Trivia / Thinner

• Creator Backlash: The director of the film wasn't happy with the ending, which differed from the book. See below.
• Distanced from Current Events: The film was in Development Hell for six years because studio execs worried that Billy's curse would hit too close to home for people affected by the AIDS crisis.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Robert John Burke lost twenty pounds for Billy's thinner scenes, and naturally wore a Fat Suit for before the curse. Depending on what stage of Billy's condition he was filming, he could spend up to six hours in the make-up chair.
• Executive Meddling:
  • A sad example. Director Tom Holland was diagnosed with bell's palsy during filming. If he had gotten an immediate steroid injection, he would have been fine. But execs insisted he keep working, meaning it was thirty-six hours before he could see a doctor. It took him a year and a half to fully recover.
  • The original ending was the same as the book's, but test audiences hated it. As a result, they added in a bit more of Billy deciding to kill Dr Mikey with the pie too.
• Inspiration for the Work: The book came about because of Stephen King's own weight problems.
• Production Posse: Director Tom Holland had previously worked with Lempke's actor Michael Constantine on an episode of Combat! when Holland was an actor credited as "Tom Fielding" with Constantine also playing a vengeful character like his character in this film.
• Science Marches On: At the start of the novel, Billy Halleck weighs in at 249 lbs. and is considered massively overweight by nearly everyone he meets with his Doctor in particular chiding him (mentioning his risk for a heart attack). In The New '10s in America his weight wouldn't be commented on quite so drastically. The 1996 film version boosts Billy's weight to an even 300 lbs. to emphasize his mass due to Robert John Burke's height. ^note  Part of Stephen King's inspiration for the book was a routine visit to the doctor's office where he was told "I don't know if you've noticed, but you've entered Heart Attack Country" due to his heavy smoking and being slightly overweight. King grudgingly lost the weight and quit smoking, but his Doctor's line made it into the book verbatim.
• Typecasting: John Horton plays Judge Carey, having previously played a judge in The Shawshank Redemption (another Stephen King adaptation).
• Underage Casting: Michael Constantine was in his late sixties playing Tadzu Lempke. Justified because you'd be hard pressed to find a 106-year-old actor, and Lempke is supposed to look younger than his real age.
• What Could Have Been:
  • At one point the film was going to have some gruesome SFX make-up for Billy Halleck to have his flesh dangling off his jaw and cheekbones. They scrapped it because it was too horrific.
  • Dino De Laurentis was planning to produce the film, with Sam Raimi directing, after completing Maximum Overdrive (another Stephen King adaptation). But they ended up committed to Evil Dead 2.

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