50 Fun Facts About Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

Which Hollywood star, better known for westerns, directed the 1997 film of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Clint Eastwood directed and produced the film, and personally talked Jim Williams's sister into letting him shoot inside the real Mercer House.

Which bronze statue of a child holding two bowls appears on the cover of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Bird Girl stood almost unnoticed on a family grave plot for decades; once the cover made it famous, so many visitors came that the family had it removed.

Which Usual Suspects Oscar winner played Jim Williams in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Kevin Spacey visited Savannah before the shoot so that he could pick up the local accent by listening to people talk.

In Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, performer The Lady Chablis gate-crashes which formal Savannah event?

A debutante ball held each year by Savannah's African American society is the party she invites herself to. The Lady Chablis later played herself in the 1997 film.

Jim Williams of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil once draped what from a window to disrupt a film shoot?

A Nazi flag went up at Mercer House in 1979 after a film company working outside refused his request for a donation to the local humane society; the synagogue across the square complained.

Which former First Lady offered Jim Williams of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil $90,000 for a Fabergé box?

Jackie Onassis made the offer on a visit to Mercer House in the early 1980s, and Williams turned her down even though he would have cleared $20,000 on the jade box.

Sonny Seiler, the defense lawyer in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, owned which line of college mascots?

Uga the bulldog has been raised by the Seiler family since 1956, and Uga V appears in the 1997 film playing his own father.

Which British actor, then 24, played Jim Williams's victim in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Jude Law took the part of the young hustler as one of his first film roles, with the character renamed for the screen from the real Danny Hansford.

Which actor played reporter Kelso, the author's stand-in, in the 1997 film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

John Cusack based the part on John Berendt himself, who took the cast on his own guided tour of Savannah.

In Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Jim Williams restores Savannah's old houses and makes his living as what?

An antiques dealer known internationally, Williams ran his restoration workshop from the basement of Mercer House and restored more than fifty houses.

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil spent a record 216 weeks on which newspaper's best-seller list?

The New York Times list kept the book for more than four years, and the visitors it sent south lifted Savannah's hotel-tax revenue by about a quarter within two years.

Which Johnny Mercer standard does k.d. lang sing in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Skylark, with music by Hoagy Carmichael, is heard as the film opens and again over the end credits.

Mercer House, the mansion in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, faces which of Savannah's historic squares?

Monterey Square, named for an American victory in the Mexican War, is where filming began in 1997, and the house fills a whole block on its south-west side.

The cover statue of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil stood for decades in which Savannah cemetery?

Bonaventure sits on a bluff above the Wilmington River, and songwriter Johnny Mercer is buried there.

Which Roman goddess's name does John Berendt give the root doctor in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Minerva was the pseudonym for Valerie Boles, a real South Carolina root doctor who would not take money from anyone's hand in case the touch let them work a spell on her.

John Berendt followed Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil with The City of Falling Angels, set in which city?

Venice drew Berendt after a 1996 fire destroyed its historic La Fenice opera house, and he built the book around the people he met while living there.

In Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, how does Jim Williams account for shooting Danny Hansford in his study?

Self-defense was his claim throughout: he said Hansford drew a pistol on him first. Prosecutors countered that Williams had rearranged the study to fit that story.

Building work on Mercer House, the mansion in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was halted for years by what?

The Civil War stopped the job soon after it began in 1860; the house was finished around 1868 by a new owner, and nobody named Mercer ever lived in it.

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil was a 1995 finalist for which American honor in general nonfiction?

The Pulitzer Prize shortlist was a long way from the modest first printing of 25,000 copies; the book also won the Southern Book Award.

Which pianist in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil was dubbed the Lady of 6,000 Songs by Johnny Mercer?

Emma Kelly earned the name when the songwriter tested her with title after title and reckoned she knew six thousand by heart; she plays herself in the 1997 film.

Jim Williams's fourth trial in the Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil case was moved from Savannah to which city?

Augusta jurors acquitted him in May 1989, eight years after his arrest; being tried four times on one charge was a record for the state.

Danny Hansford, the victim in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, goes by which name in the 1997 film?

Billy Hanson was one of several new names: the film also renamed the district attorney and the neighbour whose dog annoys Williams, to put distance between the characters and real people.

In the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Kelso comes to Savannah to cover a party for which magazine?

Town & Country sends him for a short piece on Jim Williams's Christmas party; in reality Berendt first met Williams in 1982 and moved south three years later.

Before Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt wrote a column for which men's magazine?

Esquire ran his column from 1982 to 1994, and he had been an associate editor there in the 1960s before a spell editing New York magazine.

Which publisher won a four-way bidding war for the manuscript of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Random House printed the manuscript without changing a word, fourteen months after Berendt finished writing it.

Which studio released the 1997 film of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and built its courtroom in Burbank?

Warner Bros. filmed the party scenes inside the real Mercer House, but Williams's sister barred the shooting scene, so the study was rebuilt on a California soundstage.

Sonny Seiler, Jim Williams's real lawyer, plays which part in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

The judge was not the part he asked for: Seiler wanted to be the jury foreman who announces the verdict, until the film-makers talked him onto the bench.

Which Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil character is a piano-playing lawyer who covers bad checks with charm?

Joe Odom throws parties at all hours, and in the 1997 film, where Paul Hipp plays him, the visiting reporter first finds him at the piano.

Why did John Berendt's first agent turn down the manuscript of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Too local, she told him, and no publisher would take a chance on it. A second agent had four major houses bidding within a week.

Which tune does Jim Williams blast on his organ in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Jeepers Creepers is his answer to a neighbour's barking dog: he plays the ballroom organ loudly enough to drown it out.

Which Savannah green space hosts the dog-walking scenes in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Forsyth Park lies a block south of Mercer House, and the real root doctor behind the book often sat there, passing on neighbourhood news to Jim Williams.

Kelso eats breakfast at which real Savannah diner in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Clary's Cafe opened in 1903 as a drug store, and Berendt used it as his listening post for local gossip while he was researching the book.

The director's daughter Alison plays which singer in the 1997 film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Mandy Nicholls becomes the visiting reporter's love interest on screen, a romance the book never had, and Alison sings Come Rain or Come Shine on the soundtrack.

Which screenwriter, later director of The Blind Side, adapted Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil for film?

John Lee Hancock had already written A Perfect World for the same director, who had not read Berendt's book when the script reached him.

Which Ladykillers actress played the root doctor in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Irma P. Hall had broken through a year earlier as Aunt T. in A Family Thing; the woman she played was based on a real practitioner from South Carolina.

Which Australian actor played defense lawyer Sonny Seiler in the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Jack Thompson had played a defense lawyer before, in the Australian war drama Breaker Morant; the real Seiler was on set too, in a part of his own.

In the film Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which eccentric keeps flies on strings tied to his lapels?

Luther Driggers is an inventor said to own a vial of poison strong enough to kill the whole city if it ever reached the water supply.

In the case behind Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Jim Williams shot Danny Hansford with which pistol?

A 9mm Luger came out of his desk after, by his account, the gun Hansford pointed at him jammed; Williams phoned the police about half an hour later.

By Jim Williams's account in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Danny Hansford pushed over what in the hallway?

A grandfather clock, English and made in the 1700s, went over during the row, which moved into the study moments later.

Which Savannah photographer shot the moonlit cover picture for Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Jack Leigh found the statue at dusk on his second day of searching, and is said to have spent ten hours in the darkroom giving the photo its moonlit look.

Which Illinois sculptor made the 1936 statue on the cover of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Sylvia Shaw Judson died in 1978, sixteen years before the book made her statue famous; she had meant its two bowls to hold food or water for birds.

The cover statue of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil was moved in 1997 to which Savannah institution?

Telfair Museums took the statue on loan from the family that owned it; founded through a bequest from Mary Telfair, it was the first public art museum in the South.

The garden in the title Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil is a cemetery in which South Carolina town?

Beaufort holds the grave where the root doctor works her spells at the dead of night; the film moved those scenes to a Savannah cemetery.

The title Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil draws on the timing of spells in which folk-magic tradition?

Hoodoo holds that the half hour before twelve is the time for working good and the half hour after is the time for working harm.

Which composer of Parade wrote the songs for the 2024 stage musical Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Jason Robert Brown at first said no because he could not picture the book as a musical; an earlier attempt built on Johnny Mercer songs had been shelved.

Which Savannah society in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil has had exactly sixteen members since 1893?

The Married Woman's Card Club began so that wives had something to do while their husbands worked; a member who divorces must resign, and guests leave promptly at six.

How did the third of Jim Williams's four trials end in the Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil case?

A hung jury followed when one woman held out against eleven votes to convict; the first two trials had both ended in convictions that were later overturned.

Which reputed model for TV's Matlock first defended Jim Williams of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?

Bobby Lee Cook lost that first trial in 1982, but the conviction was thrown out after he was anonymously sent a police report in which an officer contradicted himself.

The Lady Chablis of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil called her 1996 autobiography Hiding My what?

Candy completes the title, Hiding My Candy: The Autobiography of the Grand Empress of Savannah, and John Berendt wrote the introduction.

John Berendt, the narrator of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, grew up in which upstate New York city?

Syracuse was home to two writer parents, and it is to them that Berendt dedicated the book.