Stars Left On The Cutting Room Floor Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Even an Oscar nominee cannot escape the fate of being cut from a movie. One of these was Harrison Ford. But despite the fact his scenes were cut, a strange looking kid still made it home. In which movie was he left on the cutting room floor?

Answer: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

Harrison Ford was signed up to play the school principal of Elliott, the human kid who found an extra-terrestrial stranded on earth and set out to help him get home.

Ford was in a scene where he chastised the kid for freeing frogs that were to be dissected. Sadly for Ford, due to time constraints, the scene was cut.

Ah, what as shame, I hear you cry: but all is not lost! - the scene can be found in a search of YouTube.

2. Flashbacks: Where would we be without them in movies. They help set the scene for the action. In the movie "The Big Chill", one actor was signed up purely for a flashback - but it was left on the cutting room floor. Who wasn't untouchable when it came to the big directorial decisions?

Answer: Kevin Costner

The originally planned opening scene for "The Big Chill", a 1983 movie about seven college friends reuniting after the death of their friend, was to be a flashback showing their dead friend - Costner - very much alive. Sadly it was cut.

Costner put that behind him with a string of top appearances including "Dances With Wolves", "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves", "The Bodyguard" and of course you spotted the clue - "The Untouchables".

"The Big Chill" boasted a well-known cast that included Tom Berenger, Glenn Close, Jeff Goldblum, William Hurt and Meg Tilly. It was well received critically and nominated for three Oscars.

3. While the movie "Savages" was being made, scenes featuring a very photogenic blonde as the mother of the hero were shot. Sadly they did not make it to the movie theatre. Who was the actor?

Answer: Uma Thurman

Thurman shot several scenes playing Blake Lively's mother that were meant to explain Lively's history of relationships. This backstory was completely left behind for the final cut.

Thurman made the move from modelling to acting when she starred in "Dangerous Liaisons" in 1988, but really shot to movie prominences with a part in "Pulp Fiction" (1994), which won her an Oscar nomination. A host of appearances followed, including the first two "Kill Bill" movies; "The Truth About Cats & Dogs" (1996); "Batman & Robin" (1997); and "Les Mis�rables (1998).

If you are left scratching your blonde or even non-blonde head at one of the 'wrong' names: despite the fact she plays the brunette Abby Sciuto in "NCIS", Pauley Perrette is naturally blonde. (You won't believe how long I have been trying to work that fact into a funtrivia question.)

4. Maybe he should have made them an offer they could not refuse? Which star noted for a TV mafia role was left on the cutting room floor because test audience did not like his character?

Answer: James Gandolfini

James Gandolfini was signed up to play opposite Sandra Bullock in "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" (2011).

Bullock played a character who attended a support group for those who had lost loved ones in the 9/11 attacks. Gandolfini played a man she met at the group.

Test audience gave his character a poor reception and the scenes were cut.

Gandolfini, you may remember, played Tony Soprano in the long-running TV series (1999-2007) about a New Jersey mob family.

5. Sometimes when the director thinks your face does not fit, then you end up left on the cutting room floor. That's what happened to Ashley Judd after she had filmed scenes for a 1994 crime caper. What was it called?

Answer: Natural Born Killers

"Natural Born Killers" starred Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jr., Tom Sizemore, and Tommy Lee Jones.

Harrelson and Lewis played two victims of traumatised childhoods who became lovers and psychopathic serial murderers. They embarked on a road trip conducting mass murders along the way, but always careful to leave one survivor. This attracted media attention and they were made folk heroes by an unscrupulous reporter.

Judd was just 24 when she was cast to play a court witness to one of the crimes.

Oliver Stone did not think that Judd's scene fitted "the flow of the movie" and cut the scene claiming time constraints.

6. Sometimes a character will be left on the cutting room floor because test audience don't like them; but one actor found the opposite. He was cut because the test audience wanted to see more of him. Which Oscar winner suffered this fate over "The Ring"?

Answer: Chris Cooper

In the movie, Cooper was to appear in the opening scene as a child murderer being interviewed by a character played by Naomi Watts.

He was not seen again until the final scenes when his character reappeared. The test audience were confused; they felt they want to see more of him.

The outcome...his entire character was cut.

Released in 2002, "The Ring" starred Watts as a journalist investigating the suspicious deaths of those who died within a week of watching a "cursed" video. Two more movies in the series followed in 2005 and 2017. The movies were well received and proved to be money-spinners at the box office.

Cooper won the best supporting actor Oscar in 2003 for "Adaptation". In addition, there was a catalogue of other nominations and wins for the part. In a busy movie and TV career, he also won a Screen Actors Guild award for "American Beauty" in 1999.

7. There are many reasons that an actor's part may be left on the cutting room floor, but Tobey Maguire was dropped from one because he was too famous. For which film was he denied a chance to star with a tiger in a small boat?

Answer: Life Of Pi

Maguire filmed several scenes for a small part in Ang Lee's "Life Of Pi" (2012) but was replaced by another actor.

"Life of Pi" was the story of a boy lost at sea after a shipwreck. Cinema goers saw him on a small boat with a tiger - and that is all I am going to say on that plot line.

Lee later admitted: "I misjudged the situation. I underestimated the power of stars. I love Tobey. But it's a small part. So when it's a movie star sitting there, it captures attention. It didn't really work out."

8. We have all heard of actors who were disruptive influences on the set, but which comedic genius young one was cut from a "Harry Potter" movie because he made the other actors laugh too much?

Answer: Rick Mayall

Rick Mayall shot to fame on the chaotic TV comedy series "The Young Ones", which featured the lives of a group of college students.

He had an impressive track record on British TV before he was signed up to play the part of Peeves in "Harry Potter & The Philosopher's Stone". Peeves had been a regular character in the books and more movies should have followed.

In a later interview Mayall recalled: "I got sent off the set because every time I tried to do a bit of acting, all the lads who were playing the school kids kept getting the giggles, they kept corpsing, so they threw me off".

A month later, he got a phone call to say the character had been dropped.

* For those who have never heard of it, "corpsing" is a real word, my dictionary defines it as "theatre slang to laugh or cause to laugh involuntarily or inopportunely while on stage". It is a generally a British term, Americans, apparently, call it something else.

9. "Um, Mr Allen, we have a problem - this movie is going to be way too long." "Okay, then just cut somebody out". A little bit harsh on poor Liv Tyler, but which musical had her scenes left on the cutting room floor?

Answer: Everyone Says I Love You

Liv Tyler had a burgeoning career as a model and TV star when she was cast in the 1996 Woody Allen musical "Everyone Says I Love You".

Her performance was cut because of the film's long running time.

Tyler later said in newspaper interview that Allen wrote to her, apologising for the cuts.

In that same year, Tyler did score a breakthrough in "Stealing Beauty" and went on to bigger thing, including "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings" in 2001.

"Everyone Says I Love You" was released in 1996 and had a strong cast that included Edward Norton, Drew Barrymore, Alan Alda, Natalie Portman, Julia Roberts and Goldie Hawn. Woody Allen also saved a part for himself.

Allen had a troubled public perception for many years, but this musical was well received. In 'Rolling Stone' magazine, Peter Travers wrote that at times "'Everyone Says I Love You' proves the musical can still cut it as sublime entertainment".

The story centres around a wealthy New York family in which the children make what appear to be incongruous choices in their relationships.

10. Which four-times Golden Globes winner may have got a little hexed in the city when a big-screen character was dropped because the directors decided to end the storyline earlier than planned?

Answer: Sarah Jessica Parker

SJP won those four Golden Globes along with two Emmies and three Screen Actors Guild awards for "Sex And The City" (1998-2004).

She was signed up to play activist Gloria Steinem in "Lovelace", the 2013 biopic of adult movies actress Linda Lovelace.

In real life, Steinem and Linda Lovelace met up in 1984 to take a stand against the porn industry.

By moving the ending back to 1980, the directors ensured SJP was not needed.

Source: Author darksplash

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor skunkee before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.

Being an actor can be a fickle thing, with no expectation of being always in demand. Some of the biggest names have suffered the indignity of having their movie scenes slashed and left on the (proverbial) cutting room floor. Spot these 10.

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