Field of Dreams - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Field of Dreams or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Field of Dreams

[aaron]

President George W. Bush named this as his favorite film.

[richard]

For the final shot of the film, the local Dyersville Police Department was required to direct traffic for four hours from a wide spread of six miles after the aerial shots were complete.

[edgar]

In 1991, Hawaii's House of Representatives filed House Resolution 95 to plead the case for "Shoeless" Joe Jackson's reinstatement. Among the reasons given, was a quote given by James Earl Jones's character in the movie that "grasps the essence of an American tradition, baseball." Among those receiving a copy of the House Resolution were Phil Alden Robinson, Charles Gordon and Lawrence Gordon (Field of Dreams producers), and cast members Kevin Costner, Amy Madigan, and James Earl Jones.

[maureen]

The deleted scenes include Ray getting his hearing checked, Ray buying baseball equipment, Ray getting lost on the way to Fenway with Terence, and Ray and Terence watching batting practice.

[linda]

When Ray's brother-in-law yells at him, "Ray, do you know how much this land is worth?" and he responds, "Yeah, $2,200 an acre," the exchange is supposed to connote that the baseball field represents a large, intolerable financial loss. Actually, a baseball field is about two acres in size, which, even if it had generous proportions, meaning that Ray was losing no more than $5,000 from maintaining his "Field of Dreams".

[harry]

When the baseball game is on the small TV, the "veteran southpaw" pitcher is MLB veteran Ricky Horton, who was with the Chicago White Sox at the time.

[gerald]

When Ray is in the feed store, and is being teased by the other farmers, and they're asking him about hearing voices, the song "Crazy" can be heard playing on the radio.

[jesus]

As Ray is taking Terence back to his apartment, in the reflection of the van's windshield, the word "Books" passes by. This is fitting, considering that Terence Mann is a writer.

[phyllis]

Phil Alden Robinson had originally envisioned "Shoeless" Joe Jackson as being played by an actor in his 40s, someone who would be older than Kevin Costner, and who could thereby act as a father surrogate. Ray Liotta did not fit that criteria, but Robinson thought he would be a better fit for the part, because Liotta had the "sense of danger" and ambiguity, which Robinson wanted in the character.

[gabriel]

There was an actual Archibald "Moonlight" Graham. The people Terence Mann is interviewing in the bar were people who knew the real "Doc" Graham. They found out about the movie and the inclusion of "Doc" Graham's character. They drove from Chisholm, Minnesota to Iowa. The stories the men shared were actual stories about "Doc" Graham.

[elmer]

Kinsella's book was suffused with references to the 1960s, so the art director and set decorator put '60s relics and images in the house, even though they seemed incongruous with an Iowa farm.

[frederick]

After the PTA meeting Annie kids Ray, saying that when Terence Mann was a kid, he had a baseball bat named Rosebud. This is a play on Citizen Kane (1941), in which a key element in Kane's life was a sled that he had as a kid with the name Rosebud painted on it. While Ray's baseball field nearly ruins him, Orson Welles, who wrote, directed and starred in Citizen Kane, was almost ruined by multi-million dollar publisher William Randolph Hearst, who was the thinly disguised real-life version of Kane.

[maureen]

At some point during principal photography, Phil Alden Robinson began to lose confidence in his ability to tell the story effectively. He dreamed angry fans of the book were coming at him with knives. Larry Gordon had to call him with a pep talk, telling him his script was great, that he just needed to trust it, and shoot what he had written.

[phyllis]

According to Phil Alden Robinson, Kevin Costner was the studio's first choice for the part of Ray, but having just starred in Bull Durham (1988), they didn't think he'd want to be in a second straight baseball movie. Ultimately, one studio executive slipped a script to Costner, who immediately expressed interest in the film.

[nicholas]

"Shoeless" Joe Jackson's home was Greenville, SC; there is now a museum located near the baseball field where the Greenville Drive of the South Atlantic League play, along with a "Shoeless" Joe Jackson statue.

[claude]

In W.P. Kinsella's novel, protagonist Ray Kinsella is reunited with his identical twin brother, Richard Kinsella (a subplot that was discarded for the movie).

[caroline]

The owners of the site of the baseball field in Iowa cancelled their 20th anniversary event, due to the economic downturn, and donated the money raised for it to a local food bank.

[jeffrey]

When he first meets Ray, Shoeless Joe says it's hard to see the ball because of the lights. Ray explains that owners put lights in so that night games could be played and the teams could make more money. Shoeless Joe replies, "owners" with a disgusted dismissive tone. The background story of the 1919 White Sox scandal is that the owner was cheap and didn't pay the players what he'd promised them. As a result, they accepted bribes from prominent gamblers to throw the series. In any reality, it is well-documented that the 1919 White Sox players despised the owner, making Shoeless Joe's scoff at owners putting lights on the field meaningful.

[harry]

During a lunch with the Iowa Chamber of Commerce, Phil Alden Robinson broached his idea of a final scene in which headlights could be seen for miles along the horizon. The Chamber folks replied that it could be done, and the shooting of the final scene became a community event. The film crew was hidden on the farm to make sure the aerial shots did not reveal them. Dyersville was then blacked out, and local extras drove their vehicles to the field. In order to give the illusion of movement, the drivers were instructed to continuously switch between their low and high beams.