Pictures of Whipstaff Manor From the Casper Movie

This is the first feature film to have a fully computer-generated visual effects character in a leading role.

The town of Friendship, Maine is the name of a real village in mid-coast Maine, near Camden and Rockport, where scenes from the movie were filmed.

During filming, Bill Pullman and Christina Ricci had to talk to tennis balls in place of the ghosts, while the ghosts were added later on.

James and Kat Harvey are named after Harvey Comics, the long time publisher of "Casper the Friendly Ghost".

In the mirror scene, Dr. James Harvey was going to transform into Steven Spielberg. Spielberg filmed the cameo, but it was cut for pacing reasons. Spielberg was relieved, feeling he was a terrible actor.

The house that was used for Whipstaff Manor was also used to film scenes from the Backstreet Boys' music video, "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)". Most notably is the ballroom dance sequence from this music video.

The breakfast scene was the first scene animated, which is why Casper and the Ghostly Trio appear more solid when compared to the rest of the movie. In addition, the pancakes Casper serves the Harveys were completely animated, and not actually there on-set.

J.J. Abrams did an uncredited re-write of the screenplay.

After watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) several times, executive producer Steven Spielberg approached its director Steve Barron to direct the film. However, Barron turned it down. He would later admit it was a mistake to turn the offer down.

For the scene where Casper drags Kat out the window and takes her to the lighthouse, Christina Ricci had a piece of fishing line tied to her wrist, to give the appearance of being pulled by a ghost.

A musical scene, titled "Lucky Enough to Be A Ghost," was scripted and filmed, where the three ghosts sang about their mental problems during a session with Dr. James Harvey. It was dropped because the already expensive visual effects would have cost an extra few million dollars.

This is the second movie in which Christina Ricci is the love interest of Devon Sawa (Casper in his human form). The other one is Now and Then (1995).

A deleted portion of the attic scene involved Kat coming across an old photograph of Casper's uncles, Stretch, Fatso, and Stinkie when they were still humans. This was featured and shown in the storybook released alongside the film.

Original director Alex Proyas wanted something unusual for the design of Whipstaff Manor. Production designer Leslie Dilley suggested up front that they should go with a haunted house that's not the usual nineteenth century Victorian design, and designed the Manor based on the style of Antoni Gaudí, a 19th century modernist architect. Whipstaff Manor is primarily inspired by Gaudi's Casa Batlló, a house he designed in Barcelona: the outside of Whipstaff echoes the famous undulating exterior of Batlló with the "whale jaw" balconies the painted diamond "tiling" seen inside the entry mirrors the "dragon scale" roof of Batlló the main room borrows directly from the unique stained glass, woodwork, and organic shapes found on the Noble Floor of Batlló and the swirled ceiling seen in Whipstaff Manor is an almost identical replica of the ceiling in Batlló.

It's implicit in Dr. James Harvey's possession scene by the three ghost uncles that the three cameos (Clint Eastwood, Rodney Dangerfield, and Mel Gibson) match the personalities of each uncle when they were alive (Stretch - Eastwood, Fatso - Dangerfield, and Stinkie - Gibson).

Items from the set were placed on display for many years at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida.

A live-action sequel was proposed, and a preliminary script was drafted, when production wrapped. Unfortunately, Christina Ricci and Bill Pullman were attached to other projects, and would not be available for more than a year. The producers decided to produce a cartoon series instead with The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper (1996).

In an early scene, Casper suggests eating "under the Harvest Moon" in an effort to keep his uncles from discovering the Harveys have moved into their house. Assuming the film's events occur in the same year as its release, this places the Harveys' first night at Whipstaff as Sunday, October 8, 1995, while Kat's first day of school and subsequent trip to the lighthouse with Casper happen on Monday, October 9.

A scene was filmed with Zelda Rubinstein shooting out of a chimney and shouting "Go toward the light!", reprising her role from Poltergeist (1982), but it was cut.

Years after the film's release, Christina Ricci said in a interview "Looking back, that movie sucked. It just didn't make any sense. I'm supposed to fall in love with a ghost? How does that work? And he's like cartoon, well part of him?" She would later claimed that she wanted to move on from children's films as she got older, one of many reason a sequel never happened.

Kat says the mansion would be perfect for Stephen King, a Maine-based writer known for supernatural stories.

Hugh Laurie, Rowan Atkinson, Rik Mayall, John Cleese, Michael Palin, Bill Murray, Steve Martin, Alan Rickman, Bryan Cranston, Jason Alexander, Michael Richards, Daniel Stern, Chevy Chase, Gene Wilder, and Stephen Fry were considered for the role of Paul "Dibs" Plutzker.

Original director Alex Proyas vision of the film was darker, less comedic, and more deconstructionist. He loved the idea of doing a kid's fantasy movie with his favorite film, The Wizard of Oz (1939) as inspiration. In interviews, he wanted Casper to be an opportunity to do a great kid's film with real solid emotional resonance. Unfortunately, it started to move away from his potential and left production under a week before production and the script for his vision was rewritten in late stage of production.

Brad Silberling was hired as a new director, just one week after original director Alex Proyas left production.

John Ritter, Tom Hanks, Dennis Quaid, Kurt Russell, Rene Russo, Robin Williams, Jim Carrey and Tim Allen were offered, but declined the role of Dr. James Harvey.

Early CGI models of Casper were closer to his original look in the comics, with oval eyes with blue rings around them. However, his face made him look more lifeless and off-putting. Steven Spielberg decided to change his look and to give Casper more "sympathetic" looking eyes. (A la E.T.)

Austin O'Brien and Jonathan Taylor Thomas were considered for the voice of Casper.

This is the first live-action movie to feature voice actor Brad Garrett (Fatso). His next five live-action movie voice roles are Luca from Garfield (2004), Easter Island Head from Night at the Museum, Riff Raf from Underdog (2007), Krang from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (2016), and Eeyore from Christopher Robin (2018).

Stretch's name is spoken on-screen only once, when Kat finds the bedroom of the Ghostly Trio.

Sigourney Weaver, Debi Mazar, Michelle Pfeiffer, Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, and Famke Janssen were considered to play Carrigan Crittenden.

This is Brad Silberling's debut movie.

When Dr. James Harvey visits his daughter Kat's chosen room when they first arrived at Whipstaff Manor, he leaves and suddenly trips on the small stairs. This was not part of the script. Bill Pullman did actually trip but kept his composure professionally that it was kept in the movie.

When Carrigan and Dibs first arrive at Whipstaff Manor, the line "What a dump", exclaimed by Carrigan, was improvised by Cathy Moriarty on the spot. It served as an inadvertent reference to Bette Davis's famous line from Beyond the Forest (1949).

Alex Proyas, who was originally set to direct this movie, was interviewed several years later about his time working on the project and described the actually made and released version as directed by Brad Silberling as a missed opportunity, and that any attempt at emotion came off forced.

Rick Moranis was considered for the role of Dr. James Harvey.

Many of the film's elements are inspired by Topper Returns (1941). Both films have a haunted house bequeathed to a woman named Carrington/Carrigan, secret passages below the house, railway tracks leading to the secret lair, and a ghost who befriends the woman who inherits the house.

Devon Sawa said in a 2016 interview that people ask him all the time if he ever uses Casper's line "Can I Keep You?" as a pickup line. He replied, "I haven't said those words since I shot Casper. Never! Never. I'm very shy about stuff like that, so I don't think I could have ever mustered up the courage to use that as a pickup line. But I get it at least once a day. At least! Especially on Twitter. Or someone will tweet me the video like I haven't seen it. It's cute."

Bill Pullman and Devon Sawa appeared in The Guilty (2000).

The sentence being diagrammed on the chalkboard in the classroom reads "Paul Revere and William Dawes saw & warned."

This is Universal Pictures' first live-action/animated hybrid movie. It was rated PG by the MPAA.

When Dr. Harvey is possessed by the ghosts, he turns into the Crypt Keeper at one point. Cathy Moriarty (Carrigan Crittenden) appeared in Tales from the Crypt: Seance (1992).

Christina Ricci previously appeared in The Addams Family (1991) and Addams Family Values (1993) as Wednesday. Both of her cinematic characters in this movie and "The Addams Family" movies are residents of a haunted house.

The vacuum Dr. Harvey trips over and subsequently uses on the ghostly trio is a Kirby Classic III Upright Vacuum in maroon Manufacturered in the 1970's.

Alex Proyas was in talks to direct at one point.

Bill Pullman plays Dr. James Harvey. James is Pullman's middle name in real life.

Dan Aykroyd appears as Dr. Raymond Stantz from the Ghostbusters films, and this was the last time he played the character in a feature film until Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021), 26 years later.

Dan Aykroyd: As Dr. Raymond Stantz from Ghostbusters (1984), who runs out of the house frantically and says, "Who you gonna call? Someone else!" It would later be confirmed by Aykroyd that the movie is canon to the popular "Ghostbusters" series that he stared and created.

Don Novello: As Father Guido Sarducci (from Saturday Night Live (1975)), the Catholic priest Carrigan Crittenden hires to perform an exorcism on the mansion.

Mel Gibson: One of the people into whom Dr. Harvey turns while possessed by The Ghostly Trio.

Clint Eastwood: One of the people into whom Dr. Harvey turns while possessed by The Ghostly Trio.

Rodney Dangerfield: One of the people into whom Dr. Harvey turns while possessed by The Ghostly Trio.

Pictures of Whipstaff Manor From the Casper Movie

Source: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0112642/trivia/?ref_=tt_ql_trv

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