In 2001, adventure comedy Joe Dirt hit the screen with David Spade in the lead as an anti-hero of sorts, who in the end turns out to be the actual hero, winning people over with his kindness and goodness.
More than the movie, what caught the audience’s eye was the car that Spade drove in the movie, a 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona. For those who know their classic cars, this Dodge was one cool, classic car and comes very expensive. Two engines were used to power the car, although both the versions fall in the six-figure territory, with the 6.9-liter Hemi having crossed $900,000 in an auction.
In the movie premise, the car is more of a substitute for Dirt’s actual hero car, his ’67 Plymouth GTX Hemi convertible.
The movie car also seemed like an utter wreck, with body panels in different colors and lots of rust everywhere. Was that the true picture? And if so, where is the Dodge Daytona from Joe Dirt now?
That Dodge Charger Daytona Of Joe Dirt
In the movie Joe Dirt, produced by Adam Sandler and starring David Spade, Christopher Walken, and Adam Beach, Dirt is a janitor who decides to look for his parents in a criss-cross ride across the country. He wears a mullet hairdo that was installed on his head as a baby because the top of his skull never formed.
In the movie, he basically comes across as a loser, an under-achiever, but slowly as the plot progresses, his good traits are revealed and his friends become his family. One of the funniest scenes of the movie, at least in terms of car prices, is when he is unable to retrieve his mint-condition Plymouth GTX from the impound lot, and decided to buy a Dodge Charger Daytona for $450 instead.
Any car muscle aficionado would either be affronted over this or be rolling on the floor, laughing at what the scriptwriters tried to pass off as reality. Even a wrecked Dodge Daytona would cost a few thousand, and none of them could ever be bought for $450! Most cost more than $100,000…
Only 503 of these were ever made, just the right number to qualify for NASCAR. Only 70 of these bore the 6.9-liter Hemi, the rest came with the 7.2-liter V8. In 1969, the Daytona aced NASCAR, becoming the first car to break the 200mph barrier, in the able hands of Buddy Baker. Another NASCAR champion, Bobby Isaac took it all the way to 217.368 mph, setting a new land speed record at the Bonneville salt flats.
The Charger Daytona in Joe Dirt looks old and rusted but it's anything but. Underneath all that fake rust and deliberately dull movie paint, lies a mint condition 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona, bearing a 7.2-liter V8 that jets 365 horses in stock form. Quite the catch and the good thing is, the car survived the movie perfectly.
Where’s That Daytona Now?
The Daytona also came with a ton of movie props. Whosoever got the car also got a Joe Dirt lobby card as well as the original call sheet for 24 June 2000. Some invoices, an indemnity certificate for the car, and Joe Dirt’s lumberjack jacket and red tee were also a part of the same along with plenty of other things. It was listed on CaliforniaClassix for sale, and they later updated their website with the information that it had been sold in 2002 for a mere $18,000, in the same condition it was in the movie itself.
Later, a Dutch company, PTTM Garage, as in Pedal To The Metal Garage listed the car as sold to one of their private clients, for an undisclosed amount, after they tracked down and persuaded the original owner to sell it to them. The car is not for sale, and the owner seems to be keeping it as a forever buy.
The other movie memorabilia that was sold with the car is also displayed at the PTTM Garage, and it’s worth the look…
The Dodge Charger For Joe Dirt, As In, David Spade
When it comes to David Spade and the Dodge Charger Daytona, there’s another more recent and expensive connection. A fully restored mint condition 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona, bearing the legendary 6.9-liter Hemi passed through Mecum Auctions in 2015 and was grabbed for a whopping $900,000. For the Dodge Charger Daytona, these monies are a benchmark, even for a rare classic car.
And who bought it? None other than Joe Dirt, David Spade himself, who bought this Copper Metallic beauty but finds it too beautiful to drive around. As he later stated, he would probably just park it in his garage and spray it with Armor oil all day long, or drive it to the Beverly Center and stand on its hood!
Sources: CaliforniaClassix, PTTMGarage, FoxNews