40 Fun Facts About The Indian in the Cupboard

Which British novelist, already famous for the adult bestseller The L-Shaped Room, wrote The Indian in the Cupboard?

Lynne Reid Banks has sold more than 15 million copies of her tale about a boy and a living plastic figure. Four sequels followed over the next 18 years.

Little Bear, the tiny man Omri brings to life in The Indian in the Cupboard, belongs to which nation?

Iroquois is the nation of the three-inch-tall Little Bear, an 18th-century fighter who soon starts bossing his giant host around. Some editions call him Little Bull.

The magic key in The Indian in the Cupboard once locked which belonging of Omri's great-grandmother?

A jewelry box belonging to Omri's great-grandmother supplied the only key in the house that fitted the cupboard. In the sequel the same key works its magic on an ordinary chest.

Omri, the boy hero of The Indian in the Cupboard, shares his name with which member of the author's family?

Her youngest son, Omri, is the child the author created the book for and dedicated it to. An older boy of hers, Gillon, also lent his name to a character.

In The Indian in the Cupboard, what is on television when Little Bear shoots Boone with an arrow?

An old Western showing the slaughter of Native Americans has Boone cheering, and Little Bear answers by hitting the cowboy in the chest. Guilt strikes him at once, and he helps nurse Boone back to health.

The Indian in the Cupboard's screenwriter, Melissa Mathison, had earlier penned which Steven Spielberg hit?

Mathison earned an Oscar nomination for E.T., and reviewers spotted its echoes here: another boy hiding a wondrous visitor in his bedroom. She later adapted The BFG for the same director.

Little Bear rejects the toy tipi Omri offers in The Indian in the Cupboard because his own people live in what?

Longhouses, framed with poles and walled with bark, could run more than 75 metres. Little Bear's scorn for the tipi sends Omri off to read about his guest's real history and culture.

The 1995 film of the British novel The Indian in the Cupboard moves Omri and his toys to which American city?

New York gives the film's Omri a Manhattan townhouse to grow up in. One reviewer found this version of the place implausibly clean and cosy.

Which Muppet puppeteer, the performer of Miss Piggy, directed the 1995 film The Indian in the Cupboard?

Frank Oz also performed and voiced Yoda before turning to directing. Here he swapped puppets for blue-screen effects that put full-sized and three-inch actors in one frame.

Omri is given both the plastic figure and the cupboard in The Indian in the Cupboard to mark which occasion?

His birthday, the ninth, brings Omri a small plastic figure from Patrick that he finds a letdown. Locked in the cupboard overnight, it is a living, breathing man by morning.

The magic cupboard in The Indian in the Cupboard began life as a small white cabinet for storing what?

Medicines were what the old white cabinet once held before Omri got it as a present from one of his siblings. Only plastic figures wake up inside it; nothing made of other materials ever does.

On first meeting the giant Omri in The Indian in the Cupboard, what does Little Bear take the boy to be?

A god is Little Bear's first guess, but he soon works out that Omri is just an ordinary, if enormous, boy. From then on the tiny man does most of the ordering about.

In The Indian in the Cupboard, what does Little Bear claim from the elderly chief who dies of shock on waking?

His headdress passes to Little Bear, who reasons that he is the only one around to inherit the title of chief. The old man's death shakes Omri, who sees that the figures are real people.

In The Indian in the Cupboard, the soldier Tommy Atkins is summoned to treat Boone from which conflict?

World War I is where Tommy has come from, plucked out of the trenches where he tends the wounded. His name is old slang for any ordinary British soldier.

Which wife does Little Bear pick from an array of plastic figures near the end of The Indian in the Cupboard?

Bright Stars is the woman Omri brings to life after Little Bear, newly made a chief, demands a bride. Some editions of the book call her Twin Stars.

At the novel's farewell party in The Indian in the Cupboard, Boone and Omri each become Little Bear's what?

Blood brother is the bond Little Bear seals with the cowboy he once shot, and with Omri too. Each boy then keeps his friend's plastic figure as a memento.

To whom does Omri hand the magic key at the end of The Indian in the Cupboard, to avoid temptation?

His mother gets the key back, as it had come down to her from her own grandmother. Without it Omri cannot summon his tiny friends on a whim.

In the Indian in the Cupboard books, Little Bear's people are busy battling which European soldiers?

The French are the enemy who leave Little Bear badly wounded when Omri summons him again in the second book. The boys then try arming his village with modern guns, with tragic results.

The soldier Tommy Atkins decides his visit to Omri's giant room in The Indian in the Cupboard must be what?

A dream is all Tommy thinks it is, so he calmly patches up the wounded cowboy and goes back to his own time. The nurse summoned in the next book assumes she has simply dozed off on duty.

In the third Indian in the Cupboard book, what does Patrick accidentally drag back with him from Boone's own time?

A tornado follows Patrick through the magic and rips apart Omri's bedroom, part of the house and the street outside. The key vanishes in the wreckage and turns up later in a hedge.

The Indian in the Cupboard grew out of a shabby real cabinet from which room of its author's house?

The bathroom cabinet looked so tatty that one of the household wanted it thrown out. The author declared it magic instead and spun a tale about it on the spot.

Before The Indian in the Cupboard, its author was among the first women on British television doing which job?

News reporter was the job she talked her way into at the newly launched ITN in 1955. Bored by the minor assignments she was handed, she began her first novel on the company's typewriters.

Where did the author of The Indian in the Cupboard spend most of the 1960s working as an English teacher?

An Israeli kibbutz was her base for about eight years after she followed a sculptor there and married him. All three of their children were born on it.

Two former heads of the American Indian Library Association faulted The Indian in the Cupboard chiefly for what?

Harmful stereotypes of Native Americans were the charge, and a school board in British Columbia briefly pulled the book from its libraries a year later. It had already won several young readers' awards.

Litefoot, Little Bear in the film The Indian in the Cupboard, was already known as what kind of performer?

A rapper from the Cherokee Nation, Litefoot was spotted performing at a concert in Rome and had never acted before. He shaved his head for the part.

Which British comedian plays the tiny soldier Tommy Atkins in the 1995 film The Indian in the Cupboard?

Steve Coogan was already known in Britain for his spoof broadcaster Alan Partridge when he took the small part. He was later Oscar-nominated for co-scripting and producing Philomena.

In the film The Indian in the Cupboard, what danger lurks as Little Bear hunts under the floor for the key?

A pet rat is on the loose in the dark space beneath the boards as he searches. He makes it out with the key, and Omri can finally fetch help for the wounded Boone.

In the film The Indian in the Cupboard, Omri borrows a hatchet for Little Bear from which other toy figure?

A knight supplies the blade, one of the many small problems Omri solves to keep his guest equipped. He also helps Little Bear build a tiny dwelling of his own.

In the film The Indian in the Cupboard, what does the frightened Little Bear point at Omri on their first meeting?

A dagger is the tiny man's only defence when the door opens on a boy many times his size. Omri locks the cupboard again and decides to keep what he has found a secret.

Little Bear's tattoos in the film The Indian in the Cupboard were drawn on Litefoot each day with what?

Permanent markers did the job, in sessions that took up to four and a half hours each day. An adviser from Little Bear's own nation checked every detail, down to his leggings and moccasins.

Which sequel finds Little Bear badly wounded in battle, a year after his farewell to Omri?

The Return of the Indian was the first of four follow-ups to the original novel. The series ran to five books in all, the last appearing in 1998.

In the second Indian in the Cupboard book, Omri wins first prize in what kind of competition?

Story writing wins Omri the prize, for a tale called The Plastic Indian that is secretly a true account of his adventures. Everyone else takes it for fiction.

When Omri tries to summon Tommy Atkins again in the second Indian in the Cupboard book, what arrives instead?

His folded uniform and bag are all that appear, and Omri grasps that the soldier has since been killed in action. A nurse has to be found to save Little Bear instead.

In the Indian in the Cupboard sequels, the tiny nurse who saves Little Bear's life goes by what title?

Matron comes from a set of plastic hospital figures owned by Patrick's cousin, and Omri pockets her when the borrowing goes wrong. She later gets a whole surgical team to operate in his bedroom.

Which adult, having glimpsed the tiny people, threatens to expose Omri in the third Indian in the Cupboard book?

His headmaster had been shaken by the sight of them on a day Omri took Little Bear to school, and now he vows to get to the bottom of it. A blow on the head finally discredits him.

Which saloon dancer from Boone's own time marries the cowboy in the third Indian in the Cupboard book?

Ruby Lou first meets a shrunken Patrick in her saloon and helps him rescue the unconscious Boone. Later she and the cowboy are stranded together in Omri's time, and their friends gather for the wedding.

In the fourth Indian in the Cupboard book, Omri learns his great-great-aunt cast the magic key from what?

Lead was what Jessica Charlotte, a music-hall performer who could read the future, used to copy a key and steal her sister's earrings. Her psychic gift slipped into the copy by accident.

In the fifth Indian in the Cupboard book, Omri's father first plans to make a time machine out of what?

His car seems the answer because it is big enough to hold them both, with a camping trip as cover. The plan misfires and briefly sends two of his boys to the wrong country.

In the last Indian in the Cupboard book, where does Omri urge Little Bear to take his threatened people?

Canada is the refuge Omri and his father recommend, as colonists push onto the tribe's land. Before parting for good, Little Bear tells Omri he is no longer a boy but a warrior.

Litefoot persuaded the makers of the 1995 film The Indian in the Cupboard to hire an adviser from which nation?

Onondaga is the nation the film gives Little Bear, so Litefoot argued that the Mohawk adviser already hired was not close enough. The replacement dated every detail of his look to 1761.