Trivia / Ghost (1990)

• Completely Different Title : In Korean, its 'Love and Soul'
• Creator's Oddball: Directed by one of the Zucker brothers. Yes, those Zucker brothers.
• Dueling Works:
  • With Truly, Madly, Deeply as romantic films with ghostly lovers. Eerily, the romantic leads, Patrick Swayze and Alan Rickman, would both die from pancreatic cancer.
  • Also with Ghost Dad as both movies featured a ghost as a main character. Ghost was released two weeks after Ghost Dad which got trounced at the box office.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Demi Moore cropped her long hair to a Boyish Short Hair do for the film.
• Friendship on the Set: After Whoopi Goldberg was cast as Oda Mae Brown at the urging of Patrick Swayze, despite the two never having even met beforehand, they became very fast friends and would remain so until Swayze's death.
• I Am Not Spock: Tony Goldwyn recalled to the A.V. Club in 2014 that his role as the conniving and murderous Carl prompted a waitress to refuse to serve him. He couldn't figure out why she was shooting him death stares, until she finally asked him if he was an actor.
  Tony Goldwyn: She said, "I'm so sorry! I knew I hated you, but I didn't know where from, and because I couldn't place who you were."
• Looping Lines: Gets really obvious when Carl is chasing Molly and Oda Mae in the climax, as actor Tony Goldwyn's face is clearly visible in multiple shots where his lips aren't moving while his character is yelling after the two women.
• Star-Making Role:
  • The film turned Demi Moore into the highest paid actress in Hollywood at the time. Prior to this film, while she was a well-known actress, she wasn't a bankable star.
  • While Whoopi Goldberg has proven her dramatic chops in Steven Spielberg's adaptation of The Color Purple and had starred in a few comedies, this was her first really big success as a comic actress. She won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar as Oda Mae and quickly became one of Hollywood's most bankable female leads; the success of Ghost led to the creation of Sister Act (Sister Act 2 made her, much like Moore before her, Hollywood's highest-paid actress) and Goldberg getting to host the Academy Awards as the first-ever female solo host of the show.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Kim Basinger, Geena Davis, Helen Hunt, Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Andie MacDowell, Madonna, Michelle Pfeiffer, Molly Ringwald, Meg Ryan, Mary Steenburgen, and Kathleen Turner were all considered for the role of Molly Jensen. The part went to Demi Moore largely because she has the ability to cry out of either eye on cue.
  • Some other actors who were considered for the role of Sam were Kevin Bacon, Alec Baldwin, Nicolas Cage, Kevin Costner, Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp, David Duchovny, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Tom Hanks, Paul Hogan, Dennis Quaid, Mickey Rourke, John Travolta, and Bruce Willis (Demi Moore's real-life husband at the time). Director Jerry Zucker initially felt that Patrick Swayze would be completely wrong for the role, but Swayze did so well during his audition that Zucker offered him the role on the spot.
  • Whoopi Goldberg almost turned down the role of Oda Mae, until Patrick Swayze convinced her and the producers that she'd be perfect. She ended up winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Tina Turner and Oprah Winfrey were up for the part.
  • Eddie Murphy was considered for a part, but his agent turned it down for him.

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