History Trivia / Shrek1

* DuellingMovies: With ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc1'', another monster themed CGI buddy comedy.

* DuellingMovies: With ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc'', another monster themed CGI buddy comedy.

* ApprovalOfGod: Despite its many liberties taken with Creator/WilliamSteig's original book, Steig himself loved the movie. Reportedly, his reaction was something along the lines of, "It's vulgar, it's disgusting — and I love it!". Sadly, this was the only ''Shrek'' movie Steig had a chance to watch, as he died just two years after its release.

** There was going to be a scene shortly after Shrek and Donkey get Fiona out of the dragon's keep that would involve them riding a mine cart like a roller coaster, complete with at least three references to Ride/{{Disneyland}} via the talking skull from ''Ride/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'', the yeti from the ''Ride/MatterhornBobsleds'', and the Bear Band from the ''Ride/CountryBearJamboree''. The storyboards for this scene are included in the DVD.

* WriterRevolt: Well, ''producer'' revolt. Former Disney CEO Creator/JeffreyKatzenberg made this film as a great big "Screw you!" to his previous company and especially his former partner Creator/MichaelEisner, whom he loathed, after Eisner shot down many of Katzenberg's idea and later beat him out of the studio head position. It worked, seeing as how this film put [=DreamWorks=] on the map and ended up indirectly contributing to Eisner being let go by Disney.

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Hoo-boy, did Creator/CartoonNetwork love this movie. Ever since the channel first got the rights to it in the mid-2000s, ''Shrek'' has been frequently shown as a movie when Cartoon Network needs time to fill. It was common to see on the network from 2007 to 2011, when the network would air the film at least once (and sometimes even twice!) a week. To a lesser extent, this also applied to the other Turner networks such as Creator/{{TNT}} and Creator/{{TBS}}.

* CreatorKiller: Not to [=DreamWorks=] itself, but one of the franchise's sources of fuel was all the snark directed towards Creator/{{Disney}} boss and Creator/JeffreyKatzenberg's former superior Creator/MichaelEisner, including having Farquaad be a caricature of him; this movie was one of the multiple punches that eventually knocked Eisner out of the Mouse House in 2005 (nearly losing Creator/{{Pixar}} was the final punch to send him to the floor).

** There was going to be a scene shortly after Shrek and Donkey get Fiona out of the dragon's keep that would involve them riding a mine cart like a roller coaster, complete with at least three references to Disneyland via the talking skull from Pirates of the Caribbean, the yeti from Matterhorn Bobsleds, and the Country Bears. The storyboards for this scene are included in the DVD.
** After Shrek won the tournament in the first film, there was to be a scene where Farquaad explains the quest to Shrek and they're standing side-by-side to show their size comparison ([[AdaptationInducedPlotHole explaining Shrek and Donkey's size jokes to Fiona later in the film]]). Several ideas for that scene include them walking by a garden or having dinner. One was storyboard in which Farquaad shows Shrek and Donkey his desire to turn Duloc into a more modern city with convenient stores and mini-malls, and it shows Farquaad holding the deed to the swamp to entice Shrek to accept.

** In the Brazilian dub, comedian Bussunda was Shrek. When he died in 2006, TheOtherDarrin was also TheOtherMarty: professional dubber Mauro Ramos, whose already recorded track for the first movie served as reference for Bussunda's performance, took over the role in the movies and specials that followed.

* TheOtherMarty: Creator/ChrisFarley was originally cast as Shrek, and even recorded some dialogue. When Farley died, fellow ''SNL'' cast member Mike Myers got his part. Initial reports were that the script was radically reworked after Farley's death and Myers was basically voicing a different character. Unearthed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zYT5hQR4Q4 animatics featuring Farley's Shrek]] show some differences, but not as many as originally thought; the scene is very similar to one in the final film. Myers himself was initially hesitant about accepting the role, because he was friends with Farley, and didn't want to disrespect his memory. He changed his mind after thinking it over.

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Hoo-boy, did Creator/CartoonNetwork love this movie. Ever since the channel first got the rights to it in the mid-2000s, Shrek has been frequently shown as a movie when Cartoon Network needs time to fill. It was common to see on the network from 2007 to 2011, when the network would air the film at least once (and sometimes even twice!) a week. To a lesser extent, this also applied to the other Turner networks such as Creator/{{TNT}} and Creator/{{TBS}}.

* CreatorKiller: Not to [=DreamWorks=] itself, but one of the franchise's sources of fuel was all the snark directed towards Creator/{{Disney}} boss and Jeffrey Katzenberg's former superior Michael Eisner, including having Farquaad be a caricature of him; this movie was one of the multiple punches that eventually knocked Eisner out of the Mouse House in 2005 (nearly losing Creator/{{Pixar}} was the final punch to send him to the floor).

* WriterRevolt: Well, ''producer'' revolt. Former Disney CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg made this film as a great big "Screw you!" to his previous company and especially his former partner Michael Eisner, whom he loathed, after Eisner shot down many of Katzenberg's idea and later beat him out of the studio head position. It worked, seeing as how this film put [=DreamWorks=] on the map and ended up indirectly contributing to Eisner being let go by Disney.

* ApprovalOfGod: Despite its many liberties from William Steig's original book, he loved the movie. Reportedly, his reaction was something along the lines of, "It's vulgar, it's disgusting — and I love it!". Sadly, this was the only ''Shrek'' movie Steig had a chance to watch, as he died just two years after its release.

* AccentDepundent: The pun in Lord Farquaad's name ([[spoiler: that is, "fuckwad"]]). In a rhotic American accent (or indeed, the Scottish one put on by Creator/MikeMyers), his name sounds perfectly innocent.

* RevivalByCommericialization: The film gave a huge amount of renewed attention to Music/LeonardCohen's "Hallelujah" as a result of featuring Music/JohnCale's cover (and Music/RufusWainwright's on the soundtrack album), resulting in the track accelerating in popularity and becoming Cohen's SignatureSong in the public eye.

* ColbertBump: The film gave a huge amount of renewed attention to Music/LeonardCohen's "Hallelujah" as a result of featuring Music/JohnCale's cover (and Music/RufusWainwright's on the soundtrack album), resulting in the track accelerating in popularity and becoming Cohen's SignatureSong in the public eye.

** The four main characters were played by Creator/MikeMyers, Creator/CameronDiaz, Creator/EddieMurphy, and Creator/JohnLithgow - all of whom were BilledAboveTheTitle. Creator/JimCummings, who has a relatively prominent role as the Captain of the Guard, and Creator/FrankWelker, who voices Dragon, are the only voice actors by profession to appear in the film.

* AccentDepundent: An interesting inversion occurs with Lord Farquaad. [[spoiler: that is, "fuckwad"]] In a rhotic American accent (or indeed, the Scottish one put on by Creator/MikeMyers), his name sounds perfectly innocent.

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Hoo-boy, did Creator/CartoonNetwork love this movie. Ever since the channel first got the rights to it in the mid-2000's, Shrek has been frequently shown as a movie when Cartoon Network needs time to fill. It was common to see on the network from 2007 to 2011, when the network would air the film at least once (and sometimes even twice!) a week. To a lesser extent, this also applied to the other Turner networks such as Creator/{{TNT}} and Creator/{{TBS}}.

** It's difficult to imagine just how influential and popular ''Shrek'' was when it first came out, as just about every western animated feature has been influenced by its humor and style, not to mention "proving" that computer animation was the only way to go in the 21st century. In a nutshell, the trend was for such a film to star talking animals [[CelebrityVoiceActor voiced by celebrities]] and featuring pop-culture references and body/toilet humor, i.e. ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'', ''WesternAnimation/OpenSeason'', etc.

** While not as immediately obvious around its release, the film also was a large factor of the death of the movie musical during the 2000's. After the Disney Renaissance films revived the format by making it their bread and butter, the studio slowly transitioned away from them starting with ''WesternAnimation/{{Tarzan}}'' to avoid further criticism of becoming too formulaic. Had that been it, the movie musical might have stood a chance of remaining relevant, but ''Shrek'''s subversive and aggressive use of pop songs had two lasting effects. Firstly, this made every animated movie after its release for close to a decade to rely largely on pop songs for the soundtrack. Secondly, the film's mockery of musical conventions made people not take the format nearly as seriously. These two aftershocks killed theatrical musicals for basically the rest of the 2000's, with the genre being non-existent until the surprise success of ''Film/HighSchoolMusical''. This slowly caused the genre to re-emerge until it was safely declared back with the immense popularity of the songs from Disney's ''WesternAnimation/{{Frozen|2013}}'' in 2013.

** Along with Creator/BlueSkyStudios' ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'', another hugely successful non-Disney CGI film that was released a year later[[note]]Disney would ironically obtain the rights to that film upon buying Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox (Blue Sky's parent company) in March 2019[[/note]], it wound up being the final nail in the coffin for hand-drawn feature film animation in America, which had been on a slow decent in popularity for the later half of the 90s. Dreamworks would close its 2D animation unit in 2003 and Disney would follow suit a year later, allowing the last few 2D movies they'd produced to die a quick, painless death at the box office so they could jump on the CGI bandwagon as quickly as possible. Despite some conceited efforts to keep the art form alive since then, CGI has remained the standard for all American animated features to this day.