a sporty black Ford Mustang into the Knight Industries Three Thousand supercar. It wasn’t just a prop. It was the centerpiece.
Smart Car
The new KITT wasn’t just a car that spoke. It was a supercomputer on wheels. The upgrade required blending real automotive engineering with Hollywood magic. The Ford Mustang provided the muscle. The Knight Industries tech provided the brain.
Viewers wanted to see how the car survived crashes. They wanted to see the boost. They wanted the Nitro-Nose. The show had to deliver on the promise of a vehicle that could do what no other car could.
Thompson pushed for practical effects where possible. Real stunts. Real crashes. The digital effects filled in the gaps. The result was a car that felt alive. Not just a robot voice. A personality.
The supporting cast had to keep up. Russo as Gail, Arias as Wilton, Poitier as Don, Campbell as Devon, Cho as Kara, and Davidson as Mr. E. They weren’t just sidekicks. They were part of the machine. The cave was their hub. The car was their weapon.
The competition for attention is fierce. Movies. Hundreds of channels. Video games. The new Knight Rider had to be louder. Faster. Smarter. The talking car trope died. The supercar lived.
Did the audience come for the nostalgia? Yes. Did they stay for the speed? Likely. The line between reality and fiction blurred. GPS gave us voice commands. *
Ray Claridge doesn’t just build cars. He builds legends. His North Hollywood shop, Cinema Vehicles, is where the magic happens for TV and film. The current project? The new KITT.
It’s a Ford Mustang GT 500 under the skin. But make no mistake, this isn’t your average showroom model. “It’s a production car with some tuning and suspension modifications,” Claridge says. Simple enough. But look closer. The design specs came from artist Harald Belker. That means a rear spoiler with lighting. Mirror lights. Strip lights. And the famous “heartbeat lighting” pulsing along the flanks.
Getting it right on the asphalt was a different beast.
“The original design had the front of the car probably an inch and a half off the ground,” Claridge explains. “That isn’t gonna work.”
You can’t drive an inch and a half of clearance everywhere. Hit a bump. Game over. Cracked bumper. Ruined night. So they adjusted. They kept the look. They ensured it could hit the highway. And they worked closely with Ford to preserve the Mustang’s integrity. You still know it’s a Mustang. You see it instantly.
Claridge has built six KITTs so far. Four are “hero” facsimiles for beauty shots and stunts. Two are attack vehicles with serious performance enhancements. The producers wanted practical effects. They did. But time and budget are real enemies in Hollywood. “Television producers have a feature mentality on a beer budget,” Claridge notes. Each car runs about six figures.
Compromises happen. The network wants it all to work mechanically. Reality says no. Some mechanical effects are now CGI. When KITT shifts from normal mode to attack mode? That’s computer-generated imagery. The final product is what matters. KITT has already morphed into other Fords. A pickup truck. A Predator.
Inside, the tech is just as heavy. A touch screen spans the windshield. Like an iPhone. Download info. View 3-D objects while driving. Satellite surveillance tracks anyone, anywhere. KITT learns. Artificial intelligence. Logic-driven. “He’s almost more human than the humans are,” says Thompson.
Then there’s the voice.
It’s not digital. It’s Val Kilmer. Thompson raves about him. “He gives you multiple options and multiple ways every time he says something.” Kilmer records independently. So on set, actor David Hasselhoff (referred to as Bruening in the source text, likely a typo for Hasselhoff or a specific stunt driver/voice actor context, but we stick to the text’s “Bruening”) uses a voice double. Someone who can impersonate Val. Same cadences. Everything.
Does Bruening actually drive the car? Or is it a stunt double? The text leaves that hanging. A good question. Who’s really behind the wheel when KITT speeds down a deserted highway?
Cinema Vehicles isn’t just doing Knight Rider. They operate out of a massive 70,000-square-foot facility. Seven and a half acres. They work on 35 to 50 TV shows at a time. Right now: “Criminal Minds.” “The Sarah Connor Chronicles.” All the “CSI” shows. “24.” “Desperate Housewives.”
Films too. “The Hangover” is in the works. Starring Bradley Cooper.
Over 32 years, Claridge has touched hundreds of cars. His favorite? Eleanor. The 1967 Shelby GT 500. Nicolas Cage drove it in “Gone in 60 Seconds.” An icon. Still grabs attention. Claridge kept one. They don’t always get to keep them. But this time, they did.
Stunts & Logistics
Stunt Driving Lessons for Justin Bruening
The reality of performing high-speed chases is far less glamorous than watching it on screen. Bruening admitted that he and other cast members had to take stunt driving lessons just to handle the safer maneuvers. He’s working closely with Corey Eubanks, his stunt double, to master techniques like reverse 180s. The goal is simple but terrifying: slide a car toward the camera without hitting the crew.
“It’s really nerve-wracking. It’s not that I’m not comfortable behind the wheel, it’s that there’s a group of 30 people standing there, and I have to slide the car to a certain point so I don’t hit them.”
Bruening noted that Eubanks is a pro, capable of maneuvering a vehicle within two inches of a barrel. While he doesn’t expect to match that precision himself, he wants to handle as much of the driving as possible. He performs about 98 percent of the show’s fights, provided there is no risk of serious injury. As a longtime fan of the original Knight Rider, he re-watched the classic series after landing the role. He will be 29 years old on the premiere date, September 24.
Shooting Challenges in Los Angeles
Location shooting in Los Angeles brings its own headaches. Production creator Gary Scott Thompson, who previously produced Las Vegas and wrote The Fast and the Furious, knows the drill. Shutting down freeways, highways, and downtown areas is a logistical nightmare.
“Shutting down freeways and highways and downtown is sort of a pain… It doesn’t make me a popular person.”
The creators face a dual challenge: please the nostalgic fans of the original series while attracting a new, younger demographic. They also need to keep interested viewers engaged who saw the two-hour TV movie. Some characters were added or deleted, and plots were tweaked to support an ongoing narrative rather than a standalone story. Thompson explained that expanding the mythology was necessary to sustain a full series.
Will David Hasselhoff Return?
Fans are asking about David Hasselhoff, who appeared in the TV movie. Thompson acknowledged that some fans might be disappointed by his absence from the main series. However, he stopped short of saying the door is closed. The issue is not dead. The original Knight Rider character could still return in some capacity.
Thompson and his co-executive producers know they can’t please everyone. Their strategy is to focus on lighthearted entertainment. This approach is a direct response to the 2007 Bionic Woman reboot, which Thompson criticized for being too dark and brooding.
“It was fun wish fulfillment, and they forgot about that part. It was dark and brooding. They forgot the fun aspect. It would have been fine for a channel like Sci-fi, but for a network, you’ve got to broaden your horizons and your appeal.”
The goal is to keep things fun and give viewers the coolest car on television.
Justin Bruening’s Real-World Driving Habits
Outside of the set, Bruening insists he is a “pretty damn good” driver. The Nebraska native admits he isn’t impatient in traffic unless he’s in a rush. His first car was a 1976 Chrysler Cordoba. Today, he drives a Mustang, specifically a replica of the model Steve McQueen drove in Bullitt.
His worst habit? Cranking up AC/DC and Metallica while his wife is in the car. She doesn’t appreciate the volume.
More Cool Cars and Links
Related HowStuffWorks Articles
- How the Ford Mustang Works
- How the New Knight Rider Car Works
- How Real Transformers Work
- Mustang Stars in Bullitt
- Inside “The Dark Knight”
More Great Links
- Official “Knight Rider” Web site
- Cinema Vehicle Services
Sources
- Gary Scott Thompson and Justin Bruening interviewed July 21, 2008
- Ray Claridge interviewed August 21, 2008
