50 Fun Facts About Carrie
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Take the 50-question quizWho wrote the 1974 novel Carrie?
It was his first published novel, though he already had five unpublished ones in a drawer.
In which fictional Maine town is Carrie set?
The town is left financially and emotionally shattered after the 'Black Prom'.
What is Carrie's full first name in the novel?
She is 16 and ridiculed for her weight, her clothes and her mother's religion.
What is the name of Carrie's religiously fanatical mother?
She locks Carrie in a closet as punishment for the 'sin' of menstruating.
What supernatural ability does Carrie possess?
King was partly inspired by a Life magazine article on the subject.
Which popular girl leads the locker-room bullying and later plots the prom prank?
Banned from the prom for refusing detention, she recruits her boyfriend Billy to collect pig's blood.
Which classmate, feeling guilty, asks her boyfriend to take Carrie to the prom?
After the massacre she is scapegoated and writes a memoir defending Carrie.
What is the name of Sue's boyfriend, who takes Carrie to the prom?
In the novel he is knocked out by a falling bucket and dies in the fire without regaining consciousness.
What is dumped on Carrie at the moment she is crowned prom queen?
Chris rigs the prom queen ballot so that Carrie is on stage under the buckets.
What is the name of the gym teacher in the novel who comforts Carrie after the shower incident?
The 1976 film renamed her Miss Collins.
How does Carrie kill her mother in the novel?
Margaret has just stabbed her with a kitchen knife; the flying knives are the film's version.
What nickname does the novel give the night of the disaster at the school dance?
It leaves 440 casualties and prompts a congressional commission.
How many casualties does the novel report from prom night?
They include the majority of the graduating class; many survivors leave town.
How does the novel end?
An Appalachian mother writes to her sister that her four-year-old is 'destined to be even more powerful'.
What literary form does the novel partly take, mixing narrative with reports and excerpts?
King enjoyed faking documents in the style of Esquire and Reader's Digest.
For which men's magazine did King originally intend Carrie as a short story?
A friend had suggested he try writing a story about a female character.
Who rescued the first three pages of Carrie from the trash and urged King to keep going?
He had given up out of discomfort and apathy, convinced it would never sell.
What was King's day job while writing Carrie?
He lived in a trailer in Hermon, Maine, and taught at Hampden Academy.
Which publisher released the Carrie hardback in April 1974?
Editor Bill Thompson pushed the advance up from $1,500 to $2,500.
How much did New American Library pay for the paperback rights to Carrie?
King's $200,000 share let him quit teaching and write full time.
What did King's original ending have Carrie doing before his editor talked him out of it?
Bill Thompson persuaded him to make the ending more subtle.
How many copies did the paperback edition eventually sell, boosted by the 1976 film?
The hardback had sold only about 13,000 to 17,000.
Who directed the 1976 film adaptation?
He pushed the studio for permission to direct after being intrigued by the story.
Who plays Carrie White in the 1976 film?
She turned up to her screen test with Vaseline in her hair and a seventh-grade sailor dress.
Who plays Carrie's mother in the 1976 film?
She earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for the role.
Which future Grease star plays Billy Nolan?
He and Nancy Allen's Chris die when Carrie flips their car and ruptures its gas tank.
Who plays Carrie's chief tormentor in the 1976 film?
She was the last to audition, on the verge of leaving Hollywood, and later married De Palma.
Who plays Sue Snell in the 1976 film?
Her mother Priscilla Pointer plays Mrs. Snell; she returned as Sue in The Rage: Carrie 2.
Who plays the gym teacher Miss Collins in the film?
She later starred as Margaret in the notorious 1988 Broadway musical.
Who wrote the screenplay for the 1976 film?
He shared a screenplay credit again on the 2013 remake.
Who was De Palma's first choice to play Carrie?
Slade had drawn good notices for Our Time (1974); Spacek's screen test changed his mind.
Who persuaded the film's eventual star to audition for the title role?
Fisk was also the film's art director, and ended up burying her for the final graveyard shot.
How was the final graveyard scene shot to give it a dreamlike quality?
It was inspired by the ending of Deliverance, and Spacek insisted on using her own hand from beneath the gravel.
What was the film's final budget?
United Artists had first allowed only $1.6 million, and some scripted scenes were cut for money.
Roughly how much did the 1976 film gross in the US and Canada?
It earned $14.5 million in rentals there by January 1978.
Which studio released the 1976 film?
It opened on November 3, 1976.
Which two Academy Awards was the film nominated for?
Spacek and Laurie were the nominees, unusual recognition for a horror film.
Who composed the score for the 1976 film?
He went on to score De Palma's Dressed to Kill, Blow Out and Body Double.
What was the opening scene, later cut, meant to show?
The pebbles looked like rain on film, and when the model house rig failed they burned it down instead.
Where was the exterior of the White house filmed?
The crew raided religious souvenir shops to dress it; the school exteriors were Palisades Charter High.
In which year was the 1976 film added to the US National Film Registry?
Its prom scene ranked eighth on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments.
What was the title of the 1999 sequel to the 1976 film?
Emily Bergl played Rachel Lang, revealed to share a father with Carrie; it lost money.
Who played Carrie in the 2013 remake?
Julianne Moore was Margaret and Kimberly Peirce directed.
How many performances did the 1988 Broadway musical of Carrie manage before closing?
After sixteen previews it lost more than $7 million, one of Broadway's most expensive flops.
Which director was announced in 2024 to make a Carrie TV series for Amazon?
The series, announced in 2024, was slated to premiere on Prime Video on October 7, 2026.
Which novelist wrote the introduction to the 2024 50th-anniversary edition of Carrie?
Hodder & Stoughton published the anniversary edition in Britain in March 2024.
Who played Margaret White opposite Chloë Grace Moretz in the 2013 remake?
Judy Greer took the gym-teacher role of Miss Desjardin in the same film.
Which director, known for Boys Don't Cry, made the 2013 remake?
The film grossed $84 million worldwide but drew mixed reviews.
Who starred as Carrie in the 2002 NBC television film written by Bryan Fuller?
The studios intended it as a backdoor pilot and changed the ending, but no series followed.
Roughly how many copies did the paperback of Carrie sell in its first year?
The hardback had sold only about 13,000 to 17,000 copies.
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