Airplane!
Short description
Airplane! is a comedy about Ted Striker, a former military pilot haunted by a failed mission and unable to fly again. When his girlfriend, flight attendant Elaine Dickinson, leaves him, Ted boards the Los Angeles-to-Chicago flight where she is working, hoping to win her back. During the trip, spoiled food served on board sickens much of the crew and many passengers, leaving the airliner without anyone able to fly it. Ted is the only person aboard with piloting experience, and he is pressed into taking the controls, guided from the ground by controllers who offer more enthusiasm than useful advice.
The film was directed by Jerry Zucker, Jim Abrahams and David Zucker, who also wrote the screenplay together. It was the first feature each of the three directed, and the trio went on to make Top Secret! and Ruthless People in the following years, while David Zucker later directed The Naked Gun films. The cast includes Robert Hays and Julie Hagerty as the central couple, with Leslie Nielsen as Dr. Rumack, Lloyd Bridges as Steve McCroskey, Peter Graves as Captain Oveur and basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as Roger Murdock. Jon Davison produced, with Paramount and Howard W. Koch Productions behind the film.
Made for about 4 million dollars, it earned roughly 83 million worldwide, a strong return. On IMDb it holds 7.7/10 from around 286,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.3/10 from over 5,000 votes. A critics' rating of 8.5/10 from 73 reviews places it somewhat above those audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- Bill Murray and Chevy Chase were considered for the role of Ted Striker.
- Initially, Marci Goldman was considered for the role of Mrs. Hammond, but she eventually played Mrs. Jelline.
- Air traffic controllers are playing the game "Basketball" (1978) on the Atari 2600 video game console.
- The only airline that purchased the film for in-flight entertainment was Mexican airline Aeromexico.
- Julie Hagerty's debut role.
- In the scene where the sick woman's husband gives her oxygen, a bearded man is visible in the background. The script called for the beard to be blown off by the wind, but the glue was too strong. You can see the man "making faces" hoping the beard will come loose.
- While telling an elderly woman on the adjacent seat about how he met Elaine, Stryker says he served in the Air Force. However, the flashback shows him in a Navy uniform.
- A parody of Hall Bartlett's drama “Zero Hour!” (1957).
- The interior of the dispatch tower was filmed at the Combat Control Center for ballistic missiles, built in 1954 to protect the United States from attack by the USSR. At the time, it was the largest computer system in the world. It weighed 6,000 tons and occupied an entire floor of a fortified bomb shelter. When the system was removed from active duty, its components were put up for sale. They were mainly bought by film companies, who were attracted by the equipment, which was futuristic for its time, despite being released in the 1950s.
- The scene depicting an argument between employees making announcements in the airport building featured actual announcers from Los Angeles International Airport.
- In the Italian release, the slang conversation between the Black actors was dubbed into the Neapolitan dialect. In the German release, it was dubbed into the Bavarian dialect (with subtitles in standard German).
- Leslie Nielsen’s (1926-2010) role as the doctor in “Airplane!” was his first comedic role. He later said he was very happy when he was offered the role, as he feared he was reaching an age where he could only be counted on for “old man” roles on screen. The studio wanted Dom DeLuise (1933-2009) for the role of the doctor, but directors Jerry Zucker, David Zucker, and Jim Abrahams insisted on their choice. Filming in this movie opened a new chapter in Nielsen’s acting career. He began to play in comedies, particularly in other films by the Zucker and Abrahams directors.
- The DVD of the film states in one section that the argument about abortion taking place between the announcers in the airport building is taken from a “cheap novel.” In reality, it is taken from the novel “Airport” (1968) by American author Arthur Hailey (1920-2004), based on which George Seaton made a film of the same name in 1970.
- In the end credits, before the names of the crew members, there are phrases like "The guy who was responsible for a lot of things."
- The mandatory copyright notice at the end of the film concludes with the phrase “Something like that.”
- The actors improvised the street slang conversation between the two Black passengers from beginning to end, as the rest of the cast and crew simply didn't know the slang of the 'Black neighborhoods'.
- The film's action takes place mainly inside a jet airplane, however, the sound of propellers can be heard in the passenger cabin. Studio executives insisted on using a jet passenger plane in the script.
- Sigourney Weaver auditioned for the role of Elaine Dickinson.
- Filming took just over a month.
- The model of the airplane used in the film is now located in a museum in Las Colinas, a district of the city of Irving in the state of Texas.
- Robert Hayes and Julie Hagerty rehearsed the dance they perform to The Bee Gees' song "Stayin' Alive" (1977) for a whole month.
- Teenage girls fighting in the bar were played by men.
- The newspaper featured a photo of a boy with the caption “Child locked in refrigerator ate his own leg.” This was a photograph of Billy Koch, who was the grandson of the film’s producer, Howard W. Koch. His grandfather once called the boy and asked him to bring him the photograph. Billy only found out what it was needed for when the film was released.
- Christopher Lee turned down the role of Dr. Rumack. He called it "a big mistake" in his autobiography.
- Directors Jerry Zucker and David Zucker made a cameo appearance in the film. They play ground crew workers who direct a plane on the taxiway straight towards the airport building.
- The Boeing 707 used in the film was a repainted aircraft from the American airline TWA.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
