41 Fun Facts About Monster House

In what year did the animated film Monster House open in US theaters, in late July?

2006: it opened on July 21, the same weekend as Clerks II and Lady in the Water.

Who directed Monster House, his feature directorial debut?

Gil Kenan, a recent UCLA film-school graduate, made his feature debut here after his stop-motion thesis short The Lark caught the producers' attention.

Which actor voices the grumpy old neighbor Mr. Nebbercracker in Monster House?

Steve Buscemi also voiced Randall Boggs in Monsters, Inc., another 2000s animated favorite.

Who voices D.J. Walters, the boy who spies on the house across the street?

Musso was also starring on Disney Channel's Hannah Montana around the same time.

What is D.J.'s best friend Chowder's real first name?

Chowder's real first name is Charles; Chowder is only a nickname, and it is what D.J. and Jenny call him throughout the film.

Who voices Chowder?

Sam Lerner voices Chowder; he later played Geoff Schwartz on ABC's The Goldbergs.

Which actress voices Jenny Bennett, the prep-school girl who joins the boys?

Locke went on to play K-Mart in the Resident Evil films.

Who voices D.J.'s teenage babysitter Zee?

Maggie Gyllenhaal voices Zee, D.J.'s goth babysitter; two years later she played Rachel Dawes in The Dark Knight.

What is Mr. Nebbercracker's first name?

Horace fakes cruelty toward the neighborhood children to keep them safe from what his house might do.

What is the name of Nebbercracker's late wife, whose spirit possesses the house?

Constance was Nebbercracker's wife, a carnival performer he rescued and married; after her death her spirit animates the house.

What was the freak-show billing of Nebbercracker's wife before he helped her escape?

'The Giantess' was an unwilling performer; Nebbercracker helped her flee and start a new life with him.

Which actress voices the house itself, Nebbercracker's wife?

Kathleen Turner had already voiced one iconic animated woman: Jessica Rabbit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

What is the day job of Reginald "Skull" Skulinski, the local supernatural expert?

He is also a hardcore gamer, and in the epilogue he ends up dating Zee.

Which Napoleon Dynamite star voices Skull?

Jon Heder, Napoleon Dynamite himself, voices Skull, who tells the kids the house can only be stopped by striking its heart.

Who voices Bones, Zee's rude boyfriend who gets swallowed by the house in Monster House?

Jason Lee was starring in My Name Is Earl at the time, and had voiced the villain Syndrome in The Incredibles two years earlier.

Which two comedians voice police officers Landers and Lister?

Kevin James voices Officer Landers and Nick Cannon voices Officer Lister; the house plays dead when they arrive, then swallows their cruiser.

The story of the animated film Monster House takes place on the day before which holiday?

Halloween: D.J. thinks he has outgrown trick-or-treating, then goes anyway with Chowder at the end.

In Monster House, what does Chowder lose on Nebbercracker's front lawn, setting the plot in motion?

A basketball: Nebbercracker confronts D.J. over it, faints, and is taken away by paramedics.

What childhood toy of Bones' had Nebbercracker confiscated years earlier?

Bones spots his old kite in the house's doorway, grabs for it, and is swallowed.

In Monster House, what do the kids decide is the heart of the living house?

The furnace is the house's heart: the kids plan to sedate the house with a dummy and then put the fire out, but the police interrupt.

What do the kids stuff inside their dummy to knock the house out?

They fill a homemade dummy with cold medicine to put the house to sleep, but the police arrive and spoil the plan.

What household fixture serves as the house's uvula?

The chandelier hangs in the house's throat like a uvula; yanking it makes the house gag and spit the kids back out onto the lawn.

What is Jenny doing when the boys rescue her from the house's front porch?

Jenny is going door to door selling candy for her prep school when the house grabs her on the porch; the boys pull her free.

How did Nebbercracker's wife die, according to his story?

She fell into the unfinished basement and was buried by a concrete mixer: children taunting her one autumn night set off the fall, and her spirit merged with the house.

Where do the kids lure the walking house for the final showdown?

They lead the house to a construction site, where Chowder battles it from an excavator and D.J. blows it up with dynamite.

What does the house use to lift itself off its foundation and give chase?

The house rips a pair of trees from its yard and walks on them, chasing the kids and Nebbercracker through the neighborhood.

Which two writers, later of Community and The Sarah Silverman Program, wrote the original Monster House script?

Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab wrote the original script; Harmon later created Community and co-created Rick and Morty.

Which two filmmakers served as executive producers on Monster House?

Robert Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg executive-produced it through their ImageMovers and Amblin Entertainment banners, respectively.

Monster House's human characters used an animation technique pioneered on which Zemeckis film?

The Polar Express (2004) pioneered the performance-capture process Monster House used, with actors wired to sensors on a bare stage.

Monster House was the first animated feature to use which rendering software?

Arnold, Marcos Fajardo's path-tracing renderer, was used on Monster House before any other animated feature; Autodesk bought it in 2016.

Monster House lost the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature to which film?

Happy Feet won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, beating Monster House and Cars; at the Golden Globes, Cars won instead.

What was Monster House's approximate production budget?

Monster House's production budget was about $75 million; its North American gross of $73.7 million came in just under that figure.

Which film kept Monster House out of the number one spot on its opening weekend?

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest held the top spot in its third weekend; Monster House opened second with $22.2 million.

Which company published the Monster House video game in July 2006?

THQ published it for PlayStation 2, GameCube, Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS in the same month the film opened.

In the Monster House video game, which rooms serve as save points?

Bathrooms are the game's safe rooms, where the player saves progress between fights with the house's animated furniture.

In the video game, what special weapon does Jenny use to attack enemies and break padlocks?

Jenny's slingshot breaks padlocks and hits distant enemies; D.J. stuns foes with his camera flash, and Chowder lobs water balloons.

What was the director's next film after Monster House?

City of Ember, from Jeanne DuPrau's novel, came out in 2008; he later directed the 2015 Poltergeist remake and Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024).

What does D.J. use to watch Nebbercracker's house from his bedroom window?

A telescope: D.J. watches Nebbercracker's house through one from his bedroom window and records every toy the old man grabs.

Which two actors voice D.J.'s unnamed parents in Monster House?

Fred Willard and Catherine O'Hara, both Christopher Guest mockumentary regulars, voice D.J.'s parents, who leave him with the babysitter for the weekend.

Which Corpse Bride screenwriter did the director bring in to revise the script?

Pamela Pettler, fresh off Corpse Bride, helped rework the script, adding the idea that the house is possessed by a dead woman's soul.

Roughly how much did Monster House gross worldwide during its theatrical run?

Monster House grossed about $142 million worldwide, $73.7 million of it in North America, after a $22.2 million opening weekend.