History Trivia / TheAddamsfamily

* ChannelHop: Orion originally produced the first film, but the studio's bankruptcy led to them selling the US rights and copyrights to Paramount. Orion retained the international rights, which were licensed to Columbia for distribution. The sequel is produced and released by Paramount outright.
* CreatorCameo: Director Barry Sonnenfeld is seen on the train in the first movie, and is Joel Glicker's father in the sequel.

** Ophelia was originally going to have a brief scene in the first movie. She's still in the finished product, only now in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment (she's the lady dancing with a candle at Fester's party).

** Music/{{Cher}} wanted to play Morticia. This would have provided a nice CastingGag, as Cher and Christina Ricci had previously played mother and daughter in ''Film/{{Mermaids}}''.

** Orion executives wanted Creator/AnthonyHopkins to portray the role of Uncle Fester, according to some behind-the-scenes chatter. Hopkins refused, instead wanting the role of [[Literature/SilenceOfTheLambs a deranged psychopath in another Orion film]].

* ThrowItIn: In ''Addams Family Values'', Joel can't get the arrow knocked into a target with a bow, so he throws the arrow onto the ground. [[https://www.gamespot.com/gallery/the-best-thanksgiving-movie-35-things-you-didnt-know-about-addams-family-values/2900-3636/ According to David Krumholz, who played Joel]], he actually screwed up during that scene in real life, so he had to throw the arrow down onto the ground and walk out, and the directors thought it was hilarious after the scene was filmed.

* ExecutiveMeddling: In a 2016 Yahoo! interview, ''Addams Family Reunion'' director Dave Payne claims that this was the catalyst that ended up causing the movie's downfall, as he had intended to make a darker kids movie version of the familiar universe and characters, but executive producer Haim Saban shot down every single one of his original ideas and instead told the crew to basically imitate as much of the original series and movies as possible, but excise any darker elements and satire present in the latter and aim the production squarely at children.

** An early [[https://youtu.be/IqC4ur1WicQ teaser trailer]] for the first movie begins with footage of another film that's being played in a theater. The character in the film turns and screams at something in the audience. As everyone turns back to look, it is revealed that the entire family is occupying the back row, and they snap their fingers in time to the theme music before the teaser ends. This sequence was shot specifically for the teaser, and features Creator/ChristopherLloyd in early makeup for Uncle Fester. This is a wonderful example of ShownTheirWork: This is based off a New Yorker cartoon by Creator/CharlesAddams, completely unrelated to the family at that!

** Music/MichaelJackson was planned to write a horror-themed song for ''Values'' along with a promotional music video using clips from the film. However, plans for this were dropped due to contractual disputes between Paramount and Epic Records (it's commonly purported that these plans were dropped because of Jackson's child molestation accusations in late 1993, though there's no evidence to support this theory). The song would eventually be released four years later on Jackson's album ''[[Music/HIStoryPastPresentAndFutureBookI Blood on the Dance Floor: History in the Mix]]'' as "Is it Scary," and served as a basis for the song "Ghosts" on the same album.

* TheCastShowoff: Creator/RaulJulia gets a full song ([[https://youtu.be/Mw0IakmQri0 The Mamushka!]]) in the first film and [[https://youtu.be/NIDabDkcS8o an extended tango sequence]] with Anjelica Houston in the second film seemingly for no real reason other than to show off Julia's Broadway-honed singing and dancing skills.

** Ophelia was originally going to have a brief scene in the first movie.

* CreatorCameo: Director Barry Sonnenfeld is seen on the train in the first movie, and is Gary's father in the sequel.

** Music/{{Cher}} wanted to play Morticia. Creator/KimBasinger was initially cast, but dropped out to do another film.

* AdaptationSequence: Newspaper Comic —> TV show —> Cartoon —> Video Game —> Movie —> TV show loosely based on movie —> Video Game —> Sequel to movie —> Broadway Musical

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: After Illumination Entertainment obtained the rights to Charles Addams' original cartoons, there was a planned stop-motion animated film with Creator/TimBurton calling the shots. As of July 2013, the project has been cancelled.

* TroubledProduction: Ooooh boy, here we go;
** Problems began with producer Scott Rudin, who at the time was head of production at Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox, who initially pitched the film to his colleagues. However, the franchise's right were held by Creator/OrionPictures (by virtue of their merger with Creator/{{Filmways}} in 1982), and Fox was unable to purchase the rights due to Orion's plans to create a new television series.
** Pre-production finally began after Charles Addams' ex-wife sold her portion of the rights to Orion, who at that point had scrapped their idea for a series and instead decided to make a feature film. Rudin left Fox to serve as producer, and a screenplay was penned by Caroline Thompson and Larry Wilson (of ''Film/EdwardScissorhands'' & ''Film/{{Beetlejuice}}'' fame), with additional material by an uncredited Paul Rudnick, who would go onto write the sequel ''Addams Family Values''. Several rewrites followed, and after Creator/TimBurton passed the director's chair, it was taken up by Barry Sonnenfeld, who at the time had only ever worked as a cinematographer and had no directorial experience. Sonnenfeld's lack of experience proved to a problem, as he repeatedly had on-set panic attacks and lost 13 pounds in less than 10 weeks. Sonnenfeld asked Rudin to let him go, but the producer refused.
** Three months prior to the end of principal photography, director of photography Owen Roizman suddenly quit and had to be replaced by Gale Tattersall, who had to be rushed to the hospital just weeks later and was replaced by Sonnenfeld himself.
** Raul Julia missed several days of shooting after a blood vessel in his eye burst, and Sonnenfeld had to split his time between Los Angeles and New York after his wife fell ill with several weeks of shooting left.
** During principal photography, Orion Pictures began suffering serious financial issues after a string of expensive flops, and in an effort to recoup their losses sold the film to Creator/{{Paramount}} Pictures mid-shoot after the film went over-budget.
** Problems followed the film after release. Orion had failed to sell the film's full foreign distribution rights to Paramount, and in turn were inherited by Creator/{{MGM}} (which bought Orion in 1997), who in some territories have their properties distributed on home media by 20th Century Fox. As a result, the film didn't receive a DVD release outside of North America or the United Kingdom until 2013.

* TheCastShowoff: Creator/RaulJulia gets a full song [[https://youtu.be/Mw0IakmQri0 (The Mamushka!)]] in the first film and [[https://youtu.be/NIDabDkcS8o an extended tango sequence]] with Anjelica Houston seemingly for no real reason other than to show off Julia's Broadway-honed singing and dancing skills.

* RoleReprisal:

* CreatorCameo: Director Creator/BarrySonnenfeld has an uncredited appearance as the passenger of Gomez's train replica and composer Marc Shaiman appears in the "Mamushka" scene as the redbeard music conductor.

* ActorAllusion: The 1960s TV episode "Morticia The Breadwinner" contains one to Morticia's actress, Carolyn Jones, whereupon Morticia and Uncle Fester are deciding on a good assumed name they can use to call Gomez's stockbroker: 'Jones?' asks Morticia. 'What kind of a name is that?!' replies Uncle Fester irritably.

* PlayingGertrude: Carol Kane is ''26 years younger'' than the actress she [[TheOtherDarrin Darrined]], making her younger than either Huston or Julia.

** Pre-production finally began after Charles Addams' ex-wife sold her portion of the rights to Orion, who at that point had scrapped their idea for a series and instead decided to make a feature film. Rudin left Fox to serve as producer, and a screenplay was penned by Caroline Thompson and Larry Wilson (of ''Film/EdwardScissorhands'' & ''Film/Beetlejuice'' fame), with additional material by an uncredited Paul Rudnick, who would go onto write the sequel ''Addams Family Values''. Several rewrites followed, and after Creator/TimBurton passed the director's chair, it was taken up by Barry Sonnenfeld, who at the time had only ever worked as a cinematographer and had no directorial experience. Sonnenfeld's lack of experience proved to a problem, as he repeatedly had on-set panic attacks and lost 13 pounds in less than 10 weeks. Sonnenfeld asked Rudin to let him go, but the producer refused.

* RoleReprisal: The series had new actors for most of the family, but had Jackie Coogan and Ted Cassidy once again reprise their roles as Uncle Fester and Lurch. John Astin returned to his role as Gomez in the 1973 cartoon.

* WagTheDirector: According to director Creator/BarrySonnenfeld, in the first film, [[spoiler:Gordon Craven ''wasn't'' supposed to have been Fester all along, [[http://www.vulture.com/2012/04/barry-sonnenfeld--men-in-black-3.html but still an imposter]], though the family would've accepted him as Fester anyway, as, in Sonnenfeld's words, "...family wasn't about blood, it was about love."]] Sonnenfeld described Creator/AnjelicaHuston as "passionately against" the idea and Creator/RaulJulia as "outraged" (though funnily enough Creator/ChristopherLloyd himself didn't care either way), and in the end, the cast chose ten-year-old Creator/ChristinaRicci to convince Sonnenfeld to change the ending.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: As stated above, a third film was planned, but Raul Julia succumbed to his stomach cancer in 1994, and the film never came about since Julia was deemed irreplaceable.

** An early [[https://youtu.be/IqC4ur1WicQ teaser trailer]] for the first movie begins with footage of another film that's being played in a theater. The character in the film turns and screams at something in the audience. As everyone turns back to look, it is revealed that the entire family is occupying the back row, and they snap their fingers in time to the theme music before the teaser ends. This sequence was shot specifically for the teaser, and features Creator/ChristopherLloyd in early makeup for Uncle Fester.
*** This is a wonderful example of ShownTheirWork: This is based off a New Yorker cartoon by Creator/CharlesAddams, completely unrelated to the family at that!

* StarMakingRole: Creator/ChristinaRicci's beloved performance as Wednesday in the first two movies made her not only a star, but also a 90's goth icon.

** Creator/TimBurton was originally set to direct.