What Lies Beneath
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40 free What Lies Beneath trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
What Lies Beneath arrived in the summer of 2000 as a rare thing: a glossy, grown-up ghost story led by two of the biggest stars of the day. Michelle Pfeiffer plays Claire Spencer, who starts to believe her lakeside house is haunted, and Harrison Ford plays her husband Norman, in a role that turned his heroic image inside out. This quiz covers the whole film: the strange events in the house, the neighbours next door, the secret at the heart of the marriage and the famous final act. It also goes behind the camera, with questions on the cast, the writers, the unusual way the shoot was scheduled and how the film fared with critics and audiences. It is pitched for anyone who has seen the film, from first-time viewers to fans who know every scare. Each answer comes with a short explanation, so you will pick up a few stories from the production along the way.
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Q 01Which actor, later Marvel's Agent Phil Coulson, wrote the screenplay for What Lies Beneath?
Clark Gregg
Clark Gregg stayed with the production for rewrites, which cost him the chance to read for a major role in the TV series Sports Night.
Q 02What Lies Beneath was shot during a year-long break in the filming of which Tom Hanks movie?
Cast Away
Cast Away paused so Hanks could lose weight and grow a beard, and the same crew made the thriller in between rather than sit idle.
Q 03Which Oscar-winning director of Tom Hanks hits made the thriller What Lies Beneath?
Robert Zemeckis
Robert Zemeckis said he took the script because he kept second-guessing its main character, which kept him turning the pages.
Q 04In What Lies Beneath, how does Norman Spencer finally die after chasing Claire from the house?
Drowning
Drowning claims Norman when his truck plunges into the lake and the corpse of his victim, shaken loose from the wreck below, appears to seize him.
Q 05In What Lies Beneath, what happened to Claire a year earlier that wiped her memory of an affair?
A car crash
A car crash a year before the story left Claire with a gap in her memory, which is why the ghost has to lead her back to what she once knew.
Q 06In What Lies Beneath, how did Norman know Madison Frank, the woman whose ghost haunts Claire?
She was his student
She was his student, and their affair during a rough patch in his marriage ended with a threat that he decided he could not live with.
Q 07In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire keep finding mysteriously filled with water at home?
The bathtub
The bathtub fills by itself more than once, and in its water Claire glimpses the reflection of a woman who is not her.
Q 08In What Lies Beneath, the Spencers' lakeside home stands in which New England state?
Vermont
Vermont also hosted the location shoot, where the exteriors of the two neighbouring houses were built specially beside the water.
Q 09What Lies Beneath borrows music, visuals and plot ideas from which famous director's thrillers?
Alfred Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock is echoed in references to Psycho and Vertigo, though one reviewer argued he would never have put a real ghost in the story.
Q 10In What Lies Beneath, what do Claire and her friend Jody hold at the house once the haunting begins?
A séance
A séance is soon followed by a warning traced on the fogged mirror, which convinces Claire that a dead woman is trying to reach her.
Q 11In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire wrongly suspect her new neighbour Warren of doing?
Killing his wife
Killing his wife is what Claire assumes when Mary vanishes for days, until Mary turns up alive and well beside her husband.
Q 12In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire secretly take from the home of Madison Frank's mother?
A lock of hair
A lock of hair lets Claire summon the dead woman, and the possession that follows ends only when she lets it fall.
Q 13In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire find inside the small box she recovers from the lake?
A necklace
A necklace that the missing woman wore in her photograph sits inside, proof that Norman knew far more than he had admitted.
Q 21In What Lies Beneath, what does Norman hit his head on, knocking himself out, as he attacks Claire?
The sink
The sink catches Norman as he stumbles back in shock, after the face of the paralysed Claire seems to turn into that of his dead victim.
Q 22In What Lies Beneath, what is hitched behind the truck in which Claire flees from Norman?
A boat
A boat rides behind the truck, and when both end up in the lake it punches through the roof of a sunken wreck and frees the body inside.
Q 23In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire lay on Madison Frank's gravestone in the final scene?
A red rose
A red rose is Claire's offering on a winter visit to the cemetery, made once the dead woman has at last been given a proper grave.
Q 14In What Lies Beneath, which framed item falls from Norman's desk, revealing a hidden key?
A newspaper article
A newspaper article about Norman hides the key, and its reverse side carries a report on a young woman who has gone missing.
Q 15In What Lies Beneath, which drug does Norman use to paralyse Claire before staging her death?
Halothane
Halothane leaves Claire awake but unable to move, and she saves herself only because the dose begins to wear off in time.
Q 16In What Lies Beneath, in which nearby town did Jody once see Norman arguing with a woman at a café?
Adamant
Adamant gives Norman away when he later pretends never to have heard of the place, and Claire drives there alone to look around.
Q 17In What Lies Beneath, what was Michelle Pfeiffer's character Claire before she gave up her career?
A cellist
A cellist in her earlier life, Claire is at a loose end at home once her daughter has moved out, which is when the strange events begin.
Q 18In What Lies Beneath, why does Claire's daughter Caitlin move out of the family home at the start?
To go to college
Caitlin leaves to go to college, and her departure leaves Claire alone in the house with a marriage that is already under strain.
Q 19In What Lies Beneath, what is the surname of Mary and Warren, the quarrelling couple next door?
Feur
Feur and Mary's first name fit the initials that Claire's computer types by itself, which sends her after the wrong ghost.
Q 20In What Lies Beneath, whom did Madison Frank threaten to tell about her affair with Norman Spencer?
The dean
The dean never heard about it, because Norman silenced her first, then lied to Claire about how she had died.
Q 24In What Lies Beneath, what does Claire find Norman only pretended to do after his first confession?
Phone the police
Norman faked the call when asked to phone the police, and the discovery tells Claire she is alone in the house with a murderer.
Q 25Which actress, later Éowyn in The Lord of the Rings, plays neighbour Mary in What Lies Beneath?
Miranda Otto
Miranda Otto had been cast in the fantasy trilogy a year before the thriller opened, after Uma Thurman turned the part down.
Q 26Which 1990s supermodel made her first major film appearance as the ghost in What Lies Beneath?
Amber Valletta
Amber Valletta said the ghost was never written to resemble Michelle Pfeiffer; the director and producers noticed the likeness only after they had liked her audition tape.
Q 27Which actor, Miles Dyson in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, plays Dr. Drayton in What Lies Beneath?
Joe Morton
Joe Morton plays the psychiatrist Claire is sent to when Norman dismisses her fears, in sessions one leading critic singled out for praise.
Q 28Which actor, later Dexter Morgan's father in Dexter, plays neighbour Warren in What Lies Beneath?
James Remar
James Remar was known for menacing parts such as the gang member Ajax in The Warriors, a history that suits the red-herring suspect he plays.
Q 29Which composer of the scores for The Avengers and Predator wrote the music for What Lies Beneath?
Alan Silvestri
Alan Silvestri has scored nearly every film by the same director since 1984, and this one's box-office takings earned him an industry award.
Q 30Which famous director commissioned the story of What Lies Beneath, then gave the script to a friend?
Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg asked for an intimate tale of contact with an ordinary ghost, then decided the finished draft did not feel like one of his films.