Steven Spielberg has reflected on his efforts to stop an E.T. sequel from being made.
E.T. was released back in 1982, starring Drew Barrymore, Henry Thomas, Peter Coyote, and Dee Wallace.
“That was a real hard-fought victory because I didn’t have any rights. Before E.T., I had some rights, but I didn’t have a lot of rights,” Spielberg shared in conversation with Barrymore at the TCM Classic Film Festival: New York Pop-Up x 92NY (via The Hollywood Reporter). “I kind of didn’t have what we call ‘the freeze,’ where you can stop the studio from making a sequel because you control the freeze on sequels, remakes and other ancillary uses of the IP. I didn’t have that. I got it after E.T. because of its success.”
But, Spielberg did consider a sequel at one point. “I just did not want to make a sequel. I flirted with it for a little bit – just a little bit to see if I [could] think of a story – and the only thing I could think about was a book that was written by somebody that wrote the book for it called The Green Planet, which was all going to take place at E.T.’s home,” he added. “We were all going to be able to go to E.T.’s home and see how E.T. lived. But it was better as a novel than I think it would have been as a film.”
E.T. is one of the most beloved movies ever made, so it’s probably for the best that no follow-up ever released that might’ve ended up tarnishing that legacy.
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