Good Will Hunting
In the later ‘ ninety , two kids from Boston became stars overnight when they wrote and starred inGood Will Hunting , a dear dramatic play set in their beloved hometown . When award season arrived , Matt Damon and Ben Affleck became the two youngest recipient of the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay .
All these year later , the flick still hold up , because it ’s unfeigned to its characters and their dynamics . It feel like a picture about tangible people , as an clever janitor unwilling to realise his potential develops a unattackable bond with the first academic to talk to him on his level . So , here are 10 behind - the - scenes fact aboutGood Will Hunting .
Originally, the movie was a thriller
The original handwriting forGood Will Huntingwas a thriller . The lead character was the same , a numerical genius , but in the initial story , the FBI found some use for his intelligence and rent him to be a cryptographer . However , when Castle Rock Entertainment ’s Rob Reiner first read the script , he promote Matt Damon and Ben Affleck to eliminate the FBI subplot and focus on the characters and their relationships .
The only scene from this subplot that made it into the last movie sees Will foregather with NSA agent about potential recruitment . In that scene , he explain why he does n’t require to work for the government .
Michael Mann almost directed it
After Mel Gibson turn down the chance to directGood Will Hunting , Michael Mann came closely to have the job , despite being mostly bang for directing action thriller likeHeatandCollateral . However , Mann desire to make two change : he wanted Will and his buddies to be car thief , and he wanted to recast the lead function .
Since the manufacturer want Matt Damon to play Will , they told Mann to at least screen door - test him to see if he ’d change his mind . After the screen - run , Mann still did n’t want Damon to star . So , the producers divide ways with Mann and remain loyal to Damon .
Sean Maguire was based on Matt Damon’s mom and Ben Affleck’s dad
When Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were writingGood Will Hunting , they based the type of Sean Maguire ( Will ’s psychiatrist , play by an Oscar - win Robin Williams ) on a couple of real masses . The fiber was ab initio conceived as a sort of a spiritual cross between Damon ’s female parent and Affleck ’s father .
Of of course , when Williams took on the role , he ended up bringing his own flourish to Sean ’s characterization , but those two paternal physical body were the basis for Sean ’s emotional and cerebral core . Years after the motion-picture show ’s release , Affleck would accredit Williams as the “ rainmaker ” that assure the film would be grow .
The studio wanted Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt in the lead roles
Matt Damon has said that when he and Ben Affleck first deal their spec script forGood Will Huntingto Castle Rock Entertainment , the first word they heard on cast was “ Leo and Brad . ” Damon and Affleck had always intended to star in the film themselves , but the studio require to hire Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt .
Damon and Affleck terminate up bring down the roles and achieving their dream , and DiCaprio and Pitt would n’t appear on the silver screen together until the outlet of this year’sOnce Upon a Time in Hollywood , written and directed by the fabled Quentin Tarantino .
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck wrote a fake sex scene to figure out who actually read the script
When Matt Damon and Ben Affleck first started browse theirGood Will Huntingscript around Hollywood , they fall up with a new mode to determine which producers had in reality read it . About midway through the script , on around page 60 , they add a graphic sex picture between Will and Chuckie , apropos of nothing before or after it .
They sent the playscript to every major studio apartment in Hollywood , and none of them mentioned the scene . When one of the studio read it , it determined the only affair to alter was the out - of - the - blue sex aspect . That was how Damon and Affleck know who to go with .
Robin Williams ad-libbed a lot of his lines
Robin Williams was always noted for improvise lines in his movies . He could even advertizement - lib entire standup Set based on the affair he assure around the stage . He improvised a lot of his most celebrated lines inGood Will Hunting , too . He came up with the entire aspect in which Sean tell Will about his wife ’s farts , which is why Matt Damon express mirth so hard – the laugh was actual .
The photographic camera is noticeably shaking , too , possibly because the tv camera wheeler dealer was express joy . He also extemporise his final origin in the film : “ Son of a b***h . He steal my line . ” Damon has order that this contrast was Williams ’ best share to the motion picture .
There are rumors that Kevin Smith or even William Goldman wrote the script
The script forGood Will Huntingis credited to Matt Damon and Ben Affleck , but ever since the film was released , there have been persistent hearsay that it was write by someone else . The top candidates have been William Goldman , the writer of such near - perfect screenplays asAll the President ’s Men , The Princess Bride , andButch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid , and Kevin Smith , the filmmaker behindClerksandChasing Amy .
Smith is a close personal friend of both Damon and Affleck , and he was instrumental in gettingGood Will Huntingproduced . According to Goldman , the reason for these rumors is that “ mass do n’t desire to think those two cute guys wrote it . ”
Ben Affleck’s father and stepmother worked as janitors at Harvard
Ben Affleck was able to realistically write for a janitor act upon at Harvard University because both his Father of the Church and stepmother had held the position of steward at the prestigious school . Making the protagonist a janitor at Harvard was the perfect way to illustrate the societal disparity between workings - class Bostonians and snobbish Harvard academics at the affectionateness of the motion picture .
In 2000 , Affleck and Matt Damon appeared at a mass meeting at Harvard to talk in support of bring up the keep wage of the campus ’ employees . Affleck also narrated a 2002 infotainment calledOccupation , which chronicle a sit - in that was organise by the Harvard Living Wage Campaign .
Gus Van Sant requested that Chuckie be killed off
Every director who came near to directingGood Will Huntingrequested major changes to the script . The filmmaker who eventually brought it to the cover , Gus Van Sant , was no dissimilar . He wanted Matt Damon and Ben Affleck to sum up a scene in which Chuckie would be killed in an chance event on a twist website .
The writers contested the idea and told Van Sant it would ruin the movie , but the director still insist that they add the fit . So , they wrote it , showed it to Van Sant , and when he meet it on paper , he realized it was a bad idea and scrap it .
A Variety article about Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s script sale helped them rent a house
Castle Rock Entertainment bought the script forGood Will Huntingfrom Matt Damon and Ben Affleck for $ 600,000 . After that , they were n’t short of cash for a while . However , they both had such terrible credit rating that they struggled to get a place to live .
When they applied to rent a house for $ 3,000 a month , they had to show the landlord an article from the industry magazine Variety – which , back then , was called the Daily Variety – that reported their book sale in ordering to essay that they would be able to afford the rip . It worked and they got the plaza .
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