“They only eat vegetables, but for you, I think they’d make an exception.”
Universal paid Michael Crichton $2 million for the rights to his novel before it was even published. It was widely believed that the book would be a hit and make an outstanding movie. The novel was published in 1990, but pre-production of the film began in 1989, using only Crichton’s manuscript. Steven Spielberg was in the very early stages of pre-production for the film ER, also based on a Michael Crichton novel, when he heard about the Jurassic Park book. He subsequently dumped what he was doing to make this movie. Afterwards, he returned to ER but helped develop it into a hit TV series. Spielberg was so confident with this film that he started making his next film, Schindler’s List (1993), placing post-production in the hands of George Lucas. Harrison Ford turned down the lead role of Dr. Grant, played by Sam Neill. William Hurt was also offered the part but passed without reading the book or the script. Sean Connery turned down the role of Hammond, played by Richard Attenborough – his first acting job in 15 years. The role of Dr. Ellie Sattler played by Laura Dern was originally offered to Robin Wright Penn who passed, then to Juliette Binoche who also turned it down – to make Blue (1993). Steven Spielberg wanted the Velociraptors to be about 10 feet tall, which was taller than they were believed to be at the time, but during filming paleontologists uncovered 10 foot tall specimens of raptors called Utahraptors. After grossing over $2 billion in worldwide sales, Jurassic Park held the record until Titanic (1997).
