History Trivia / TheExorcist

** Jason Miller was a stage actor who had never been in a film before. Creator/WilliamFriedkin cast him after seeing him in a production of ''Theatre/ThatChampionshipSeason'' and thought he "reeked of failed Catholicism".

** Jason Miller, who played exorcist Father Karras, lived in a Jesuit seminary for a while to totally immerse himself in the manners and mind-set of a Catholic priest. A senior Jesuit who felt the film's subject matter was just asking for trouble gifted Miller a protective amulet of the Virgin Mary, and explicitly warned him that there would be trouble ahead. A day or two later, Miller's eldest son was critically injured in a road accident.

** The film has been dubbed into Portuguese four times, with Newton da Matta dubbing over Jason Miller in all four versions.

** The producers sought to have Creator/JamieLeeCurtis audition for Regan [=MacNeil=] but her mother Creator/JanetLeigh refused. Creator/KimBasinger, Creator/LauraDern, Creator/DeniseNickerson, Creator/MelanieGriffith, Creator/BrookeShields, and Creator/SharonStone were also considered.

** Creator/EduardoGarza, the voice director for the third Mexican Spanish dub of ''The Exorcist'', remembers that strange things happened to him during the production. He had two popped tires. The door to his home was banging by itself. He found himself locked in a cabin. There were strange noises in the dub's audio that he couldn't remove. His lights went out, and his VCR turned on by itself.

* HarsherInHindsight:
** Paul Bateson, a radiology technician who plays the tech who assists with Regan's angiography in the film later became much better known for being a serial killer in real-life. His story was the inspiration for Creator/WilliamFriedkin's later film ''Film/{{Cruising}}''.
** Father William O'Malley, who played Father Dyer and served as a theological advisor for the film, was a theology and drama teacher who was later accused of sexually abusing one of his students.

* PosthumousCredit: Jack [=MacGowran=], who played Blake Dennings, died several months before the film was released.

* QueerCharacterQueerActor: Marcus is gay like his actor Ben Daniels. In season 2, the lesbian Verity is played by Creator/BriannaHildebrand who identifies as queer.

* BillingDisplacement: Creator/MaxVonSydow only appears in the movie during the prologue and the last twenty minutes, but is billed second, despite Jason Miller and Linda Blair's characters being the main focus of the film. The reason for this is likely because von Sydow was already well known, and Miller and Blair were screen newcomers. Plus the fact that he ''was'' the title character.

** In the arteriogram scene, the bearded man who assists the doctor is Paul Bateson. He was an x-ray technician at NYU Medical Center where that scene was shot and managed to get that small part.

** Paul Bateson, a radiology technician who plays the tech who assists with Regan's spinal tap in the film later became much better known for being a serial killer in real-life. His story was the inspiration for Creator/WilliamFriedkin's later film ''Film/{{Cruising}}''.

** The supposed curse continued even long after the film wrapped. A few years later, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Bateson Paul Bateson]], the real-life radiological technician who talks Regan through the angiography, was convicted of murdering a man who picked him up at a bar.[[note]]He has also been implicated in some unsolved serial murders at the same time, although the evidence connecting him to them is very thin. Coincidentally, said series of murders provided the inspiration for [[Film/{{Cruising}} a later movie directed by Friedkin]][[/note]]

* TheWikiRule: [[http://exorcist.wikia.com/wiki/The_Exorcist_Wiki The Exorcist Wiki]].

* OldShame: Father William O'Malley refers to this movie to students as the "pornographic horror film" he once did.

* TropeNamer;
** ExorcistHead
** ThatThingIsNotMyChild

* CrossDressingVoices: Male demon Pazuzu's voice while possessing Regan is voice-dubbed over by actress Mercedes [=McCambridge=], not that [[ContraltoOfDanger you'd]] [[VocalDissonance be particularly able to tell.]]

* DarkhorseCasting: you

** Paul Bateson, a radiology technician who plays the tech who assists with Regan's spinal tap in the film later became much better known for being a serial killer in real-life. His story was the inspiration for Creator/WilliamFriedkin's later film ''Film/Cruising''.

* ScrewedByTheNetwork: Tragically so. Following Fox's merger with Disney, ''The Exorcist'' ended up being one of the shows unfortunately axed, leaving the series hanging on a rather bleak cliffhanger.

* WriteWhoYouKnow: Chris [=MacNeil=] is based on William Peter Blatty's friend Creator/ShirleyMacLaine, and her marital situation on [=MacLaine=]'s then-husband having left for Europe determined to not live in his wife's shadow. What's weird, is that nobody even cares to try and contact him because of his daughter's worsening health to the risk of DEATH. This caused Sachiko [=MacLaine=] Parker a bit of trouble, as numerous people had heard Blatty had based Chris on Shirley and assumed that Sachiko had been sick or possessed. Shirley is pretty sure that the original cover photo on the first edition of the book is Sachiko, although officially it's the daughter of Blatty's editor.

* OnSetInjury: Creator/EllenBurstyn received a spinal injury while making the film. In the sequence where she is thrown away from Reagan, a harness jerked her hard away from the bed. She fell on her coccyx and screamed in pain.

** Jason Miller, who played exorcist Father Karras, lived in a Jesuit seminary for a while to totally immerse himself in the manners and mind-set of a Catholic priest. A senior Jesuit who felt the film's subject matter was just asking for trouble gifted Miller a protective amulet of the Virgin Mary and explicitly warned him that there would be trouble ahead. A day or two later, Miller's eldest son was critically injured in a road accident.

** Elien Dietz played both Regan in certain scenes (e.g. the vomiting scene), and the disembodied form of Pazuzu (white-faced demon).

** According to Wiki/TheOtherWiki, Creator/AnissaJones, eager to shed her childish public persona, tried out, but Friedkin thought ''Series/FamilyAffair'' was too close to the public memory, and audiences would think "Buffy" was being possessed.

* ColbertBump: An example from well before Colbert. After the book was published in 1971, it wasn't a particularly great seller...Until the author appeared as a last-minute guest on Dick Cavett's talk show. The book hit the NYT bestseller list after that.

* CrossDressingVoices: Male demon Pazuzu's voice while possessing Regan is voice-dubbed over by actress Mercedes McCambridge, not that [[ContraltoOfDanger you'd]] [[VocalDissonance be particularly able to tell.]]

** This was [[https://www.daimonologia.org/2020/10/vasiliki-maliaros-greek-who-played.html Vasiliki Maliaros]]' only film appearance. She was discovered by Friedkin in a Greek restaurant. [Either she had never acted before, or had only been on the stage, accounts vary.] Friedkin selected her because she bore an uncanny resemblance to his own mother and William Peter Blatty felt she resembled his mother, too.

* DarkhorseCasting:

* WriteWhoYouKnow: Chris [=MacNeil=] is based on William Peter Blatty's friend Creator/ShirleyMacLaine, and her marital situation on [=MacLaine=]'s then-husband having left for Europe determined to not live in his wife's shadow. What's weird, is that nobody even cares to try and contact him because of his daughter's worsening health to the risk of DEATH. This caused Sachiko [=MacLaine=] a bit of trouble, as numerous people had heard Blatty had based Chris on Shirley and assumed that Sachiko had been sick or possessed. Shirley is pretty sure that the original cover photo on the first edition of the book is Sachiko, although officially it's the daughter of Blatty's editor.

** Jack [=MacGowran=], who played Blake Dennings, is probably the most famous "victim" of the curse, as he died within a few months of finishing his work on the movie at age 54.[[note]]Some sources erroneously claim that he died during filming.[[/note]] However, [=MacGowran=]'s death has a fairly mundane explanation: he had survived a severe case of the flu the previous year and the stress of working on the film, along with his work on a Broadway production of ''Theatre/ThePloughAndTheStars'' in New York, caused a relapse and complications which ultimately proved fatal.