Here are 25 kickass Steven Spielberg facts.
1-5 Steven Spielberg Facts
1. Steven Spielberg completed his degree course, 33 years after dropping out, by submitting Schindler’s List as his final project. – Source
2. Steven Spielberg promised Tom Sizemore a role in Saving Private Ryan as long as he never failed a drug test while shooting. If he failed once, even on the last day, Spielberg promised to kick him out of the movie and reshoot all of his scenes with a new actor. – Source
3. Believing that his comic strip, ‘Calvin and Hobbes,’ only works in print form, cartoonist Bill Watterson has refused to ever sell the film rights to his comics and has turned down offers from Steven Spielberg and Pixar. – Source
4. After Drew Barrymore posed nude in Playboy at age 19, her godfather, Steven Spielberg, sent her a quilt for her 20th birthday with a note that said “cover yourself up”. Enclosed were also the Playboy pictures, altered by his art department to make her appear fully clothed. – Source
5. When Steven Spielberg first saw a CGI animatic of the T. rex chasing a herd of Gallimimus, he told the go motion creator on set “you’re out of a job”, who in turn replied, “don’t you mean extinct?” The dialogue was later written into the script as a conversation between Malcolm and Grant. – Source
6-10 Steven Spielberg Facts
6. Steven Spielberg still gets 2.5% of profits from Star Wars because while visiting the sets of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, George Lucas thought that movie would be a bigger hit than Star Wars. Spielberg disagreed and they both decided to trade 2.5% profit on each other’s films. – Source
7. Steven Spielberg asked to do a James Bond movie but was refused. When he told George Lucas he was going to ask again, Lucas said “I’ve got something better than that. It’s called Raiders of the Lost Ark.” – Source
8. Steven Spielberg waited 10 years after being given the story Schindler’s List to make the film, as he didn’t feel mature enough at the time. – Source
9. When Steven Spielberg was to be awarded his honorary doctorate from USC’s Cinematic Arts school, he agreed to accept only if it was personally signed by the admissions officer who rejected him for an average “C” grade when he applied there as an aspiring film student. – Source
10. Chris Pratt joked about Steven Spielberg giving him the lead in Jurassic Park 4, in 2010. – Source
11-15 Steven Spielberg Facts
11. Steven Spielberg declined to direct the Harry Potter movies and said “It’s just like withdrawing a billion dollars and putting it into your personal bank accounts. There’s no challenge.” – Source
12. Steven Spielberg beat James Cameron to the film rights to Jurassic Park by “a few hours” and Cameron’s version of the movie would have been “nastier, much nastier”. – Source
13. Steven Spielberg often asks his stars to forego a fee in favor of a percentage of the gross profits. Tom Cruise took 15% of ‘Minority Report’, amounting to $53.7 million. – Source
14. Steven Spielberg had acquired the rights to Ghost in the Shell, which will be made into a live action movie that is prospected to have Scarlett Johanson as leading actress. – Source
15. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were both executive producers on The Land Before Time. – Source
16-20 Steven Spielberg Facts
16. Steven Spielberg is the creator of the Medal of Honor video game series. – Source
17. Steven Spielberg made the Indiana Jones movies as revenge for being rejected from directing a James Bond movie. – Source
18. Steven Spielberg initially considered filming Schindler’s List entirely in German and Polish but decided he “wanted people to watch the images, not read subtitles. There’s too much safety in reading. It would have been an excuse to take their eyes off the screen and watch something else.” – Source
19. Steven Spielberg refused to take a salary for making Schindlers List, & instead relinquished all profits to create a Holocaust Survivor’s charity. Fearing the low budget film would be a flop, the studio agreed to fund it only if he helped them with another project the same year – Jurassic Park. – Source
20. Steven Spielberg purposely did not allow Matt Damon to attend the pre-production Boot Camp for actors in Saving Private Ryan so the remaining cast would build up genuine resentment for his character. – Source
21-25 Steven Spielberg Facts
21. Robin Williams called and told jokes to Steven Spielberg every two weeks during the filming of Schindler’s List to cheer him up. – Source
22. A struggling Vin Diesel wrote, directed and starred in a short film which was screened at the 1995 Cannes film festival. Later, after seeing it, Steven Spielberg was so impressed he created the role of Private Caparzo in Saving Private Ryan specifically for him. – Source
23. In 1984, due to the complaints of the gore in “Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom” and “Gremlins”, Steven Spielberg requested that the MPAA create a new category, called PG13, for movies that have too much adult content to be rated PG, but not enough to be rated R. – Source
24. Steven Spielberg stepped down from his position on the advisory board for the Boy Scouts of America because of his disapproval of the organization’s anti-homosexuality stance. – Source
25. Steven Spielberg was so impressed by a McDonald Ad about pee wee football that aired during the 1992 Super Bowl, he contacted the advertising executives to turn it into a full-length movie. “Little Giants” was the result. – Source