Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
50 free E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial grew out of the imaginary friend Steven Spielberg invented after his parents' divorce, was rejected by Columbia as a wimpy Walt Disney movie, and went on to out-gross Star Wars and hold the all-time record for eleven years. It was shot in story order under a fake title so the young cast would really be saying goodbye at the end. These 50 questions cover the film from Night Skies to the 40th-anniversary IMAX run: Melissa Mathison's first draft, the million-dollar sale to Universal, the candy Mars refused to license, Carlo Rambaldi's $1.5 million puppet with a face borrowed from Einstein and Hemingway, the chain-smoking voice of E.T., the Harrison Ford scene that was cut, the redwood forest finale, John Williams's flying theme, the Cannes premiere, the Oscars it won and the Best Picture it lost to Gandhi, the Atari cartridges buried in New Mexico, the Satyajit Ray dispute, the guns turned into walkie-talkies and the Xfinity reunion with a grown-up Elliott. Easy questions stay with the cast and the candy; the hardest ask about budgets, shooting days and the Buck Rogers strip that inspired the phone. Every answer is cited to a page we checked, with a short explanation so you learn something even when you miss. Play it solo or print it for a Spielberg movie night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Who directed E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial?
Steven Spielberg
He also produced; it was his first summer blockbuster for Universal since Jaws.
Q 02What is the surname of Elliott's family?
Taylor
Pauline Kael noticed that Elliott's name begins with an E and ends with a T.
Q 03Which candy is used to lure E.T. into the house?
Reese's Pieces
Mars refused to license M&M's, fearing E.T. would frighten children; Hershey said yes and sales soared.
Q 04Who played the boy who befriends the alien?
Henry Thomas
He auditioned in an Indiana Jones costume and won the part with an improvised scene, crying over memories of his dead dog.
Q 05Which future star played little sister Gertie?
Drew Barrymore
She impressed Spielberg with a story about leading a punk rock band.
Q 06Who wrote the screenplay?
Melissa Mathison
Her first draft, titled E.T. and Me, took about eight weeks and Spielberg thought it was perfect.
Q 07What was the title of the darker abandoned project that E.T. grew out of?
Night Skies
In that script, malevolent aliens terrorised a family; only Buddy, the friendly one, survived into E.T.
Q 08Which studio rejected E.T. as 'a wimpy Walt Disney movie'?
Columbia Pictures
Columbia kept 5% of the net profits and reportedly made more from it than any of its own 1982 films.
Q 09How much did Universal pay to acquire the script from Columbia?
$1 million
MCA president Sid Sheinberg made the deal at Spielberg's request.
Q 10What was the film's production budget?
$10.5 million
It went on to gross $619 million worldwide in its first run.
Q 11Who designed E.T.'s animatronics?
Carlo Rambaldi
He had designed the aliens for Close Encounters; the puppet cost $1.5 million and took three months.
Q 12E.T.'s face was inspired by Albert Einstein, Ernest Hemingway and which poet?
Carl Sandburg
Rambaldi's own painting Women of Delta gave the creature its extendable neck.
Q 13How did 12-year-old Matthew DeMeritt perform E.T.'s awkward walks and falls?
Walking on his hands
Born without legs, he shared the suit with little people Tamara De Treaux and Pat Bilon.
Q 21What game do Michael and his friends play at the kitchen table?
Dungeons & Dragons
The young actors played it between takes too, along with riding bikes around the sound stages.
Q 22Which comic strip inspires E.T. to build his communication device?
Buck Rogers
Science educator Henry Feinberg built the actual prop from household parts.
Q 23Which 1952 film is E.T. watching when the boy kisses a girl at school?
The Quiet Man
John Wayne kissing Maureen O'Hara on TV drives Elliott's impulse through their shared feelings.
Q 14Who provided the main voice of E.T.?
Pat Welsh
Her two-packs-a-day voice earned $380 from sound designer Ben Burtt for nine and a half hours of work.
Q 15Which star's scene as the school principal was cut from the film?
Harrison Ford
His face is never seen; the footage surfaced on the 1996 LaserDisc.
Q 16Under what cover name was the film shot to keep the plot secret?
A Boy's Life
Scripts were read behind closed doors and everyone on set wore an ID card.
Q 17What was unusual about the sequence in which E.T. was filmed?
It was shot roughly chronologically
Spielberg wanted the children to be genuinely saying goodbye to E.T. at the end.
Q 18Where were the film's final six days of shooting, the woodland scenes, filmed?
Redwoods near Crescent City
The flying-bicycle chase and Halloween exteriors were shot in Porter Ranch.
Q 19Which cartoon director's style inspired showing adults only from the waist down early on?
Tex Avery
Dee Wallace, as the mother, was the one exception.
Q 20Which director suggested the scene of E.T. hiding among stuffed toys in the closet?
Robert Zemeckis
He proposed it after Spielberg sent him a draft of the screenplay.
Q 24Why does the boy become intoxicated at school?
E.T. is drinking beer at home
He then frees the frogs about to be dissected in biology class.
Q 25What flower does E.T. revive, which Gertie later gives him as a farewell gift?
A chrysanthemum
The plant wilts and blooms again in step with E.T.'s own health.
Q 26What is the name of the lead government agent played by Peter Coyote?
Keys
He is identified by the keys jangling on his belt before his face is ever shown.
Q 27Who plays Mary, the children's single mother?
Dee Wallace
She was the only adult shown from the waist up in the film's first half.
Q 28Which actor played Tyler, one of Michael's friends on the bikes?
C. Thomas Howell
Macchio was considered; the two later co-starred in The Outsiders.
Q 29Who composed the score, including the famous Flying Theme?
John Williams
Spielberg loved the chase music so much he re-edited the sequence to fit it.
Q 30Who narrated the film's 1982 audiobook album, produced by Quincy Jones?
Michael Jackson
It came out exactly two weeks before Thriller and won a Grammy for Best Recording for Children.