Pay It Forward
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
7correct to beat the crowd
40 free Pay it Forward trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
A schoolboy is handed an assignment to change the world, and his answer is disarmingly simple: when someone does you a good turn, do not repay them, repay strangers instead. Pay It Forward turned that idea into a bestselling novel, a star-filled film and a phrase people use at drive-through windows everywhere. This quiz covers the story from every side: Trevor's plan and the people it reaches, the actors behind the main roles, the changes made between page and screen, and the production details fans like to argue about. It also digs into the older history of the idea, which was around long before the film. It suits anyone who has seen the film, read the book for class, or simply likes the thought of passing a kindness on.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which city did the makers of Pay It Forward choose as the setting after first placing the story in Tucson?
Las Vegas
Las Vegas was picked so the film could show working life away from the Strip, where Trevor's mother holds down two jobs.
Q 02Which young star of The Sixth Sense plays Trevor McKinney, the boy behind the plan in Pay It Forward?
Haley Joel Osment
Haley Joel Osment was announced for the part in November 1999, months after his Oscar-nominated breakthrough, and later won a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for it.
Q 03Under Trevor McKinney's rule in Pay It Forward, how many new people must each person helped do a favor for?
Three
Three is the heart of Trevor's plan: because every favor is repaid to three other people instead of the giver, kindness spreads geometrically rather than one person at a time.
Q 04Which Founding Father explained pay it forward in a 1784 letter, asking that his loan be passed on, never repaid?
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin called it a trick for doing a great deal of good with a little money: the borrower was to lend the same sum to the next honest person in trouble.
Q 05At which coffee chain's Florida drive-through did 378 customers in a row pay it forward by buying the next order?
Starbucks
Starbucks baristas in St. Petersburg kept a tally for eleven hours, until customer 379 declined to join in and paid only for her own $2.25 drink.
Q 06Which rock frontman plays Ricky, the abusive and long-absent dad of Trevor McKinney, in Pay It Forward?
Jon Bon Jovi
Jon Bon Jovi had been acting since the 1990s and took this supporting part as the ex-husband Arlene must finally learn to turn away.
Q 07What happened to the author of Pay It Forward that led two strangers to help her and inspired the novel?
Her car caught fire
Her car caught fire in a rough neighborhood, and the two men who came to her aid were gone before she could thank them, so the kindness could only be passed on.
Q 08Which actor, fresh from an Oscar for American Beauty, plays the scarred teacher Eugene Simonet in Pay It Forward?
Kevin Spacey
Kevin Spacey plays him as a recluse who clings to routine, a man whose burn scars were inflicted by his own father.
Q 09Which Mad About You star plays Arlene McKinney, the mother working two jobs, in Pay It Forward?
Helen Hunt
Helen Hunt had four films out in 2000, with Pay It Forward arriving the same month as Dr. T & the Women and two months ahead of Cast Away.
Q 10Which school subject does Eugene Simonet teach when he sets the world-changing assignment in Pay It Forward?
Social studies
Social studies is the class where, on the first day of the school year, he chalks up a challenge to think of an idea that could change the world and then act on it.
Q 11Where does Trevor McKinney let the homeless Jerry sleep as his first favor in Pay It Forward?
The garage
The garage is where Arlene discovers the stranger her son has taken in, and Jerry repays the kindness by repairing her car.
Q 12Which actor, who went on to play Jesus in The Passion of the Christ, plays the homeless Jerry in Pay It Forward?
Jim Caviezel
Jim Caviezel, billed as James, plays an addict whose relapse convinces Trevor the plan has failed, until Jerry later talks a stranger out of ending her life.
Q 13How is Trevor McKinney fatally wounded while defending his bullied friend Adam near the end of Pay It Forward?
He is stabbed
Q 21Which Pacific Northwest city hosted the extra filming for Jerry's rescue scene in Pay It Forward?
Portland
Portland stood in for that one sequence only; the rest was shot on location in Nevada and on studio stages in California between February and April 2000.
Q 22Which Deep Impact director made Pay It Forward and gave her real-life husband a small part in it?
Mimi Leder
Mimi Leder was one of the first women to graduate from the AFI Conservatory, and her husband Gary Werntz appears in the film as Mr. Thorsen.
Q 23Which composer of the American Beauty and Shawshank Redemption scores wrote the music for Pay It Forward?
Thomas Newman
He is stabbed when one bully pulls a knife and another shoves Trevor onto it, and the boy later dies in hospital.
Q 14What do thousands of strangers hold outside the McKinney home in the final scene of Pay It Forward?
A vigil
A vigil forms after the news reports Trevor's death, as people touched by the movement, including pupils from his school, arrive at the house to honor him.
Q 15Which make of brand-new car does a stranger hand to reporter Chris Chandler at the start of Pay It Forward?
Jaguar
Jaguar is the make a lawyer gives away after a fleeing criminal wrecks the reporter's own car, a gift so strange that Chris sets out to learn the reason.
Q 16What does Trevor McKinney trick his mother and his teacher into sharing as a favor in Pay It Forward?
A dinner date
A dinner date is his second favor, set up on the theory that two lonely adults would be happier together, though the evening seems to fail at first.
Q 17Which second job does Arlene McKinney work besides being a casino change attendant in Pay It Forward?
Cocktail waitress
Cocktail waitress is one of two jobs she juggles while trying to stay sober, which leaves her latchkey son plenty of hours alone to hatch his plan.
Q 18From which city does reporter Chris Chandler trace the chain of favors back to Trevor McKinney in Pay It Forward?
Los Angeles
Los Angeles is where the trail begins, and the film opens there with one of the later favors before working backward to a classroom project.
Q 19What is wrong with the girl a gang member forces hospital staff to treat in Pay It Forward?
An asthma attack
An asthma attack had left her ignored in the emergency room until he demanded oxygen for her, and her grateful father went on to give away his new car.
Q 20Where is the woman about to jump from when Jerry saves her life to repay Trevor in Pay It Forward?
A bridge
A bridge is where Jerry, back on drugs and sure he has let the boy down, finally passes the favor on by persuading a stranger to step back.
Thomas Newman gave the cues titles as odd as Cosmic Aristotle and Velocity Organ, and the score album reached shops eleven days after the film opened.
Q 24Which Mrs. Doubtfire screenwriter adapted Pay It Forward and thought of opening the story with the reporter?
Leslie Dixon
Leslie Dixon was so stuck she considered handing back her fee; her backward-tracing fix pleased the novelist so much that the unpublished book was restructured to match.
Q 25Which Jane Siberry song, recorded with k.d. lang, plays over the final scene of Pay It Forward?
Calling All Angels
Calling All Angels was first heard in the 1991 Wim Wenders film Until the End of the World, nine years before it closed Trevor's story.
Q 26Which star of the 1970s series Police Woman plays Grace, the homeless mother of Arlene, in Pay It Forward?
Angie Dickinson
Angie Dickinson's Grace neglected her daughter for years, and Arlene pays a favor forward by forgiving her, a link in the chain that finally reaches the reporter.
Q 27Which former Saturday Night Live cast member plays the reporter Chris Chandler in Pay It Forward?
Jay Mohr
Jay Mohr, known then as the conniving rival agent in Jerry Maguire, plays the journalist whose search gives the film its structure.
Q 28Which Ben Stiller comedy held the top box-office spot the weekend Pay It Forward opened in fourth place?
Meet the Parents
Meet the Parents was in its third week at number one, and both Remember the Titans and Bedazzled also outsold the new drama on its opening weekend.
Q 29Which California novelist wrote the 1999 book Pay It Forward and helped found a foundation named after it?
Catherine Ryan Hyde
Catherine Ryan Hyde collected well over a hundred rejections before her first short story sold, and her breakthrough novel went on to be translated into twenty languages.
Q 30In the novel Pay It Forward, the teacher's scars are wounds from which conflict, a detail the film changed?
The Vietnam War
The Vietnam War cost the book's teacher half his face, while the film swapped the battlefield for a violent childhood home.