50 Fun Facts About My Sister's Keeper

What term describes Anna Fitzgerald, conceived through IVF in My Sister's Keeper?

A savior sibling is conceived as a donor match for a sick child; Picoult has said the idea grew from news of a real American couple whose son was born as a match for his sister.

In Picoult's novel, what kills Anna Fitzgerald just after she wins her case?

A truck hitting the car leaves Anna brain-dead, and lawyer Campbell Alexander approves the organ donation that saves Kate. The epilogue follows the family eight years on.

How does the 2009 film of My Sister's Keeper end for the two sisters, compared with Picoult's novel?

Kate dies and Anna lives in the film, the reverse of the novel, in which Anna is killed after the trial and her kidney saves Kate.

Which director of The Notebook and John Q. made the 2009 film My Sister's Keeper?

Nick Cassavetes is the son of director John Cassavetes and actress Gena Rowlands, and he cast his mother as the older Allie in The Notebook.

Jodi Picoult has said she regretted letting the director of My Sister's Keeper do what?

Change the ending is what Picoult said she regretted allowing; she had defended her own ending as the only one true to the story, even after phoning an oncology nurse to ask for another way out.

Which There's Something About Mary star plays the mother, Sara Fitzgerald, in the 2009 adaptation?

Cameron Diaz's Sara is a former attorney who gave up her career to care for Kate, and she goes back to work only when the family's ordeal is over.

Which Little Miss Sunshine Oscar nominee plays Anna Fitzgerald in the 2009 adaptation?

Abigail Breslin was Oscar-nominated at ten for Little Miss Sunshine, and she came to this film as a late replacement after its first Anna withdrew.

Which sister act was cast as Kate and Anna Fitzgerald before the elder balked at shaving her head?

Dakota and Elle Fanning withdrew together in February 2008, and the actress who took over as Kate went through with it, shaving her head and her eyebrows.

Anna Fitzgerald hires lawyer Campbell Alexander to sue her parents for what legal status?

Medical emancipation would let Anna make her own treatment decisions, including whether to give Kate a kidney; when she wins, the judge hands Campbell medical power of attorney.

Under cross-examination in the 2009 adaptation, what does Anna Fitzgerald admit about her lawsuit?

Kate asked her to refuse the kidney, knowing she would not survive another operation and having had enough of the family's suffering; Jesse's intervention at the hearing forces the admission.

Jodi Picoult set the Fitzgeralds' story in the fictional town of Upper Darby, in which US state?

Rhode Island is the novel's setting, but the film moved the Fitzgeralds west and was shot in Southern California.

What is the full first name of Anna Fitzgerald, the youngest Fitzgerald child in Picoult's novel?

Andromeda is the name of a galaxy and a constellation, a fitting choice from a father who is fond of astronomy; everyone just calls her Anna.

Why does lawyer Campbell Alexander secretly need his service dog in Picoult's novel?

He has epilepsy, developed after a concussion, and it is why he left Julia Romano years earlier, believing she deserved better; a seizure during the trial exposes the secret.

Julia Romano, Campbell Alexander's high-school girlfriend, is appointed to Anna's case in what role?

A guardian ad litem advises the court on what is best for a child, which puts Julia opposite the man who broke her heart in high school without ever saying why.

What loss shapes Judge DeSalvo, who hears Anna's case in Picoult's novel?

His daughter, to a drunk driver, when she was 12, so he too is a parent who has buried a child by the time Anna's petition reaches his court.

Sara Fitzgerald, once a civil attorney, responds to Anna's lawsuit in Picoult's novel by doing what?

Representing herself, Sara at first assumes Anna merely wants attention and expects the complaint to be withdrawn; Anna will not back down.

Jesse Fitzgerald, the overlooked eldest child, spends his time in Picoult's novel doing what?

Setting fires in empty buildings with homemade explosives, and using drugs, is how Jesse acts out after years of being ignored in favour of Kate and Anna; the epilogue makes him a police officer.

In the epilogue of Picoult's novel, eight years after the trial, what has Kate Fitzgerald become?

A ballet teacher, Kate also narrates the final pages, speaking of deep guilt and of a bond with the part of Anna she carries inside her.

In Picoult's novel, what does Sara hide from Kate about Taylor Ambrose, the boyfriend she met during chemotherapy?

That he has died is hidden by Sara, who fears the grief would rob Kate of her will to live; Kate assumes Taylor simply stopped calling, and the rift with her mother deepens when she learns the truth.

How is wealthy aunt Suzanne, who openly criticises Sara's treatment of both girls, related to Sara?

Her older sister by ten years, Suzanne climbed the corporate ladder while Sara gave up the law for motherhood, and she backs Anna more openly than Brian does.

Which actress, Ariel DuBois on the TV series Medium, plays Kate Fitzgerald in the 2009 adaptation?

Sofia Vassilieva shaved her head and her eyebrows to play Kate, and became an honorary ambassador for Stand Up to Cancer the same year.

Which 30 Rock star plays Anna's lawyer, Campbell Alexander, in the 2009 film My Sister's Keeper?

Alec Baldwin won two Emmys as Jack Donaghy, and his Campbell, a lawyer who keeps a service dog he will not explain, supplies the film's dry comic relief.

Which twice Oscar-nominated actress, for Working Girl and In & Out, plays Judge De Salvo on screen?

Joan Cusack later won a Primetime Emmy for playing Sheila Jackson on Shameless; the novel's Judge De Salvo is a man, while the film's is Judge Joan De Salvo.

Which star of The Lost Boys and Speed 2 plays the father, Brian Fitzgerald, in the 2009 adaptation?

Jason Patric, grandson of Jackie Gleason, plays the parent with misgivings: Brian takes Anna's lawsuit far better than Sara does.

Which Sarah Connor Chronicles star plays Kate Fitzgerald's boyfriend, Taylor Ambrose, on screen?

Thomas Dekker played John Connor on that series and Zach on Heroes; in the film, Taylor is a fellow patient whom Kate meets in hospital and falls for.

Which Bones star plays Dr. Farquad, one of Kate Fitzgerald's doctors, in the 2009 adaptation?

Emily Deschanel's father, Caleb Deschanel, shot the film as its cinematographer; her younger sister is the actress and singer Zooey Deschanel.

Which film topped the US box office the weekend My Sister's Keeper opened fifth, in June 2009?

Revenge of the Fallen, the Transformers sequel, opened that weekend with over $100 million; Variety had tipped Keeper as a female-friendly alternative to it.

Which Randy Newman song, sung by Edwina Hayes, opens the My Sister's Keeper soundtrack album?

Feels Like Home was written for Randy Newman's Faust, in which Bonnie Raitt sang it; Hayes's cover came from her 2008 album Pour Me a Drink.

Which Bridge to Terabithia and The Proposal composer also scored the 2009 film My Sister's Keeper?

Aaron Zigman wrote his first film score for the same director's John Q. in 2002 and stayed with him for The Notebook before this film.

My Sister's Keeper's director drew on his child Sasha's health history; she was born with what?

A heart defect that required substantial surgery; he had already dedicated his 2002 film John Q. to Sasha.

Picoult says the idea came 'through the back door' of researching eugenics for which earlier novel?

Second Glance had her reading about the American Eugenics Society, once based at Cold Spring Harbor, and she said finding the Human Genome Project in the same place was too much of a coincidence.

Picoult traced Sara's desperation to her own son Jake's childhood illness: a benign tumour where?

In his ear, a cholesteatoma, treated with an experimental approach that needed repeated surgeries; the standard route, she said, would have left him profoundly deaf.

Jodi Picoult studied creative writing under Mary Morris at which university, graduating in 1987?

Princeton is where she published two short stories in Seventeen magazine while still a student; a master's in education from Harvard came later.

Beyond novels, Jodi Picoult wrote several 2007 issues of which DC Comics series?

Wonder Woman came her way when DC Comics approached her, and she has said her first order of business was to get the heroine a functional outfit.

Which Picoult novel about a school shooting first put her at number one on the New York Times list?

Nineteen Minutes follows the aftermath of a small-town school shooting, and PEN America later counted it among the books most often banned from US schools in 2023–24.

Which bestselling teen series ranked two places above My Sister's Keeper on the American Library Association's 2009 most-challenged list?

Twilight was fifth and Picoult's novel seventh, with The Catcher in the Rye between them; the complaints against Keeper ranged from offensive language to sexism and violence.

Which ALA prize for adult books with special teen appeal did Picoult's novel receive in 2005?

The Alex Award is named for Baltimore librarian Margaret Alexander Edwards, known as Alex, and honours ten books a year.

With which family member did Jodi Picoult co-write the young-adult novel Between the Lines?

Her daughter Samantha van Leer shares the byline on Picoult's first novel for teenagers, in which a bookworm finds the fairytale prince in her favourite book wants out of his story.

Which illness, diagnosed when she was a small child, is Kate Fitzgerald fighting in My Sister's Keeper?

Leukemia, of the acute promyelocytic kind, has been Kate's fight since she was two, and Anna was conceived because nobody in the family was a donor match.

What is Brian Fitzgerald's job in My Sister's Keeper, both in Picoult's novel and on screen?

Firefighter Brian takes Anna to live at his fire station to keep her apart from Sara during the lawsuit, in the book and the film alike.

Which state is Kate Fitzgerald's favourite place, the one her family revisits each year as the 2009 adaptation ends?

Montana is the place Kate keeps coming back to in her thoughts, and by the film's close Sara is back at work and Jesse is in college.

Which condition of Jesse's went unnoticed for years on screen, a source of guilt for Kate Fitzgerald?

Dyslexia went unnoticed while Kate absorbed their parents' attention, and Jesse's grades suffered; the novel's Jesse acts out far more destructively.

In the 2009 adaptation, on what terms does Campbell Alexander take Anna Fitzgerald's case?

Pro bono means without charge; Campbell, who has a hidden illness of his own, sympathises with Anna's feeling of having no control over her own body.

Before the hearing in the 2009 adaptation, what one last outing does Kate Fitzgerald request?

A trip to the beach is granted when Brian discharges her from the hospital for the day and threatens to divorce Sara unless she joins them.

Kate Fitzgerald's oncologist in Picoult's novel is Dr. Harrison who?

Chance is the doctor who has treated Kate since she was two, and who warns the family that she may well die during a transplant, leaving Anna a kidney short for nothing.

What was Anna Fitzgerald's very first donation to Kate, in Picoult's novel?

Umbilical cord blood worked at first, but the cancer kept returning, so Anna went on to give blood, marrow and more as she grew.

Which network made TV movies of Picoult's The Pact and Plain Truth, while Keeper went to theatres?

Lifetime made The Pact, Plain Truth, The Tenth Circle and Salem Falls as original movies, which makes the 2009 feature the one Picoult adaptation on that list to reach theatres.

Which production company, credited beside Curmudgeon Films, made the 2009 film My Sister's Keeper?

New Line Cinema had been folded into Warner Bros. in 2008, the year before release, which is why Warner put the film into US theatres.

Evan Ellingson, the film's Jesse Fitzgerald, also played Kyle Harmon in which CBS crime series?

CSI: Miami cast Ellingson as Horatio Caine's son from 2007 to 2010, either side of the film, whose script Variety found scarcely more interested in Jesse than his mother is.

Keeper co-writer Jeremy Leven also wrote and directed which 1994 Johnny Depp romance?

Don Juan DeMarco has a psychiatrist treating a young man who insists he is the world's greatest lover; Leven also adapted The Notebook for the same director.