Cool Runnings Cast Remembers John Candy at 90s Con: ‘I Was Expecting to Meet a Movie Star and I Just Met a Person’

It’s time to once again feel the rhythm and feel the rhyme!

Original cast members from popular ’90s sports comedy Cool Runnings — Leon (who played Derice Bannock), Doug E. Doug (who played Sanka Coffie), Rawle D. Lewis (who played Junior Bevil), and Malik Yoba (who played Yul Brenner) — reunited on stage in Connecticut on Saturday, March 29, to discuss the movie and take questions from fans during a 90s Con panel, hosted by PEOPLE’s Dory Jackson.

The cast took a moment to remember John Candy. In the film, former Olympian Irving Blitzer, played by the late actor, coaches a novice four-man bobsleigh team from Jamaica. The movie was one of Candy’s final productions before he died on March 4, 1994.

Yoba explained he was cast for the first iteration of the film, meant to be a drama rather than a comedy, when Candy was cast.

“He was a very sweet man, beautiful man, generous, just a great guy to be around. You know what it is? He was genuinely really happening to be doing this movie. Yeah, because it was a different type of movie for him. It wasn’t a movie which, you know…” he recalled.

“It was a serious movie for him. He lives in comedy and for him, he got to play a very serious role. This movie originally was a very serious movie. They turned it into a comedy.”

Noting they initially cast other actors — including Kurt Russell — in the serious capacity before changing things around, Lewis added, “I think he was so kind. I was expecting to meet a movie star and I just met a person. I think his pathos, his heart, he was just such a great person.”

Cool Runnings, which premiered in 1993, is loosely based on the story of the first Jamaican national bobsleigh team attempting to make it to the 1988 Winter Olympics. The movie was directed by Jon Turteltaub with a screenplay by Lynn Siefert, Tommy Swerdlow and Michael Goldberg, and a story by Siefert and Michael Ritchie.

In 2022, cast members spoke with PEOPLE about the movie’s impact, 30 years after it debuted, and to celebrate a Jamaican bobsled team competing for the Beijing Winter Games — the first time in more than 20 years a bobsled team from the country had competed in the Olympics.

“One of the things that helped us bond was, yes, we’re doing a movie that’s a comedy, but it’s also inspirational,” Robinson told PEOPLE. “But the one thing I think was very clear: We always felt that we were representing Jamaica. From the people that are working on the set, to the people that are bringing us patties and stuff during the day, we always felt like, ‘We must represent Jamaica well.’ ”

“The stories I’ve heard from people that have used it as a means by which to cope with grief, or in school settings and prisons. And I mean all over the world, I can’t even describe. I’ve heard some incredible things,” Doug added of how the film continues to inspire people.

90s Con is running through Sunday, March 30, at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford.