Call Me Ishmael Trivia Quiz

Answer: Richard Basehart

Richard Basehart plays Ishmael, a character whose name is intended to suggest a state of social isolation akin to that experienced by the Biblical character. (Ishmael, the son of Abraam by the servant Hagar, was exiled after the unexpected birth of a son to Sarai, Abraam's apparently-barren wife. This story is worthy of an entire quiz in itself, but it is only tangentially related to the movie.) Ishmael signs on as an able seaman for a whaling voyage and the story begins to unfold.

Richard Basehart had a long and varied acting career. He was 'the Fool' in Fellini's 1954 film 'La Strada', among other major film roles. On television, he is probably best remembered for starring as Admiral Harriman Nelson in the 1960's sci-fi series 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea'.

Gordon Jackson had portrayed Ishmael in a 1955 Orson Welles stage production called 'Moby Dick - Rehearsed', Henry Thomas took on the role in a 1998 TV miniseries, and Charlie Cox appeared in the 2011 miniseries.

Answer: Captain Ahab

Herman Melville showed Captain Ahab as a man totally consumed by his need to gain revenge on his nemesis. The whale became for him the embodiment of malevolence, not just a large animal with whom he had had an unfortunate encounter. In some earlier film versions of 'Moby Dick', Ahab was turned into a romantic lead, returning in triumph to claim his love after defeating the whale (and, in some versions, his conniving half-brother). Director John Huston remained true to Melville's characterization, and Gregory Peck, chosen for the part because the studio wanted a big name to draw audiences, showed us a man being consumed by his growing obsession, and dragging others into sharing it with him.

The incorrect options were also (relatively minor) characters in the film.

Answer: Queequeg

Queequeg, like the other harpooners, is from an 'uncivilized' background - he is the son of the chieftain of a South Sea tribe of cannibals who has left home to see the world. As Ishmael says of Queequeg, "Better a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian." Not only does his skill with a harpoon outweigh the prejudice against him as a non-Christian, we come to see him as in many ways a better person than some who are more easily accepted by the society in which they live.

Answer: Starbuck

The Starbucks coffee chain is actually named after this character. There was a Nantucket whaling family of this name, responsible for naming Starbuck Island, now part of the country of Kiribati. The character of Starbuck is deeply disturbed by Ahab's quest, going so far as to call it blasphemy, and offers a voice of reason in the face of Ahab's growing madness. This makes his wholehearted participation in the final attack even more dramatic for him than for the rest of the crew.

The incorrect options are also members of the crew. Stubb is second mate and Flask is third mate; along with Starbuck, they are in charge of the ship's three whale boats. Elijah is responsible for the prophetic statement, "A day will come at sea when you'll smell land and there'll be no land, and on that day, Ahab will go to his grave, but he'll rise again, and beckon, and all save one shall follow."

Answer: Father Mapple

This scene is set in the Seamen's Bethel, a chapel for sailors that still stands in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Director John Huston used it for exterior shots, but the interior scenes were not filmed on location. Father Mapple, a former whaleman, delivers his sermon from a pulpit that resembles the bow of a ship, to which he ascends by means of a rope ladder. (The original Seaman's Bethel had no such pulpit, but one has since been built for the benefit of tourists.) Once he reaches the pulpit, Father Mapple delivers a sermon based on the Biblical book of Jonah and his encounter with a whale.
We see Ishmael and Starbuck, along with his wife and son, in the congregation. Although clearly affected by the message that challenging the sea is tantamount to challenging God, and endangers one's soul, Ishmael is not deterred from his planned voyage.

Orson Welles apparently completed this speech in a single take. The role of Father Mapple was taken on by Gregory Peck in the 1998 TV miniseries starring Patrick Stewart as Ahab, and Peck won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor for the part.

Answer: Pequod

The Ryelands was built in 1887, and sold to Disney in the late 1940s for use as a movie prop. Two high-profile film roles followed: the Hispaniola in 'Treasure Island' (1950) and the Pequod' in 'Moby Dick'. In later years, renamed Moby Dick, the schooner was a tourist attraction in the English town of Morecambe (home town of English comedian Eric Morecambe) until it burned out in 1972.

Melville named the Pequod after the Pequot tribe of Native Americans, resident along the Mystic River and the Pequot River (now known as the Thames) in what is now southeastern Connecticut. They were virtually annihilated in the 1630s by a coalition of European settlers and the Narragansett and Mohegan tribes. The choice of name seems to suggest the ultimate fate faced by the ship and its crew.

Answer: New Bedford

In Melville's book, Ishmael and Queequeg meet in New Bedford, but actually go to Nantucket to board ship. The film brings meeting and embarcation together in New Bedford. While Nantucket was the first site of a whaling industry in New England, it was New Bedford where it flourished to the point that New Bedford was known as the whaling capital of the world in the 19th century.

The last whaling ship left the port of New Bedford in 1927, but the city remained an important commercial fishing centre through the 20th century.

Answer: No

In fact, the character of Fedallah, Ahab's personal harpooner, is completely absent from the movie. It is Captain Ahab who gets tangled up with the whale, and whose lifeless body seems to beckon his crew on to their doom as Moby Dick thrashes around.

After the three boats have successfully landed multiple harpoons, the whale swims away and dives, resurfacing to grab Ahab's boat in its mouth, and the sailors fall out. After another dive and resurface, Ahab is seen roped to Moby Dick's back.

Answer: Starbuck

In Melville's novel, only Ahab's boat is attacked Moby Dick; the other two boats were damaged and returned to the Pequod, where they remained until it was attacked and destroyed in a ferocious attack by the whale. In the film, they are all still actively engaged at the time of the final confrontation.

A suggestion that the survivors should retreat after they see that Ahab has been lost is countered by Starbuck, whose opposition to the chase of Moby Dick has been reevaluated. The two boats proceed to attack, and are destroyed as the whale leaps out of the sea and crashes down on them. Only then does the enraged whale ram the Pequod.

Answer: Nobody

In the final minutes of the film, Moby Dick destroys the Pequod, sending it, and all those still on board it, to join those from the whale boats in the depths of the sea. Ishmael is shown treading water, and then seeing the (unused) coffin that had been prepared for Queequeg bob up. We then hear his voice describing his rescue, and concluding, "The great shroud of the sea rolls over the Pequod, her crew, and Moby Dick. I only am escaped, alone, to tell thee."