Random Behind-The-Scenes Stories From Making Of ‘A Christmas Story’ (14 items)

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  (#5) Director Clark Also Directed ‘Porky’s,’ Which Made MGM Think He Could Create A Hit Film

  Clark's raunchy teen comedy Porky's came out in 1982 in the US to much fanfare. Even though the subject material between the risqué comedy and A Christmas Story is vastly different, it was Clark's success with Porky's that made MGM confident he could handle A Christmas Story. Peter Billingsley, who played Ralphie, talked about why it was so hard to get off the ground without Porky's success to Vanity Fair:

  I think it took so long to get made because the movie, by modern-day standards, is about nothing. It’s a family a couple of weeks before Christmas, and the kid wants a BB gun. That’s not exactly a pitch in which you’d say, "Let me get the president of the studio on the phone!"
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  (#6) The Role Of Ralphie’s Dad Was Supposed To Go To Jack Nicholson, But Creators Worried He Would Want Too Much Money

  "I love [Jack], but thank God he didn’t [end up with the part] because Darren is the Old Man," said director Clark. Clark pushed really hard to have Darren McGavin as Ralphie's dad, even though Nicholson was reportedly interested in the role.

  Still, the studio was nervous that Nicholson would ask for too high of a rate, and since Clark was pushing so hard for McGavin, they stuck with him.
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  (#3) Flick’s Tongue Wasn’t Really Stuck To A Flagpole

  One of the many beloved scenes in A Christmas Story is when Flick (Scott Schwartz) agrees to lick a freezing cold pole on a dare. Naturally, his tongue becomes stuck to the pole, and his struggle to pull it looks nothing short of painful. Schwartz revealed the trick behind making the scene, as he wasn't actually sticking his tongue to a cold piece of metal; it was a suction trick:

  It was a plastic pole. It wasn't real. And they put a little hole in it about the size of your pinky nail, and there was a suction tube with a motor that was in the snow [covered up] so you couldn't hear it, and just like a vacuum cleaner, if you put your hand on the vacuum cleaner, it's just phhhht, and you get stuck... It took us about 11½ hours to shoot that.

  And unfortunately, they had to do it more than once:

  And if that wasn't bad enough, we actually had to shoot it twice. The first time we did it, the film came out dark. They developed it dark, and they nicely came to me and said, "Listen, we have good news and bad news. The good news is you're going to be with us a few more days. The bad news is we've got to go out there and do it all over again."
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  (#1) The Stories That Inspired The Movie Were First Published As Essays In ‘Playboy’

  Writer Jean Shepherd, who also narrated the film, was already a prolific writer before he wrote A Christmas Story. He had columns in The Village Voice, Mad Magazine, and even Playboy. The stories that inspired Shepherd to write the film came straight from some of the essays published in the adult entertainment magazine, which were later collected into a book, In God We Trust; All Others Pay Cash. Scott Schwartz, who played Flick, recalled Shepherd and the movie's origins fondly in an interview with NPR:

  He improvised a great many of his stories on the air, on WOR [New York City], but he also was published in Playboy magazine... One of the many delicious ironies about this movie is the fact that the stories on which it was based were first published in Playboy.
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  (#14) Wil Wheaton And Sean Astin Auditioned For The Role Of Ralphie

  With over 8,000 kids from around the world auditioning to be Ralphie, at least a few of them were bound to be other well-known actors.

  At the time, child actors Sean Astin and Wil Wheaton both auditioned for the role of Ralphie Parker with no luck. 
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  (#12) Billingsley Still Has The Pink Bunny Suit

  Ralphie wasn't a fan of the pink bunny suit, but actor Billingsley's mom was. In 2011, the actor spoke to the Chicago Sun Times and revealed that his mother is the reason he still has the pink bunny suit:

  I was a kid so I didn't really think about keeping any of the stuff. But my mom did keep some things for me with the thought that it would be fun to have when I was an adult. So thanks to her I have the bunny suit, the [Red Ryder], a slate board, and the cowboy outfit. They're all on display in a special Christmas window at Macy's.

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