50 Fun Facts About Pet Sematary

Why is 'Sematary' spelled that way in the title of Stephen King's novel about a Maine burial ground?

Children misspelled the sign on the animal graveyard they tend in the woods, and King kept the error. He based it on a real plot that local kids had made behind his rented house.

Which actor, famous as Herman Munster, played neighbor Jud Crandall in the 1989 film Pet Sematary?

Fred Gwynne got the part only after the director fought studio executives, who feared audiences would never take a sitcom monster seriously.

Stephen King singles out Pet Sematary, his tale of a cursed burial ground, for which distinction?

It scared him the most of all his novels, by his own account. He found the finished draft too disturbing to publish and released it years later only to settle a book contract.

In Stephen King's Pet Sematary, Ellie Creed's doomed cat bears the full name of which statesman?

Winston Churchill is the cat's full name, shortened by the family to Church. He is the first creature Louis Creed buries in the ancient ground, and he comes home changed.

Which punk band, a favorite of Stephen King, recorded the title song for the 1989 film Pet Sematary?

The Ramones wrote it after a visit to King's home, where, the story goes, their bassist took the novel down to the basement and came back an hour later with the words.

Stephen King wrote the screenplay for the 1989 film Pet Sematary and also appears on screen as what?

A minister is King's cameo. He stayed closely involved throughout, insisting the film be shot in Maine and keeping the final say over who directed it.

How does the 2019 film Pet Sematary change the central tragedy of Stephen King's novel?

The daughter dies instead: Ellie, not toddler Gage, is hit by a tanker at her own birthday party after running to the family cat in the road.

Which star of 3rd Rock from the Sun played neighbor Jud Crandall in the 2019 film Pet Sematary?

John Lithgow plays Jud as a widower with a soft spot for young Ellie, which is why he shows her father the burial ground when her pet is killed.

Which teenage star of Terminator 2 played lead Jeff Matthews in the 1992 sequel Pet Sematary Two?

Edward Furlong was cast to cash in on his blockbuster fame, after the studio rejected a plan to build the sequel around a teenage Ellie Creed.

Which X-Files star joined the 2023 prequel Pet Sematary: Bloodlines as a grieving farmer?

David Duchovny plays Bill Baterman, who buries his soldier son in the cursed ground in 1969 and sets the whole story in motion.

In Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary, the Creed family moves to rural Maine from which big city?

Chicago is where the Creeds come from and where Rachel's parents still live, so she and the children are away visiting there when the family pet is killed.

Stephen King's Pet Sematary and all four of its films are set in or near which Maine town?

Ludlow is a real Maine town, though King's version of it is invented. He went back to his fictional one as the home of the troubled novelist in The Dark Half.

In Pet Sematary, what danger does elderly neighbor Jud Crandall warn the newly arrived Creeds about?

The highway outside the house is busy with speeding trucks, Jud warns. It goes on to kill first the family pet and then two-year-old Gage.

In Pet Sematary, Rachel Creed cannot talk about death because of the childhood loss of which sister?

Zelda died when both girls were children, and the memory leaves Rachel so uneasy about death that even the neighborhood's animal graveyard disturbs her.

Which creature of Algonquian legend haunts the Maine woods in Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary?

A Wendigo is the force that powers the burial ground, and Louis Creed meets it face to face while carrying his dead son through the forest.

In Pet Sematary, which Native American people once used the burial ground beyond the pet cemetery?

The Mi'kmaq, spelled Micmac in the novel, once laid their dead in the ground that Jud calls the real cemetery, and he leads Louis there instead of stopping at the pets' graves.

Around which holiday is the Creed family's cat run over in Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary?

Thanksgiving finds Louis alone in the house while his family is away, so he can bury the animal in secret with Jud. The 2019 film moves the death to Halloween.

Which director, known for Madonna's music videos, made the 1989 film Pet Sematary and its sequel?

Mary Lambert won the job by impressing King, who had the final say, with her enthusiasm for his novels and her promise to stay faithful to the book.

Stephen King conceived Pet Sematary as a retelling of which 1902 short story by W. W. Jacobs?

The Monkey's Paw is about parents whose wish brings their dead son back to the door, the same bargain Louis Creed makes for Gage.

In Pet Sematary, which fatally injured student seems to warn Dr. Louis Creed with his dying words?

Victor Pascow dies on campus after being hit by a vehicle, then appears to Louis the next night and leads him to the edge of the pet cemetery with a warning to go no further.

In the 1989 and 2019 Pet Sematary films, Rachel Creed is haunted by a sister who had which disease?

Spinal meningitis left the girl deformed, and her death scarred Rachel for life. In the 2019 film she comes back to torment Rachel in frightening visions.

In Pet Sematary, which of his father's medical tools does the resurrected Gage Creed use to kill?

A scalpel taken from Louis's bag is the toddler's weapon. He kills Jud first, then his own mother when she hurries home early.

With which drug does Louis Creed finally kill the resurrected Gage in Stephen King's Pet Sematary?

Morphine, given by lethal injection, ends both the toddler and the family cat. Louis fills his syringes knowing by then that he has been manipulated.

Which card game is Louis Creed playing in the final scene of Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary?

Solitaire is his game as he sits indoors, waiting. Then Rachel's reanimated corpse walks up behind him and lays a cold hand on his shoulder.

In the novel Pet Sematary, resurrected soldier Timmy Baterman was killed in action in which war?

World War II took Timmy, and his grieving father buried him in the secret ground. Jud tells the story to stop Louis: what came back knew secrets it had no way of knowing.

In Pet Sematary, why does Ellie Creed no longer want her returned cat in her room at night?

He smells bad, enough that she shuts him out. The once docile pet has also turned hunter, leaving the torn-up bodies of his kills for Louis to find.

Which Star Trek: The Next Generation actress played Rachel Creed in the 1989 film Pet Sematary?

Denise Crosby was known as security chief Tasha Yar, mainly from the show's first season, before she played the death-haunted mother of the Creed family.

The 2019 film Pet Sematary is set in Maine, but it was actually shot in which Canadian province?

Quebec hosted the shoot in summer 2018, in Montreal and the small town of Hudson. The 1989 film, by contrast, was made in Maine at King's insistence.

The 2023 prequel Pet Sematary: Bloodlines skipped cinemas for a release on which streaming service?

Paramount+ carried it exclusively from October 2023, after a festival premiere. The story goes back five decades to follow a young Jud Crandall.

Jud Crandall's talk of a rabid animal in Pet Sematary nods to which other Stephen King novel?

Cujo is never mentioned by name, but Jud speaks of the animal that went rabid. King had published that novel two years before this one reached the shops.

In Pet Sematary, which animal does Jud Crandall admit he brought back from the dead as a boy?

His dog came back from the burial ground when Jud was a boy. He confesses it only after Louis's own buried pet has walked back into the house.

Which Top Gun actor plays widowed father Chase Matthews in the 1992 sequel Pet Sematary Two?

Anthony Edwards, Goose in that film and later Dr. Mark Greene on ER, plays a man who moves with his teenage son to his late wife's hometown.

In Pet Sematary, Louis Creed runs the health service at which campus where Stephen King once worked?

The University of Maine had King as its writer-in-residence in 1979, when he was living in a rented house beside a busy truck route and the idea for the story came to him.

In Pet Sematary, what does Louis Creed find on his feet after his dream of a dead student?

Mud and pine needles, dried onto his feet and his bedsheets, tell Louis that his night walk to the back of the pet cemetery was no dream at all.

At the end of Pet Sematary, why does Louis Creed hope that burying Rachel will turn out better?

He buries her at once, hoping the result will be more favorable if no time is lost. A colleague, Steve Masterton, sees him vanish into the woods with the body.

Which horror director bought the Pet Sematary film rights in 1984 for $10,000 but never made it?

George A. Romero won the rights after King had turned down several other offers, but he was busy with another picture and had to pull out of the production.

In the 1989 film Pet Sematary, Rachel's dying teenage sister is played by what unexpected performer?

A grown man, Andrew Hubatsek, got the role after girls had auditioned, because the director felt an adult male would make the deformed teenager more frightening.

Which Australian star of Zero Dark Thirty played Dr. Louis Creed in the 2019 film Pet Sematary?

Jason Clarke plays Louis as an ER doctor from Boston who drugs his neighbor, digs up his child's body and reburies it in the cursed ground.

In Pet Sematary Two, Chase Matthews moves with his son from Los Angeles to Maine to work as what?

A veterinarian by trade, he treats a resurrected pet whose gunshot wound will not heal and finds that the animal has no heartbeat at all.

Which Shawshank Redemption actor plays the resurrected sheriff Gus Gilbert in Pet Sematary Two?

Clancy Brown earned a Fangoria Chainsaw Award nomination for the part, but lost to Anthony Hopkins in Bram Stoker's Dracula.

What did Stephen King do before the release of Pet Sematary Two, a sequel he did not write?

King had his name removed from the film before it opened. The sequel follows all-new characters, and it met poor reviews and a disappointing box office.

In the 2019 film Pet Sematary, Rachel Creed's sick sister dies after falling down what?

A dumbwaiter shaft is where the girl fell to her death. Years later the adult Rachel is still frightened by visions of her, which return while she is staying with her parents.

Stephen King released the shelved Pet Sematary to fulfill his contract with which publisher?

Doubleday got the book only because King owed it one. He had found the story too disturbing to publish when he finished the first draft four years earlier.

Which child actor, later Aaron on Full House, played Gage Creed in the 1989 film Pet Sematary?

Miko Hughes was two years old when the director talked the studio out of hiring cheaper twins for the part, and he went on to Kindergarten Cop and Apollo 13.

What 1988 Hollywood event finally pushed the studio to greenlight the 1989 film Pet Sematary?

A writers' strike left the studio short of films for 1989, and King's script was already finished. Executives had spent years insisting that demand for his adaptations had dried up.

In Pet Sematary, what barrier at the back of the pet cemetery is Louis Creed warned not to cross?

A deadfall, a tangle of fallen trees, marks the limit. In a dream a dead student warns Louis never to go beyond it, yet Jud later leads him over it to the older burial ground.

Stephen King based Pet Sematary on a rented house beside a truck route in which Maine town?

Orrington is where the Kings were living when a truck killed the family cat, and where local children really had made a burial plot for pets in the woods behind the house.

The sequel Pet Sematary Two is set in Maine, but it was actually filmed in which southern US state?

Georgia stood in for New England when the crew shot in Coweta County in early 1992, although King had required the first film to be made in Maine itself.

The video for the 1989 Pet Sematary title song was shot in a cemetery in which New York village?

Sleepy Hollow lent its famous cemetery on a cold January night, and the video ends with the band being lowered into an open grave beneath its own headstone.

In Stephen King's Pet Sematary, what kind of animal was Hanratty, once buried in the ancient ground?

A bull called Hanratty was buried in the old ground too, proof that Louis Creed's pet was far from the first animal taken there.