DID YOU KNOW?
1. During the first few weekends of the film's release, makeup/effects artist Tom Savini went into theaters for the last five minutes of the show to see the audience react to Jason emerging from the lake and grabbing Alice.
2. Savini also makes a cameo as a double for Brenda when she is thrown through the window.
3. The first counselor killed in the 1958 prologue is named Barry in the credits. However, the captions identify him as Gary.
4. The ending scene in which Alice is attacked by Jason was shot three times. Once in September, then October and finally in November, when the temperature was 28 degrees outside.
5. Adrienne King got the role of Alice only after the original filmmakers gave up trying to land Sally Field.
6. Steve Christy is named after Steve Miner, associate producer for the film.
7. The film has been spoofed a number of times, most notably in 'Saturday The 14th' (1981).
8. Tom Savini thought up the idea of Jason's surprise appearance at the end of the movie, then made it happen with his makeup and special effects.
9. Sean Cunningham has been quoted as saying that the type of actors that he sought for the film were "good-looking kids who you might see in a Pepsi commercial".
10. Estelle Parsons was originally signed on to play Mrs. Voorhees, but dropped out and the role was given to Betsy Palmer.
11. In the scene where Bill is found impaled to a door with arrows, his eye twitches continually because the eye effect that Savini applied was actually burning his eye and causing him excruciating pain.
12. Adrienne King didn't want to be in the film at first because of the graphic violence in it, but she changed her mind.
13. There is rumored to be a deleted scene featuring the murder of Claudette. The crew of the film dismissed this, including Tom Savini himself, who said he never even worked on the opening scene. There is, however, a still of Claudette with a machete in her throat, although that may have been shot purely for promotional material.
14. While filming Jack's (Kevin Bacon), death scene, the tubing which shot the blood out, was under the bed, and it became detached. So, Taso Stavraski, Savini's assistant, who was under the bed, took the tube in his mouth and blew, thus creating the effect.
15. On the set of the film, Noel Cunningham, Sean Cunningham's son, met Adam Marcus, who was on the set to fetch things for Sean. Years later, Adam Marcus went on to direct 'Jason Goes To Hell'.
16. In the novelization, Ned's death was actually described in more vivid detail and happened in real-time. There was no cut away like they did in the movie.
16. The scene with Jason popping out of the water was made as a joke. The producers never planned on any sequel, let alone a series based on Jason. In fact, Victor Miller (the writer) claims he didn't write the scene and refuses to watch the other films due to this "error".
17. The sound so many people think they hear "ch ch ch, ha ha ha", is actually "ki ki ki, ma ma ma". Harry Manfredini created it after he knew of the scene where Mrs. Voorhees is saying "Kill her Mommy". He simply made it by putting his own voice through an Echoplex machine.
18. The early 2000's MTV show "Fear" shot on location in Blairstown, New Jersey, at Camp No-Be-Bo-Sco.
19. Tom Savini said he based Jason's hair (or lack thereof) on a bum named Bill Bailey from his hometown.
20. Harry Manfredini composed the end theme based on a country song titled 'Sail Away Tiny Sparrow'.
21. Tom Savini and Taso Stavrakis actually stayed at the campsite during filming, with only two movies and a VCR to keep them company: 'Barbarella' (1968) and 'Marathon Man' (1976).
22. The scene with the snake was not originally in the script. Tom Savini suggested it to Sean Cunningham based on one of his own experiences he had at the campsite while staying there during filming.
23. The snake in the film (and its death) were real.
24. Betsy Palmer worked on the film for only 10 days, receiving $1000 per day. She said she only did the film so she could buy a new car she wanted, which at the time cost $10,000.
25. In the novelization of the film, Brenda's original death was much different from the actual movie. While her death wasn't actually shown on screen, in the novel, Brenda was hit in the head and chest with four arrows. Later, when she was thrown through the window, the arrows were still there. This would have meant that the scene earlier in the film where Ned is teasing her shooting arrows near her was foreshadowing (and would have made more sense).
26. The original name of Jason's character was Josh. Victor Miller changed it and named it Jason after a bully he encountered in school.
27. Betsy Palmer only appears in the film for 13 minutes. The rest of the time is a stand-in male actor, since we never see the killer's face.
28. Victor Miller's working title for the film was 'Long Night At Camp Blood'.
29. Victor Miller got the last name Voorhees from someone he knew in high school named Van Voorhees.
30. Actress Adrienne King (Alice) made $785 per week while working on the film.
31. In Victor Miller's original script, the killer was going to have a missing finger, and it would later be used to identify the killer (Mrs. Voorhees), who would have also had the same finger missing.
32. Marcie (Jeannine Taylor) was so convinced that Crazy Ralph (Walt Gorney) was really crazy, that she stayed away from him on set. She later credits Walt for how well he got into character.
33. Tom Savini, who served as a combat photographer in Vietnam, wanted to bring the sense of realism back with him in his work, and that led to him getting involved in special effects, and how they got to look so realistic.
34. Victor Miller calls the character of Annie "the setup", a la Janet Leigh in 'Psycho'. Its purpose was to serve as a precursor of what's to come. He also says 'Friday The 13th' is a like a "reverse 'Psycho'", with the mother living and the son dead, the complete opposite of that film.
36. The ending of the film is an obvious homage to Stephen King's classic 'Carrie'.
37. Actor Hugh Jackman is said to have gained his inspiration to become an actor from a desire of wanting to grow up and play Jason Voorhees.
38. There was an entire subplot cut from the film (but kept in the novelization) where Steve was trying to woo Alice, who was torn between staying there and being with Steve or returning to California to be with a guy named John, who is never mentioned in the movie. That would explain why Alice told Steve she'd have to go back and take care of some things, and their compromise of her staying at camp for an extra week.
39. According to the novelization, the love scene between Jack and Marcie was their first time hooking up. Apparently, they'd dated for a really long time and were going to separate colleges, and saw the camp experience as their way of culminating things between them before graduating and moving on. It was their "last moment in the sun", so to speak.
40. Crazy Ralph's line "you'll never come back again!" was different in the novelization, where it was "you'll never come back alive!"
Know any assorted facts that we don't have here? E-mail them to us at: lairofhorror@yahoo.com and you will get credit for them.
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