50 Fun Facts About John Candy

What does John Candy's chatty salesman Del Griffith sell for a living in Planes, Trains and Automobiles?

Shower curtain rings are the trade of Del Griffith, and a line he speaks in the film later gave the 2025 documentary John Candy: I Like Me its title.

For which Christmas blockbuster did John Candy shoot his entire cameo as a travelling bandleader in one 23-hour day?

Home Alone paid Candy just $414 for the day, a favour to its writer, and he was the one actor allowed to improvise his lines.

Which supernatural comedy offered John Candy the role of accountant Louis Tully before Rick Moranis took it?

Ghostbusters went ahead with Moranis after Candy's ideas for the character clashed with the filmmakers', though Candy still turns up in the music video for the theme song.

Which hockey superstar joined John Candy and Bruce McNall in buying the Toronto Argonauts in 1991?

Wayne Gretzky and Candy came in as minority partners beside majority owner Bruce McNall, and the team won the league title in their first season as owners.

Which country's first Olympic bobsled team does John Candy's disgraced coach train in Cool Runnings?

Jamaica really did send a debut bobsled team to the 1988 Winter Olympics, and Cool Runnings was the last Candy film released in his lifetime.

What is the name of John Candy's half-man, half-dog sidekick in the Star Wars spoof Spaceballs?

Barf belongs to a species the film calls a Mawg, and he rides shotgun in a flying Winnebago motorhome piloted by the mercenary Lone Starr.

Which comedy casts John Candy as a carefree bachelor left in charge of three children during a family emergency?

Uncle Buck did well enough in cinemas in 1989 that CBS turned the story into a television series in 1990.

Which comedian plays Neal Page, the uptight executive stuck with John Candy in Planes, Trains and Automobiles?

Steve Martin and Candy improvised so freely that the first cut ran nearly four hours before it was trimmed for cinemas.

In which Bill Murray army comedy does John Candy play Dewey Oxberger, a gentle recruit nicknamed Ox?

Stripes needed no audition from Candy: a producer who knew him from Toronto simply told director Ivan Reitman to cast him.

On which holiday was John Candy born in 1950, in the Ontario town of Newmarket?

Halloween 1950 was Candy's birthday, and Toronto's mayor proclaimed October 31, 2020, John Candy Day to mark what would have been his 70th.

Which Western comedy was John Candy filming in Durango when he died of a heart attack in 1994?

Wagons East was finished with a body double, computer effects and script rewrites, then dedicated to Candy's memory.

Which Hollywood legend ended a 20-year retirement to play John Candy's controlling mother in Only the Lonely?

Maureen O'Hara had left films in 1971, and the part was written for her by a director unaware that she had retired to the Virgin Islands.

John Candy's two Emmy Awards for SCTV honoured which part of his work on the sketch series?

Writing won Candy and his SCTV castmates the Emmy for a variety or music programme two years running, in 1982 and 1983.

Which holiday are the stranded travellers desperate to be back for in John Candy's Planes, Trains and Automobiles?

Thanksgiving gives the film its deadline, and the studio opened it in American cinemas on the day before the holiday in 1987.

Where is Neal Page's family waiting for him in Planes, Trains and Automobiles, the John Candy road comedy?

Chicago is where Neal Page lives, but a blizzard there diverts his flight to Wichita, Kansas, and the misadventures begin.

Which filmmaker wrote and directed Planes, Trains and Automobiles and scripted Candy's comedy The Great Outdoors?

John Hughes first worked with Candy as the writer of National Lampoon's Vacation in 1983, and kept writing him parts and cameos into the early 1990s.

Which style of music does John Candy's SCTV character Yosh Shmenge play with his band the Happy Wanderers?

Polka made the Shmenges breakout characters, and they earned an HBO special, The Last Polka, spoofing the concert film The Last Waltz.

Which SCTV castmate played John Candy's brother Stan Shmenge and his partner in Armed and Dangerous?

Eugene Levy landed the security-guard comedy on Candy's own recommendation, after the actor first cast opposite him dropped out.

Which Michael Moore satire, released after John Candy's death, cast him as a gung-ho American sheriff?

Canadian Bacon was already finished when Candy died; it screened at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival and was dedicated to his memory.

Which Oliver Stone film gave John Candy a small dramatic role as the shady Southern lawyer Dean Andrews?

JFK earned eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, and won for its cinematography and its editing.

In which romantic comedy does John Candy play Freddie, the womanising brother of a man who loves a mermaid?

Splash is generally considered Candy's breakout, and critic Roger Ebert argued that he, not the leading man, should have played the lover.

Which host of the 1988 Winter Olympics is the setting for the bobsled races in John Candy's Cool Runnings?

Calgary played itself: the cast and crew shot the snow scenes there first, then moved to the Caribbean for the rest of the film.

In which musical comedy does John Candy play Burton Mercer, the parole officer helping police hunt Jake and Elwood?

The Blues Brothers follows the paroled Jake and his brother as they reunite their band to save the Catholic orphanage where they grew up.

Which musical about a man-eating plant features John Candy as the radio DJ Wink Wilkinson?

Little Shop of Horrors gave Candy one of its special guest spots, alongside Bill Murray, Jim Belushi and Christopher Guest.

In National Lampoon's Vacation, John Candy plays a security guard at which closed California theme park?

Walley World only got its guard because test audiences disliked the first ending; Candy's scenes were shot months after the rest of the film.

Which comedy casts John Candy as Spike Nolan, a baseball catcher whose best friend is set a bizarre 30-day challenge?

Brewster's Millions pairs Candy with Richard Pryor, in a story filmed again and again since the silent era, from a 1902 novel about a man forced to waste money.

Which director gave John Candy an early Hollywood part as a soldier in the big-budget war comedy 1941?

Steven Spielberg filled the ensemble around Candy with names such as John Belushi, Christopher Lee and Toshiro Mifune.

In Volunteers, which Washington hometown does John Candy's Peace Corps recruit Tom Tuttle keep announcing?

Tacoma's proudest son is a Washington State graduate sent to Thailand, where the volunteers are assigned to build a bridge for a village.

Which actor directed the 2025 documentary John Candy: I Like Me, produced by Ryan Reynolds?

Colin Hanks's film opened the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival, where Candy's two children joined him for a question-and-answer session.

Which vain SCTV star, played by John Candy, saw his career nosedive after an over-budget crane shot?

Johnny LaRue blew the money on Polynesiantown, a spoof of Chinatown, and the show's writers turned the fallout into a running storyline.

Which championship trophy did the Toronto Argonauts win in 1991, John Candy's first season as a co-owner?

Grey Cup engravers named only the majority owner at first; Candy and his hockey-star partner were finally added to the trophy in 2007.

Which improv comedy troupe did John Candy join in 1972, years before starring in its television spin-off?

The Second City put Candy in its Toronto company and then on its sketch show SCTV, which made him popular across North America.

Which co-star from The Great Outdoors directed John Candy in two roles in the horror comedy Nothing but Trouble?

Dan Aykroyd wrote the film and made it his directorial debut, and like Candy he took on two parts himself.

Which bald-headed animal returns to torment John Candy's Chet Ripley at a Wisconsin lake cabin in The Great Outdoors?

A grizzly bear lost the fur on its head to buckshot in Chet's campfire story, and the role went to a trained animal called Bart the Bear.

In The Great Outdoors, John Candy's Chet Ripley is dared to finish the Old 96er, a giant serving of which food?

Steak, all 96 ounces of it: the dare comes from Roman, the boastful investment broker married to the sister of Chet's wife.

What is the job of John Candy's bumbling, disguise-loving title character in the comedy Who's Harry Crumb?

Private detective work runs in the family: Harry is the last descendant of his agency's founders, yet has spent ten years exiled to its Tulsa branch.

In Delirious, John Candy plays a head writer who wakes up trapped inside which kind of television show?

A soap opera called Beyond Our Dreams swallows him after a head injury, and whatever he types on his typewriter then comes true.

Which comedy veteran directed Summer Rental, the beach holiday film that gave John Candy his first Hollywood lead?

Carl Reiner got on so well with Candy that the pair planned another film together, The Last Holiday, though it was never made.

Which child actor played Miles, the talkative nephew who grills John Candy's bachelor babysitter in a 1989 comedy?

Macaulay Culkin's Miles gets an improvised birthday party in the film, complete with a drunken clown who is sent packing.

Which Breakfast Club actress plays the shy mortuary worker John Candy's policeman romances in Only the Lonely?

Ally Sheedy's Theresa finally gets her proposal from the bucket of a fire truck, raised to her window by Candy's lovesick Danny.

Which comedy director cast John Candy in Spaceballs and also played two roles in the spoof himself?

Mel Brooks appears as both the scheming President Skroob and the wise Yogurt, keeper of a mystical power called the Schwartz.

In The Rescuers Down Under, John Candy voices Wilbur, which kind of seabird that flies the mice to Australia?

An albatross named after aviation pioneer Wilbur Wright, he takes over the route from Orville, his retired brother from the first film.

Which 1981 animated anthology film features John Candy as the voice of Den, a bookworm turned muscular hero?

Heavy Metal also used Candy as a desk sergeant and a robot, alongside SCTV colleagues such as Harold Ramis.

Which Sesame Street character is the hero of the 1985 film in which John Candy cameos as a state trooper?

Big Bird has been caged by two con artists who run a fraudulent carnival, and Candy's trooper pulls them over for speeding and arrests them.

In a 1988 Bobcat Goldthwait comedy, John Candy supplies the voice of Don, which kind of talking animal?

A horse with a gift for stock tips: for Hot to Trot, Candy was hired to re-record the voice, ignored the new script and improvised his lines instead.

SCTV, the sketch show that made John Candy famous, is set at a television station in which fictional town?

Melonville had a corrupt mayor, Tommy Shanks, another Candy character, who gave fireside chats beside a stuffed dog.

In 2006, twelve years after his death, John Candy was honoured on which item issued in Canada?

A postage stamp from Canada Post honoured Candy in May 2006, one of four in a set celebrating Canadians in Hollywood, Fay Wray and Lorne Greene among them.

Which sport did John Candy dream of playing professionally before a knee injury in high school ended the hope?

Football stayed with him: a star offensive tackle at Neil McNeil Catholic High School, he later bought a stake in his hometown professional team.

Which American sketch show did John Candy host in 1983 without ever being a member of its cast?

Saturday Night Live had Candy host in October 1983, and writer Bob Odenkirk later called him the show's most-burned potential host, often asked and then dropped at the last minute.

Which director, later of the first two Harry Potter films, wrote and directed John Candy in Only the Lonely?

Chris Columbus shot most of the romance on location, including scenes at the old Comiskey Park baseball stadium.