94 Fun Facts About Casper

In the 1995 film, Casper haunts a mansion called Whipstaff Manor in which small town?

Friendship, Maine is a real coastal town, but Whipstaff Manor's crumbling interiors were sets built on a studio lot in California.

Which actress plays Kat Harvey, the teenager Casper falls for?

Christina Ricci, fresh from playing Wednesday Addams, took her first leading role as Kat and spent the shoot acting opposite ghosts that were only animated in afterwards.

Who plays Dr. James Harvey, the ghost therapist hired to clear Whipstaff Manor in Casper (1995)?

Bill Pullman plays Dr. James Harvey, a widowed therapist to ghosts who takes the Whipstaff job hoping to reach his late wife; a year later he was the US president in Independence Day.

Who plays Carrigan Crittenden, the greedy heiress left only a haunted manor in Casper (1995)?

Cathy Moriarty, an Oscar nominee for Raging Bull, plays Carrigan Crittenden; she came back to the series three years later as a different character, one of the witch aunts in Casper Meets Wendy.

Which Monty Python member plays Dibs, Carrigan's lawyer, in Casper (1995)?

Eric Idle plays Dibs, Carrigan's lawyer and sidekick, who is flung out of a window when he tries to double-cross her over the treasure.

In Casper (1995), what does Casper ask a sleepy Kat, a line he repeats at the dance?

'Can I keep you?' is first whispered to a half-asleep Kat; when the boy she is dancing with says it again, she realises he is Casper.

Which young actor plays Casper in human form for the dance with Kat?

Devon Sawa is on screen only for the closing dance and its kiss; months later he and the same co-star shared another screen kiss in the coming-of-age film Now and Then.

In the backstory the 1995 film gives him, what killed 12-year-old Casper McFadden?

Pneumonia after playing in the cold: he begged his father for a sled, stayed out on it all day until dark and fell ill, then lingered as a ghost so that his dad would not be lonely.

What is the name of the machine Casper's inventor father built to bring the dead back to life?

The Lazarus was built by Casper's father, who told the newspapers his dead son was haunting him; its formula holds just enough to bring one ghost back.

In Casper (1995), what does the 'treasure' hidden in Whipstaff Manor turn out to be?

A baseball signed by Duke Snider, Casper's favourite player: the map was part of a game with his dad, and Carrigan, her business finished, is swept into the afterlife as she claims it.

Casper gives up his one chance to live again in order to do what?

Bring Dr. Harvey back to life: the doctor dies in a drunken fall, and seeing Kat's grief, Casper gives him the machine's only dose instead of using it himself.

In Casper (1995), what do Casper's ghostly uncles call living people?

Fleshies is the uncles' word for the living: one of them greets the Harveys' first breakfast by declaring that he loves the smell of fleshies in the morning, a spoof of Apocalypse Now's napalm line.

Which future Everybody Loves Raymond star voices Casper's uncle Fatso in the 1995 film?

Brad Garrett, a year before he began playing Robert Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond, voiced the gluttonous Fatso; all three uncle voices returned for the animated spin-off series.

Which Ghostbuster makes an uncredited cameo in Casper (1995), fleeing the haunted manor?

Ray Stantz, played once more by Dan Aykroyd, bolts from the house with the line 'Who you gonna call? Someone else', after an exorcist has already failed to shift the ghosts.

Who directed Casper, in his feature debut?

Brad Silberling had only directed television; he was hired on the strength of one half-hour episode of Brooklyn Bridge, and protested that he knew nothing about animation.

Despite its haunted-house story, Casper (1995) opened in US cinemas over which holiday weekend?

Memorial Day weekend launched Casper at number one in May 1995: the ghost story was sold as a summer blockbuster, and it went on to take almost $300 million worldwide.

Which future executive producer of Lost did an uncredited rewrite of the Casper script?

J. J. Abrams, a young screenwriter with Regarding Henry and Forever Young behind him, spent the first two weeks of the shoot in the director's trailer, turning out new pages.

Besides Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson and Rodney Dangerfield, who appears in Dr. Harvey's mirror transformations in Casper (1995)?

The Crypt Keeper, the cackling host of Tales from the Crypt, ends the gag as a real puppet, worked on set by the puppeteer who also operated Chucky in Child's Play.

Which effects house created Casper's CGI ghosts, making it the first film with a fully computer-generated lead?

Industrial Light & Magic had made Jurassic Park's dinosaurs, but those only had to look real; Casper and his uncles had to act, joke and cry beside live actors in far more scenes.

Which flamboyant rock and roll pioneer recorded the Casper theme song for the 1995 film's soundtrack?

Little Richard gave the old cartoon theme a rock and roll makeover; the director says he simply contacted him directly, and that the singer drank a lot of coffee before recording.

Who composed the score for Casper (1995), including the track 'One Last Wish'?

James Horner knew little about the comic and scored Casper as a modern fairytale about lost youth; the same year he wrote the music for Braveheart, and two years later for Titanic.

Which pop star's first major film role was Wendy the Good Little Witch in Casper Meets Wendy (1998)?

Hilary Duff was ten when she played Wendy the Good Little Witch; the direct-to-video follow-ups, though, helped kill off a planned cinema sequel to the 1995 film, its director says.

Which 1997 direct-to-video Casper film opens with him thrown off a ghost train into Deedstown?

A Spirited Beginning (1997) has Casper kicked off a ghost train into Deedstown, where he befriends a lonely boy, Chris Carson; it ignores the origin story the 1995 film gave him.

Casper made his debut in a 1945 Paramount short with what title?

The Friendly Ghost (1945) went out as a single Noveltoon; it was well enough received that a sequel, There's Good Boos To-Night, followed in 1948 and a full series after that.

Which Paramount cartoon unit produced the original Casper theatrical shorts?

Famous Studios, Paramount's in-house unit formed in 1942 after it took over Fleischer Studios, produced the Casper theatrical shorts from 1945 to 1959.

Roughly how much was Joe Oriolo paid when he sold the Casper rights to Paramount, with no royalties to follow?

About $200 is all Joe Oriolo received: accounts give $175 or $200, a single payment with no share of the films, comics and toys that followed.

Which comics publisher took over Casper in the 1950s and later bought the character outright from Paramount?

Harvey Comics gave Casper what his cinema cartoons lacked, a supporting cast: a ghost horse, three bullying uncles and a good little witch for a friend.

Why does Casper's night as a human end at ten, not midnight?

He's too young: when Casper protests that Cinderella got until midnight, the angel replies that Cinderella wasn't twelve, and when the clock strikes ten he turns back into a ghost in front of the whole party.

Which 'tuff little ghost' with a Brooklyn accent spun off from the Casper comics into his own title?

Spooky's accent is why his girlfriend Pearl is always 'Poil' and his derby hat a 'doiby'; much of the comedy is his scheming to scare people without her catching him.

Casper's cartoons reached television in 1959 on a show named after the mascot of which toy company?

Mattel sponsored Matty's Funday Funnies and named it for its cartoon boy mascot, Matty Mattel, who introduced the old Casper shorts between commercials for the company's toys.

Apollo 16's crew gave the call sign 'Casper' to which of their craft?

The command module flew as Casper, with pilot Ken Mattingly alone aboard in lunar orbit, while the lunar module Orion took John Young and Charlie Duke down to the Descartes highlands.

In Casper's Scare School, Casper's friend Mantha is what kind of creature?

Mantha, one of Casper's two best friends at Scare School, is a zombie girl whose limbs keep falling off; the other friend, Ra, is a mummy who keeps unravelling.

In Casper's Scare School, who threatens to banish Casper to the Valley of Shadows for being too friendly?

Kibosh, ruler of the underworld, packs Casper off to Scare School as a punishment for making friends with humans.

The 1996 animated spin-off The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper aired on which children's block?

Fox Kids ran the series from 1996 to 1998; the ghosts kept their film voices, but Dr. Harvey was recast with Dan Castellaneta, better known as the voice of Homer Simpson.

What occasion does the party at Whipstaff Manor celebrate in Casper (1995)?

Halloween: the school gym is shut for asbestos removal, so Kat's class moves its dance to the creepiest house in town, which happens to be hers.

Which filmmaker executive-produced the 1995 Casper film?

Steven Spielberg executive-produced through Amblin and personally made the calls that landed Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson and Rodney Dangerfield; his own cameo was filmed, then cut.

Casper's co-creator Joe Oriolo went on to make the television cartoons of which famous cat?

Felix the Cat, a silent-film star of the 1920s, was revived for television by Joe Oriolo, who had taken over the character from his mentor Otto Messmer.

In the 1995 film Casper, which of the three uncles is the leader of the Ghostly Trio?

Stretch, the lanky, hot-tempered eldest, bosses the other two around in the film; in the early comics the trio had different names, and it was the fat one who led.

In Casper (1995), who appears as an angel and makes Casper human for one evening?

Kat's mother, Amelia, grants Casper his dream for a night as a reward; she tells her husband she never became a ghost because she had no unfinished business.

Which studio released the 1995 film Casper in cinemas?

Universal Pictures released the film but did not keep the series: the direct-to-video follow-ups went out through a rival studio, and Paramount, Casper's first home, had sold him off in the 1950s.

Casper's two credited screenwriters had been staff writers on which 1990s cartoon?

Animaniacs was where Sherri Stoner and Deanna Oliver wrote before Casper; Stoner also voiced its Slappy Squirrel, and the pair's draft was reworked on set by uncredited script doctors.

In Casper (1995), what does ghost therapist Dr. Harvey prefer to call his patients?

The living impaired is Dr. Harvey's phrase in a TV report early in the film; his theory is that ghosts are spirits with unfinished business, and his job is to find out what it is.

Which studio made two Casper holiday specials for television in 1979?

Hanna-Barbera made Casper's First Christmas and Casper's Halloween Special, both in 1979, the former teaming Casper and Hairy Scary with Yogi Bear, Boo Boo, Huckleberry Hound and Snagglepuss.

Which comic-book stablemate of Casper got a live-action film in 1994, the year before his?

Richie Rich began in 1953 as a back-up strip in another character's comic and grew into the publisher's most popular character; Macaulay Culkin played him in the 1994 film.

Casper was storyboarded to rise from Marvin Acme's grave in a funeral scene cut from which 1988 film?

Who Framed Roger Rabbit would have had Casper scare off the mourners as the coffin was lowered, but the funeral was dropped before it was animated.

Which Star Wars actor voices the fearsome ghost ruler who hunts Casper in the 1997 direct-to-video prequel?

James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader and Mufasa, plays the overlord of the centre where new spirits are trained to haunt.

In Casper (1995), which action star does Casper impersonate, in a voice supplied by mimic Jess Harnell?

Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of several star gags in the film: Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson and Rodney Dangerfield all turn up in a mirror.

In Casper (1995), how does Casper win the trust of Kat and her father on their first morning at Whipstaff Manor?

Casper serves them breakfast after his first attempt to befriend them failed the moment they saw him, and then follows Kat to school.

Which cartoon star and his pals get lost and decorate Casper's house in the 1979 special Casper's First Christmas?

Yogi Bear arrives with Boo-Boo, Huckleberry Hound, Snagglepuss and Quick Draw McGraw, and Santa ends up saving the condemned house.

In the comics and The New Casper Cartoon Show, Casper's ghostly friend Nightmare is what kind of animal?

A horse named Nightmare talks in the original comics and cartoons, though the 1990s animated series made the same character silent.

Which Ferris Bueller's Day Off actor makes a cameo appearance in all three live-action Casper films?

Ben Stein, the droning economics teacher, plays a lawyer reading a will in the 1995 film and a grocer Casper scares in the first video prequel.

Casper's tough-talking cousin from Brooklyn calls his ghost girlfriend 'Poil', but what is her actual name?

Pearl comes out as 'Poil' in his thick accent, just as his trademark derby hat becomes a 'doiby'. She spends most stories trying to stop him scaring people.

Casper's comics publisher sued which studio for $50 million, claiming the Ghostbusters logo looked too much like Fatso?

Columbia Pictures won: the court noted the publisher had let early Casper copyrights lapse and that there are only so many ways to draw a cartoon ghost.

Casper's cartoon theme song was co-written by Mack David and Jerry Livingston, who wrote songs for which Disney film?

Cinderella earned the pair and Al Hoffman an Oscar nomination for Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo, and the film came out the year they gave the ghost his tune.

Which Saturday Night Live character is called in to perform an exorcism at Whipstaff Manor in Casper (1995)?

Father Guido Sarducci, Don Novello's gossip columnist for the Vatican newspaper, is one of the experts Carrigan Crittenden hires before she turns to a therapist.

In Casper (1995), what sends Carrigan Crittenden's ghost into the afterlife moments after she seizes the treasure?

No unfinished business is left once she has the treasure she craved, and in the film only spirits with something left undone stay on as ghosts.

In Casper (1995), Carrigan Crittenden inherits only Whipstaff Manor because her late father's fortune went where?

Her father left his wealth to several charities, so she pounces on a map among the will's papers that seems to show treasure hidden in the house.

In Casper (1995), where does lonely Casper first set eyes on Kat, the girl he is instantly smitten with?

On a TV news report about her ghost-therapist father, and Casper then nudges Carrigan into hiring him so the family will move in.

In Casper (1995), which gift from his father does Casper recognise when Kat restores his old attic playroom?

A wooden sled his father bought him is what Casper recognises in the playroom, and the sight of it unlocks the memory of how his short human life ended.

In Casper (1995), what is the name of Dr. Harvey's late wife, whose spirit he hopes to contact?

Amelia is the ghost he most wants to find, and the Ghostly Trio win his cooperation by promising him a meeting with her.

Which Short Circuit star plays Tim Carson, the hero's busy father, in the 1997 direct-to-video Casper prequel?

Steve Guttenberg plays a developer set on flattening an old mansion for a mini-mall, opposite Rodney Dangerfield as the town's mayor.

In the 1997 direct-to-video Casper prequel, how does Casper stop the Applegate Mansion from being blown up?

Casper swallows the bomb, which goes off harmlessly inside him, and the stunt impresses the ghost overlord enough to let him stay.

Which star of a Stanley Kubrick horror classic plays Gabby, one of Wendy's witch aunts, in Casper Meets Wendy (1998)?

Shelley Duvall, Wendy Torrance in The Shining, here helps hide a different Wendy at a resort hotel as one of the witch's three aunts.

Which perpetually suntanned Hollywood veteran plays the warlock Desmond Spellman in Casper Meets Wendy (1998)?

George Hamilton, who had already spoofed Dracula in Love at First Bite, plays a vain warlock told by a mirror oracle that a little witch will outdo him.

Which former MTV VJ plays the Oracle in the Mirror consulted by the villain in Casper Meets Wendy (1998)?

Pauly Shore was on his second Casper job: a year earlier he had voiced Snivel, the grovelling sidekick, in the first direct-to-video film.

In Casper Meets Wendy (1998), the Oracle finally declares Wendy the greatest witch because she did what?

Wendy befriended a ghost, something no witch had ever done, since ghosts and witches are meant to be natural enemies.

Which voice actor from The Simpsons plays Dr. Harvey in the animated series The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper?

Dan Castellaneta, the voice of Homer Simpson, took over the ghost therapist's role for the cartoon, which picks up where the 1995 film left off.

Which Full House star voices Dash, one head of the two-headed headmaster, in Casper's Scare School (2006)?

Bob Saget shares the headmaster's body with Jim Belushi as Alder, and the pair scheme to turn the ghost king to stone and seize the Underworld.

Which comedian known for her wild hair and cackling laugh voices great-aunt Spitzy in Casper's Scare School (2006)?

Phyllis Diller plays the banished relative the Ghostly Trio refuse to talk about, exiled for declining to scare humans.

In Casper's Scare School (2006), the dreaded Valley of the Shadows turns out to be what kind of place?

A colorful garden greets Casper, full of creatures banished for refusing to scare, who never realised they were free to leave.

The animated TV film Casper's Scare School premiered in October 2006 on which American cable channel?

Cartoon Network gave the film an autumn premiere and, three years on, aired the spin-off series it inspired.

Which country star sings the Casper the Friendly Ghost theme over the opening of Casper's Haunted Christmas (2000)?

Randy Travis also supplied original music, and the film's tie-in album is packed with country covers of Christmas standards.

Which ice cream chain invented a Casper-themed flavor to promote the video release of Casper's Haunted Christmas?

Baskin-Robbins sold the flavor all through December and tucked a coupon for free sundaes inside every tape; its logo even appears on a shop in the film.

In his 1945 debut cartoon, lonely Casper reads a book on winning friends by which real self-help author?

Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends keeps him at home while the other ghosts head out at midnight to scare people.

In the 1949 cartoon A Haunting We Will Go, Casper hatches an abandoned egg and befriends Dudley, what kind of bird?

A duck called Dudley emerges, and Casper teaches him to swim and then saves him from a hunter's decoy trap.

Casper co-creator Joe Oriolo started as an errand boy and became an animator at which studio, home of Betty Boop?

Fleischer Studios hired him at 20, and when Paramount took the studio over and renamed it, the new owners bought his ghost story outright.

Which comic-book stablemate of Casper wears an asbestos diaper and carries a magical pitchfork?

Hot Stuff the Little Devil can produce fire, hence the fireproof diaper, and does the odd good deed mainly to annoy his fellow demons.

In the 1979 series Casper and the Angels, Casper is guardian ghost to two officers of which futuristic force?

Space Police officers Mini and Maxi patrol the Jetsons-style Space City in the year 2179, with Casper watching over them.

Which thousand-year-old ghost with a red nose and big bow tie is Casper's pal in Casper and the Angels (1979)?

Hairy Scary loves a good fright but dotes on Casper, and he returned for both of the ghost's 1979 holiday specials.

Which company behind Mighty Morphin Power Rangers co-produced the two direct-to-video Casper films of the late 1990s?

Saban Entertainment moved fastest of the suitors, and its stake in the children's TV block airing the Casper cartoon made cross-promotion easy.

Which Saturday Night Live alum voices Casper in the final season of the Netflix series Harvey Girls Forever!?

Bobby Moynihan's Casper drops in on a series built around three best friends, Audrey, Dot and Lotta, drawn from the same comics stable.

Although Whipstaff Manor was mostly a studio set, location footage for Casper (1995) was shot in which real town?

Camden appears in the exterior shots, but the sprawling haunted house itself was built for the cameras rather than found.

Which Australian director signed on to make Casper (1995) but quit over the script, wanting a darker fantasy?

Alex Proyas, fresh from The Crow, wanted something closer to The Wizard of Oz in tone, and a first-time feature director replaced him.

Which children's author and Mad magazine humorist insisted that he, not the illustrator, dreamed up Casper?

Seymour Reit said the concept and plot were his alone; decades later the makers of the 1995 film paid him a substantial honorarium.

Which cartoonist redesigned Casper with feet for his 1950s comic books and also created Stumbo the Giant?

Warren Kremer gave the ghost feet and a circle of friends so the comics would dwell less on the fact that Casper was a dead child.

In Casper's Haunted Christmas, what does the ghost king confiscate from the Ghostly Trio until Casper scares someone?

Their haunting licenses go, and the trio are flung into a Christmas-mad town they detest, with a deadline of 25 December.

In the 1997 direct-to-video Casper prequel, which ghostly skill is the only one Casper masters in his lessons?

Invisibility is all he manages; he flunks the rest, and his wish to be kind rather than frightening gets him expelled by his teachers.

Which 1970s pop duo voice Belle and Murray, the headmaster's two-headed relative, in Casper's Scare School (2006)?

Captain & Tennille, the married duo behind Love Will Keep Us Together, play an 'ancle', an aunt and uncle sharing one body.

Which Canadian studio behind the series ReBoot made Casper's Haunted Christmas (2000) entirely in computer animation?

Mainframe Entertainment made it the first Casper feature with no live action at all, and it was the studio's own first direct-to-video feature.

Which NYPD Blue actress appears as Dr. Harvey's late wife in the 1995 film Casper?

Amy Brenneman made the film in the same year as Heat, and later co-created and starred in the courtroom drama Judging Amy.

In Casper (1995), Carrigan tries an exorcism, a Ghostbuster and which third way of clearing Whipstaff Manor of ghosts?

A demolition team fails as badly as the priest and the ghost hunter, which is what finally sends her looking for a ghost therapist.

In Casper (1995), how does the scheming Carrigan Crittenden die and become a ghost herself?

She falls off a cliff moments after crashing her car in an attempt to run over her own lawyer, Dibs.

Which Young Frankenstein actress plays Fanny, one of Wendy's witch aunts, in Casper Meets Wendy (1998)?

Teri Garr, an Oscar nominee for Tootsie, plays one of three aunts who pose as ordinary women to meet men at a party.

In Casper Meets Wendy (1998), where do Casper and Wendy first meet while both families holiday at one resort?

In a barn the two hit it off at once, but they keep it quiet because ghosts and witches are supposed to be natural enemies.