Harrison Ford Trivia
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58 free Harrison Ford trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Harrison Ford was a self-taught carpenter building cabinets for Hollywood writers when George Lucas asked him to read lines opposite actors auditioning for Star Wars. This Harrison Ford trivia quiz follows the whole arc: the uncredited bellhop, the mysterious middle initial, American Graffiti, Han Solo, Indiana Jones, Rick Deckard, Jack Ryan, his lone Oscar nomination, and the late-career turn to television with 1923 and Shrinking. It also digs into the man off screen: the philosophy student expelled days before graduation, the Boy Scout rank that ended up in The Last Crusade, the ranch he gave half of to nature, the helicopter rescues, the golf-course crash landing, the spider and the ant named in his honour, and the awards from Cannes, the AFI and the Screen Actors Guild. Easy questions open each section and the deep cuts follow. Every answer was checked against Ford's Wikipedia biography, and each question shows its source once you have answered, so you can settle any argument at the table.
30 of 58 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which city was Harrison Ford born?
Chicago
Chicago-born and raised in its suburbs, he left the Midwest for Los Angeles in 1964 after a summer-stock season in Wisconsin.
Q 02Ford's fifth Indiana Jones film premiered at which festival?
Cannes
Cannes: before the premiere of The Dial of Destiny the festival gave Ford, then 80, an honorary Palme d'Or, and he said his life had just flashed before his eyes.
Q 03Ford studied philosophy at which college, in the self-styled birthplace of the Republican Party?
Ripon
Ripon College: in The Last Crusade, Indy points truth-seekers to 'Dr. Tyree's philosophy class', Ford's shout-out to his old professor there.
Q 04For what offence was Ford expelled from college four days before graduation?
Plagiarism
Plagiarism: he has said he was not strict enough about whose words went into his senior thesis, admitted it when accused, and left without a degree.
Q 05Which Boy Scout rank, short of Eagle, did Ford reach and later share with the young Indiana Jones?
Life
Life: Ford served on the summer staff of a Wisconsin Scout camp, and The Last Crusade pinned the rank's red-heart badge on River Phoenix's teenage Indy.
Q 06Ford's first known film role, in Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round (1966), was an uncredited part as what?
A bellhop
A bellhop: afterwards a Columbia executive told him Tony Curtis looked like a star even delivering groceries, and Ford replied that Curtis was meant to look like a delivery boy.
Q 07Ford was first billed as "Harrison J. Ford" to avoid confusion with a namesake who had been what?
A silent-film actor
A silent-film actor: the elder Harrison Ford died in 1957, and the newcomer only learned of him by finding his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The J stood for nothing.
Q 08Which unrelated actor sharing Harrison's surname starred in A Time for Killing (1967), his first credited film?
Glenn Ford
Glenn Ford played the Union major in the Civil War western, which Roger Corman began directing before Phil Karlson replaced him weeks into the shoot.
Q 09Which trade did Ford teach himself to support his family when acting work dried up?
Carpentry
Carpentry: his first job was a backyard recording studio for bandleader Sérgio Mendes, who, Ford said, never asked whether he had built one before.
Q 10Which writing couple hired Ford to work on their Malibu beach house?
Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne
Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne became his friends: he spent a couple of months at their house, explaining each day why the job was running late and over budget.
Q 11What was the name of the drag-racing character Ford played in American Graffiti (1973)?
Bob Falfa
Bob Falfa wears a cowboy hat because Ford refused to cut his hair short for the part, which is set in 1962.
Q 12Which director, whose offices Ford helped to remodel, gave him a small part in The Conversation (1974)?
Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola's offices later hosted the Star Wars casting sessions, and Ford recalls sweeping up there, broom in hand, as Richard Dreyfuss arrived for the first interview.
Q 13Ford's army colonel in Apocalypse Now is named after which real filmmaker?
G. Lucas
G. Lucas: the colonel is a nod to George Lucas, who was set to direct Apocalypse Now himself until Star Wars took over his time.
Q 21Which director made The Mosquito Coast (1986) with Ford, a year after their first film together?
Peter Weir
Peter Weir's film was, Ford said in 1992, the only one of his that hadn't made its money back, and he was still glad he had done it.
Q 22In Working Girl (1988), Ford was the romantic lead opposite which two actresses?
Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver
Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver: the studio gave Griffith the lead only once Ford and Weaver had signed on as box-office insurance.
Q 23Ford took over the role of Jack Ryan from which actor, who reportedly resented it for years?
Alec Baldwin
Q 14How did Ford end up being cast as Han Solo in Star Wars (1977)?
Reading lines as a favour
Reading lines as a favour: the film's maker had ruled out anyone from American Graffiti, but the casting director asked Ford to read with the other actors, and the readings won him the part.
Q 15In which film did Ford ask for Han Solo to be killed off, only to be turned down?
Return of the Jedi
Return of the Jedi: he thought a death would give the film some 'bottom', and joked that the idea was refused because there was no future in dead Han toys.
Q 16In the 1979 comedy western The Frisco Kid, Ford played a bank robber opposite which comic star?
Gene Wilder
Gene Wilder played a Polish rabbi crossing the Old West; Ford's outlaw part was first meant for a much older Western legend, who withdrew when the producers tried to lower his fee.
Q 17Ford was cast as Indiana Jones only after which actor had to turn the part down?
Tom Selleck
Tom Selleck was held to his Magnum, P.I. contract by CBS; an actors' strike then stalled the series for months, so he could have made the film after all.
Q 18What injury forced Ford to fly home from London for surgery during the 1983 shoot of Temple of Doom?
A herniated disc
A herniated disc: Ford blamed days of jolting elephant rides, joking that the only fun thing about riding elephants is the getting off.
Q 19What is the name of Ford's character in Blade Runner?
Rick Deckard
Rick Deckard was human as far as Ford was concerned, but the film's director has long insisted that the detective is himself a replicant.
Q 20Which 1985 film earned Ford a Best Actor nomination at the Academy Awards?
Witness
Witness: to play a city detective hiding among the Amish, he embedded with a Philadelphia homicide squad before filming.
Alec Baldwin had played Ryan once; in his 2017 memoir he claimed the recasting was arranged behind his back while he was still negotiating with Paramount.
Q 24Ford played Jack Ryan in Patriot Games (1992) and which other Tom Clancy adaptation?
Clear and Present Danger
Clear and Present Danger survived Tom Clancy's fury: he called an early script 'really awful' and faxed the production team memos attacking it before it was rewritten.
Q 25Which actor played the marshal chasing Ford through The Fugitive (1993)?
Tommy Lee Jones
Tommy Lee Jones won the supporting-actor Oscar as the deputy marshal, then brought the character back to lead the 1998 spin-off U.S. Marshals.
Q 26Donald Trump singled out Ford's hero in which film, saying he "stood up for America"?
Air Force One
Air Force One: asked about the praise on Australian television, Ford replied, 'It's a movie, Donald. It was a movie.'
Q 27Which 2000 thriller was the box-office bright spot in Ford's run of disappointments?
What Lies Beneath
What Lies Beneath cast him against type: the screen hero plays a research professor who turns out to be the villain.
Q 28Ford regrets turning down which thriller, in a role that won George Clooney an Oscar?
Syriana
Syriana: Ford said he had not felt strongly enough about 'the truth of the material' and came to think he had made a mistake.
Q 29In the baseball film 42 (2013), Ford played which real Brooklyn Dodgers executive?
Branch Rickey
Branch Rickey: Ford vanished into a fat suit and false eyebrows for a part that called for a character actor, which he says is what he always expected to be.
Q 30Ford starred opposite which James Bond actor in the 2011 genre mash-up Cowboys & Aliens?
Daniel Craig
Daniel Craig took the gunslinger role only after Robert Downey Jr. left the project to make a Sherlock Holmes sequel.