Press - Trivia - Escape From New York


Note: Some additional trivia can also be found here: Multimedia - Shooting Locations

• John Carpenter wrote the first draft in 1974 in film school as a reaction to the Watergate scandal and to the increasing crime and urban decay going on in New York in the 70s from a trip there. He also drew inspiration from the movie Death Wish and the book Planet of the Damned by Harry Harrison while writing it. Planet of the Damned is about the toughest planet in the universe, where somebody sends in the toughest man in the universe to get something done. He also based Snake on a punk teenager in Cleveland a friend of his knew of from his high school named Larry "Snake" Plissken that everyone thought was dead. He literally wanted to be called "Snake" and he also had a snake tattoo on his chest. This is where Carpenter got the name from and explains why everyone in the movie heard Snake was dead. He also based Snake on a collage friend who went to Vietnam and came back totally changed.

• John Carpenter tried to pitch the project to several studios, but no one wanted to make it because it was deemed to be too dark and too violent. The script made fun of presidents so bad that no studio would touch it. That all changed after the success of Halloween (1978).

• After the smash success of Halloween, the small studio of Avco-Embassy signed filmmaker John Carpenter and producer Debra Hill to a two-picture deal. The first film from this contract was 1980s The Fog and this film finished out the contract. Initially, the second film that Carpenter was going to make to finish the contract out was The Philadelphia Experiment but because of script-writing problems, Carpenter junked it for this project, which its initial script-draft he had penned back in the 1970s, and the studio green lighted it. However, the studio wanted the script to be a little more hipper and funnier, so John Carpenter rewrote the script with his former film school friend Nick Castle to add a little more humor in it. They also excised the script's most controversial material such as cannibalism. John Carpenter didn't want the movie to become too horror-esque. However, there's no denying that the Crazies are cannibals. Nick Castle also came up with the idea for the Cabbie character and suggested Cabbie's Bandstand Boogie tape to be played at the end. The Brain character was also fleshed out and more lines were added. John Carpenter had also originally wanted Bob Hauk to kill The Duke, but he felt it would be more effective if the President did it instead. John Carpenter also originally considered the idea of having Hauk tell Snake after he rescued the President that the charges in his neck were a fake and that he was never in any danger and it was all a hoax, but Carpenter decided not to use it (until Escape From L.A. came along.) The studio were also concerned about Snake's zero socially redeeming values and wanted an explanation why he is the way he is, so John added the famous deleted opening sequence where Snake robs a Federal Reserve bank in Colorado etc: Multimedia - Deleted Scenes

• Avco-Embassy Pictures, the studio behind the film, preferred either Charles Bronson or Tommy Lee Jones to play the role of "Snake" Plissken to director/co-writer John Carpenter's choice of Kurt Russell, who at the time was trying to overcome his "lightweight" screen image gained through his appearance in several Disney comedies. Carpenter refused to cast Bronson on the grounds that he was too old. John Carpenter originally wanted Clint Eastwood but couldn't afford him and when Tommy Lee Jones passed the deal to play Snake Plissken the role went to Kurt Russell. According to IMDb's EFNY trivia page Nick Nolte and Jeff Bridges were also approached to play Snake Plissken, but were uninterested. Kris Kristofferson was supposedly also considered as a possible candidate for the lead, but was not approached due to the failure of Heaven's Gate (1980). When Kurt was promoting Elvis in Australia he met director George Miller who showed him a rough cut version of Mad Max. Russell later called John Carpenter when being back in America and told him that he knew what kind of movie they should make next. Kurt's brother-in-law at the time Larry Franco (who co-produced EFNY) also told him about this futuristic movie John had been talking about and that John wanted Russell to play a guy named Snake. Kurt didn't want to play a nice guy and wanted to move on with his career and show his variety as an actor, so he was game.

• Kurt Russell helped to design Snake's outfit. He purchased the leather shirt from a guy he walked by in Paris just months before the filming begun for instance. He knew immediately that it was the look Snake's clothes would have. Kurt also suggested the eye patch (Two patches were made. One you could see through during harder scenes and one you couldn't see through in close-ups and such). In early publicity photos of Snake he was suppose to have the cobra tattoo on his left bicep instead of his stomach. He was also gonna have a rifle as opposed to a silenced Ingram Mac-10. His pants was also gonna be green instead of the ones he has in the movie. In the commentary Kurt Russell said they changed the pants due to Snake's history in the Leningrad war in Siberia where his pant would most likely be something similar to black and white, which also suited the movie's city surroundings much better. They also thought Snake looked too much like a soldier and that it didn't fit with the character's persona. However, these early publicity photos has been used widely for different EFNY merchandise such as posters and DVD's etc. Kurt also came up with Snake's performance. When he knew that Lee Van Cleef was gonna star against him, he chose to do his own take on Clint Eastwood's character in Sergio Leone's western movies, but with Lee Van Cleef's (who also starred in two of those movies) character's more enigmatic touch. Kurt also got ready to play Snake by working out in a gym for four months.

• John Carpenter also had to fight the Studio to get Lee Van Cleef as Bob Hauk. Avco Embassy wanted Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster or William Holden. Lee was reluctant at first but accepted the role when Carpenter wanted him to play the the role with his earring on. Lee Van Cleef also had a hard time moving during the shoot. His knee was hurt from a fall of a horse. 

• Ernest Borgnine originally wanted to play the role of Bob Hauk, but Lee Van Cleef had already been cast.

• John Carpenter and Debra Hill originally wanted Warren Oates to play Brain. The role was written to fit him but the actors strike forced him into a bind with another contract.

• British actor Donald Pleasence originally turned down the role of the president because he didn’t think someone not from America could play the part and with an English accent. The United States constitution requires that the President must be a native born citizen of the United States. John Carpenter wrote him a letter and told him about the comedic elements and finally talked him into it. John described the president to be a love child of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher for instance. Donald also made up a story how he got to be president (including an explanation for how the character was born in the United States and could have an English accent). According to John Carpenter it had something to do with Margaret Thatcher taking over the world and making the United States a colony again, but he never used it since the audience would not care. One of the reasons why John Carpenter chose Donald was because of his performance in Roman Polanski's Cul De Sac. Donald Pleasence also drew on his own wartime experiences as a prisoner of war for his performance as the imprisoned president. Pleasance was also known to crack people up and Escape From New York was no exception.
 
• Isaac Hayes suggested the eye twitch to John Carpenter. He had been given three scars by the make-up department and asked John what if one of these slashes severed a nerve. John wanted the character to have a gimmick of some sort and agreed. Isaac Hayes also worked out too hard in St. Louis and was so sore that he could hardly walk.

• Steven Loomis (Costume Designer) found Snake's jacket "off the rack" at a vintage clothing store. It's a 1930's "California Sportswear" brand motorcycle jacket in horsehide. The original khaki colored lining is in tatters and several scenes in both "New York" and "L.A." show the shredded lining hanging out. Steven also did some of his costume shopping at city dumps, for a truly "authentic" look.

• Director of photography Dean Cundey used a special lens - new at the time - to extract the maximum amount of light from night time shoots. He also made extensive use of the Panaglide camera. The Panaglide, a variation of the famed and award winning Steadicam, allows the operator to archive extremely steady hand-held shots which pitch the audience into the action.

• Another first is the use of a computerized light modulator invented and built by Dean Cundey and Joy Brown which allows a person to control many light functions simultaneously.

• The 1979 actors strike resulted in many closed down major studio soundstages and back lots. Therefore Escape From New York was shot on location in the following order: Atlanta, St. Louis, Los Angeles and New York.

• An average day started at the office, at 2:00 PM. Dailies were screened between 4:00 and 5:30. The lightning and prop crews would go to work with John at 6:00. The actors would start arriving for make-up and costumes. Dinner and sun set watching followed until 8:30. Filming began a half hour later and stopped around 5:30 in the morning. Sundays was a day off. 

• Nearly 95 percent of Escape From New York was filmed at night. It proved to be physically exhausting for John Carpenter who took every vitamin known to man through his then wife Adrienne Barbeau who had brought a large apothecary jar with her.

• The only scene shot in New York was the dolly shot of The Statue of Liberty with the helicopter introducing and following Rehme into a security booth. The morning shot of Manhattan (where a helicopter is seen) was also filmed here. These were the last scenes to be filmed for the movie. It was also the first film to be allowed to shoot on Liberty Island underneath the Statue of Liberty. They had the whole island for themselves and they where there for two days. It wasn't easy to get permission though. Only three months earlier they'd had bombings by Croatian Freedom Fighters and they were worried about trouble. 

• The night street (for most parts) and Grand Central Station scenes were filmed in east St. Louis, Missouri, which had entire neighborhoods burned out in 1976 during a massive urban fire. Across the Mississippi River from the more prosperous St. Louis, Missouri, East St. Louis was filled with old buildings that looked seedy and run-down. The area was more or less abandoned due to economic trouble at the time. The city's architecture was also similar to that of a major east coast city, so it was a lucky find. It was Barry Bernardi (Location Manager) who found this city on a paid vacation with a goal to find the worst city in the United States.

• The city of St. Louis was very helpful and allowed the production to shut down all the electricity in this part of the town and do whatever was needed. It was the first major film in 15 years the city hosted, so they didn't even have a film commission.

• John Carpenter sprayed the streets with water to create the required look of the city.

• Many in the first attempt to rescue the President scenes in St. Louis were actually from St. Louis National Guard. This sequence started out with 30 men pouring out of the choppers and into the streets, but ended with only 15 tired Guardsmen left due to heat exhaustions, a broken angle and a dislocated shoulder etc. You could hardly see through the helmets.

• The production design department would get their props by taking several dump trucks to the local garbage landfill sites and filling them up with junk like broken refrigerators and car shells. Every night teams would move in with bulldozers, piling up mountains of garbage and old cars ready for the rigorous night shooting. Just before dawn the same teams returned to clear the streets ready for the morning rush-hour traffic. All the debris, garbage and ruined cars were carefully stored in a local junkyard to await the next night's shooting.

• The President's downed plane was an old DC-8 bought from a guy in St. Louis. Joe Alves (Production Designer) and his assistant art director Chris Horner were first at an airplane graveyard in Tucson, Arizona scouting for parts when the guy there told them about this plane for sale for $8000 in St. Louis. The plane was carved up into 3 separate pieces and trucked into the film's St Louis locations in the dead of night as they didn't have the requisite paperwork and a security guard had to be brought in to guard the plane for eight hours. The next day the St. Louis news paper had a picture of the sight along with eye witnesses telling them having seen it crash which was false of course.

• The Grand Central Station scenes were filmed at the Union Station in St. Louis which was abandoned at the time. It was once the busiest and largest passenger rail terminal in the world. It's operation ceased in 1978 and in the early 1980s, the Station underwent a $150 million restoration. It was reopened 1985 as the largest adaptive re-use project in the U.S. housing a 539 room Hyatt Regency Hotel (now Marriott), a 10-screen movie theater, luxury offices, a lake, four active train tracks and a plaza for festivals, concerts and other special events.

• The entire crew was plagued by persistent mosquitoes during a very hot and sticky St. Louis summer.

• There was still a big mess on the streets when shooting was over and the studio was billed a pretty penny to have it cleaned up.

• John Carpenter purchased the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge in St Louis (where the 69th Street Bridge scenes were shot) for $1 from the government (or more specific the US Army of Corps of Engineers) and then returned it to them for the same amount after filming was completed.

• John Carpenter read the script for The Thing while shooting the movie in St. Louis.

• The wall Joe Alves built at Sepulveda Dam Control Resin (Liberty Island Security Control) was a 33-feet-high, 200-feet-long monolith which took over a month to build.

• The skeletal weapons being carried by the police in the beginning of the movie are M16A1 rifles with the ventilated hand-guards and gas tubes removed. In reality, though the rifles can fire without the hand guards, they are unable to fire with the gas tube removed. Cocking manually, the M16 can fire single shots even with the gas tube removed, but not in semi-automatic, full automatic or three-shot burst modes.

• The special effects (including miniature models and matte paintings) were provided by Roger Corman's "New World Cinema" workshop, and were actually supervised by future director James Cameron. He did several of their trick shots including the fake computer graphics of Manhattan in the glider and he also painted the World Trade Center skyline and the Central Park buildings background on a sheet of glass in front of the camera for a shot or two. "At one point", Carpenter says, "Cameron was finishing up just minutes before the scene was shot, so the paint was still wet." He was credited as the director of photography of special visual effects and matte artist on this movie. John Carpenter first approached John Dykstra and Universal/Hartland to provide the effects, but their price tag and celebrity attitude was outrageous according to himself. He also approached Jim Danforth, but he was involved in another project.

• The model of Manhattan measured ten foot by ten foot and was combined optically with live action footage of the surrounding water. This model of the city set was also repainted and reused for Blade Runner (1982) according to IMDb's EFNY trivia page.

• Secret Service guy #2 (the blond guy with glasses banging on the cabin door) in Air Force One is played by Steven Ford (former President Gerald Ford's son).

• Two characters from the movie are called Romero and Cronenberg as a tribute to the directors David Cronenberg and George A. Romero.

• The Hartford, CT Summit mentioned in the film had two visiting Communist nations (People's Republic of China and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) - the USSR/Soviet Union ceased to exist in late 1991.

• Bill Bartell was the pilot in the glider sequence at the start of the movie. He sold the glider to the production company, and then flew it. The glider used had the designation N2927B and was a Romanian-made IS28-B2. During the WTC roof top landing scene it bumped and smashed against the edge so it took two years to get it sold by Debra Hill. In the meanwhile she leased it to a school that teached gliding. Bill Bartell nailed the landing in one take though.

• The wire-frame computer graphics on the display screens in the glider were not actually computer graphics. (Computers capable of 3D wire-frame imaging were way too expensive when this was made.) To generate the "wire-frame" images, they built a model of the city, painted it black, attached bright white tape to the model buildings in an orderly grid, and moved a camera through the model city.

• When Kurt was to work on the wiring to open the elevator on the roof of the World Trade Center the elevator control box exploded from the wall and burned Kurt's hands a little bit. He was a bit shaken afterwards but told them to use the take for its element of surprise.

• Everyone's Coming To New York is the song sung by the men in drag at the stage show scene where Snake first meets Cabbie. It was based on Steven Sondheim's song Everything's Coming Up Roses which had been recorded and was the original choice. However, they couldn't get the rights from Steven, so they had to re-record the song.

• Co-writer Nick Castle wrote the new lyrics and the show was also choreographed by him.

• The lyrics are as follows: Shoot a cop, With a gun, The Big Apple is plenty of fun, Stab a priest, With a fork, And you'll spend your vacation in New York, Rob a bank, Take a truck, You can get here by stealing a buck, This is bliss, It's a lark, Honey, everyone's coming to New York! No more Yankees Strike the word from your ears, Play the roulette, There's no more opera at the Met, This is hell, This is fate, But now this is your home and it's great, So rejoice Pop a cork Honey, everyone's coming to New York!

• The band consisted of John Carpenter on guitar and kazoo, director of photography Dead Cundey on sax, location manager Barry Bernardi on violin and cameraman Clyde Bryan on trumpet.

• The manhole covers in the film were all made out of wood. Real ones would have been far too heavy for the actors.

• The woman in the diner is played by Season Hubley, who was, at the time, Kurt Russell's wife. She had just given birth to their son Boston prior to doing this film. It was her first role after Boston's birth.

• Season Hubley's character, the Girl in Chock Full of Nuts, was originally named "Maureen." Said name was revealed only in the tie-in novel, never in the movie.

• Maureen is described by Kurt Russell to be a "crime groupie" since it would be more fitting in a penal colony. She was originally gonna wear a t-shirt covered with crossed off names of criminals except for just one: Snake Plissken. However, in another article she was described to be a female gang leader. 

• The running gag used in the film about everybody thinking Snake Plissken was dead was also used in the John Wayne western, Big Jake (1971).

• Maggie's character was written with Adrienne Barbeau in mind.

• Isaac Hayes's '77 Cadillac Fleetwood sedan with the fender-mounted chandeliers has been used as an influence for the modern-day art car - a vehicle decorated or customized as works of art. Two other vehicles used in the film (a late 1970s Ford LTD Country Squire station wagon fitted with rebar around the windshield and windows, along with Cabbie's Checker Cab with wire mesh cages) were the ancestors of the mutant vehicles seen at Burning Man (a public art festival outside Reno, Nevada) or during the annual Houston Art Car Parade.

• Many sources mentions Madison Square Garden as being the Duke's lair. The correct building is in fact Grand Central Station. It is mentioned in the script and Novel and Debra Hill clarifies this in the commentary.

• The shot where the helicopter glides over Central Park were actually filmed in Sepulveda Dam Flood Control Basin, San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, CA.

• The idea of being put a wig on at Grand Central Station was improvised by Donald Pleasence on the set.

• Ox Baker (Slag) struck Kurt Russell very heavily with some of his blows during the gladiator ring fight scene. He also threw a trash can in Russell's face about five times. Ox had problems remembering the moves and began to swing very wildly. Russell had finally had enough and asked Baker to take it easy, tapping him in the groin to let him know he was serious. Baker then calmed down. It was the hardest scene in the film to do according to Kurt Russell and it took a whole day to shoot. The two stuntmen who were coordinating the actors moves ended up with injuries when practicing with Baker - one with a broken nose and one with a lump on his forehead as big as a baseball (Dick Warlock). Real bats with real nails were also used in this scene.  

• The 69th Street Bridge was invented by John Carpenter since they couldn't stop the ten-lane, double-decker traffic of the George Washington Bridge and couldn't afford to rebuild it somewhere else. The 69th Street Bridge was built somewhere between 1980 and 1997 and Debra Hill suggested calling it the Richard N. Nixon Memorial, or even the John B. Anderson Memorial, but that was before the election. In a later interview he claimed naming it the 69th Street Bridge was a cheap adolescent joke. In a more recent interview John Carpenter claims he didn't know New York that well and that it was meant to be the The 59th St. (Ed Koch Queensboro) Bridge.

• Roy Arbogast (the special effects supervisor) had liquid smoke shipped to St. Louis from Los Angeles which was brought into the plane unchecked as a flammable material. The bottle broke for some reason and it started to smoke while landing. The pilot thought the plane was on fire and a runway for emergence landing was prepared. FBI later came to the production office in a St. Louis hotel and questioned the production coordinator. They later came to the bridge to get the liquid smoke. Later there was a claim that they had to settle for years afterwards. The production company ended up having to pay 10.000 dollars.

• The song Cabbie is playing in his car throughout the movie and being played at the end instead of the Hartford Summit tape is called Bandstand Boogie by Charles Albertine. Bandstand Boogie was also used and sung by Barry Manilow in the Bandstand TV series (1952-1989) as the opening and closing theme during 1977-1989.

• US Army Corps of Engineers were very supportive and helped out with the helicopters and consulting etc.  

• According to IMDB's Escape From New York Trivia Page: The opening narration is not, as some reported, provided by an uncredited Jamie Lee Curtis. The computer voice in the opening and in the first prison scene is producer Debra Hill. However, Jamie Lee Curtis is mentioned (uncredited) in IMDb's credits. Kathleen Blanchard too!

• The final credit is a reference to a strip club called P.T.'s in Illinois across the river from St. Louis. The crew had to find ways to stay awake during the nights on weekends and bars closed at 1:00 in St. Louis. P.T.'s closed at 5:00.

• Many of the film crew got a countdown clock t-shirt of Escape From New York.

• Claude Debussy's composition Engulfed Cathedral is used during the glider flight into New York. It wasn't intended to be in the movie. Tom Ramsay, the editor used it on the tempo track and John Carpenter felt that it worked well with the scene so they incorporated it. For some reason a few disgruntled folk claim that Carpenter stole it without attribution, but it is clearly credited in the end titles. It would be a crime against nature according to himself.  

• Many of the clock countdown inserts were shot later to increase tension.

• The wrap party was held at the Roller Boogie Palace. Still photographer Kim Gottlieb-Walker on skates for the first time of her life, fell and broke her wrist. 

• John Carpenter and Debra Hill approached Marvel to make a comic book of Snake Plissken, but Marvel passed on the deal, claiming they did not have enough lead time to be on sale during the film's release. The Bally Pinball Machine Company was also interested in producing an Escape game.

• Debra Hill and Isaac Hayes were sent to Detroit, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Washington and New York on a publicity tour in The Duke's '77 Cadillac Fleetwood. On the day they promoted the movie on TV and radio and such. Later they went to several drive in movies with Isaac Hayes as The Duke and signed autographs and such.   

• It was during this movie John Carpenter got exposed to helicopters for the first time and decided to become a pilot for a while.

• In the Korean dub of the film, Snake Plissken was called "Cobra" while in the Italian version he was called "Hyena".

• When released in Italy the subtitles mistranslated nuclear fission as nuclear fixation.

• John Carpenter about the Statue of Liberty's fallen off head in the poster: "Here’s the thing – before the poster ever existed, we shot the Statue of Liberty, because it’s part of the police base out there. So it was in the movie. That was put in the poster by the artist that did it, and I didn’t have anything to do with it. Someone thought it would be an interesting idea – I don’t know why – that something waaaay out over the water would be in the middle of the street. It didn’t make any fucking sense, but it sold the film.

So I wasn’t thinking of that necessarily as much as I was thinking ‘Boy, whatever knocked that head…’ We were out there at night shooting the statue of liberty, and the sun came up on us – the crew – so we kind of trudged back across the water. It is forever to the city [laughs]! Forever! So I don’t know about that, it’s like throwing something from Heathrow over to London Bridge. So you go ‘Wait a minute now…’. But I accepted it." - The Den of Geek interview: John Carpenter

• The original German one-sheet poster prominently misspells Snake's last name as "Plessken".

• While many sources write that the film's production budget was $7 million, John Carpenter himself says the budget was more around $5.5 - 6.0 million.

• The film grossed $25.2 million in American theaters in the summer of 1981, with same amount grossed in foreign markets, making an over $50 million mega box-office hit in ratio to John Carpenter's production budget of $5.5-7 million.

• Around 80,000 copies of the soundtrack on vinyl was sold in the 80's. It was Alan Howarth (Co-Composer/Special Synthesizer Sound) decision to release it as a soundtrack album. John Carpenter didn't think anyone would listen to the music outside of the movie.

• Kurt Russell has stated that Escape From New York is his favorite of all his films. Snake Plissken is also his favorite character of the ones he's played. Snake's costume is the only costume he's ever kept from a movie.

• Ernest Borgnine still has Cabbie's hat in his home.

• Robert Rodriguez have said that after seeing Escape From New York at age 12 1981 in a theater, he knew he wanted to be a filmmaker.


Escape From L.A.


• Kurt Russell approached John Carpenter on doing a sequel in 1985 on a plane back from New York when doing press for Big Trouble In Little China. They had talked about it earlier but nothing was serious. Snake Plissken and Escape From New York was the only character and movie he wanted to play and revisit again. Carpenter didn't have a story for it and commissioned screenwriter Coleman Luck to write a draft of Escape From L.A. based on an outline by Carpenter & Russell which would serve as a prequel to Escape From New York. It was Russell's idea from the beginning to have L.A. being broken off from a giant earthquake. Carpenter would later describe the script as "Too light, too campy." Both Carpenter and Russell though it was ok, but it didn't quite work. In Coleman's version L.A. had turned into a lunatic asylum and Snake Plissken from Escape From New York turned out to be a "clone" etc. It also had an explanation how Snake lost his eye. During this time they had started to set up the project at DeLaurentis Studios. Unfortunately, it never came to be because Dino De Laurentis company went under so the project died. The project remained dormant following that time until L.A. started to become a more dangerous place to be in with more riots, drive-by shootings, mudslides and earthquakes going on. And five month after the 1994 Northbridge Earthquake they finally had a story and decided it was time to do the long awaited sequel. Carpenter insists that it was Russell's persistence and big stardom that allowed the film to be made since Snake Plissken was a character he loved and wanted to play again. Kurt had also been doing some informal market research when promoting a film in Europe where he asked people if they'd be interested in an Escape sequel with much positive responses. Carpenter, Russell and Debra Hill all contributed to the screenplay which they wrote on spec. Many studios were interested in making this sequel. New Line Cinema even had a poster campaign already worked out, but only Paramount understood the story and gave them the most freedom. Paramount gave them a $50 Million Dollar budget ($10 Million Dollars went to Kurt Russell). Although it's the largest budget Carpenter has ever gotten certain things from the script had to go due to length and budgetary reasons. The studio and Carpenter also decided to reinvent the film for a new audience since many younger people hadn't seen the original. It couldn't just appeal to Snake fans. Principal filming began in December 11, 1995 and it was wrapped in March 20. Paramount Pictures wanted the picture in theaters already in August the next year.

• Another early script was written by English screenwriter Peter Briggs, of Aliens vs Predator fame. The Peter Briggs version was written "on spec", meaning he did it on his own, without getting paid for it, in the hope of selling it to the rights owners. However, they, (the right owners & Carpenter & Russell), never got to read it, as it wasn't distributed or promoted at all.

• Principal photography began on the top of Mt. Hollywood Drive in Griffith Park in Los Angeles where Snake Plissken arrives in Mulholland Drive.

• The movie was shot for 70 nights straight.

• Unlike the first film, Escape From L.A. was indeed shot in a couple of various desolate parts in L.A. as well in busy parts and studio back lots. The streets looked too beautiful, but they found a couple of useful untouched sites in Northbridge from the 94 earthquake as well as an old unused landfill in Carson which was a stand in for Sunset Boulevard and Santa Monica Freeway. A part of the movie was shot in the heart of the city, on a seven block sector of fourth street. Every night in this busy part of the city they completely trashed the streets to create their intended vision of a earthquake induced wasteland. A remade city block off of Seventh and Broadway was also used. The store fronts were trashed and spattered with graffiti. The street itself was then littered with giant styrofoam chunks of rubble and populated by food vendors and prostitutes and their consorts. Other locations used was the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, The Queen Mary in Long Beach, The Los Angeles Theater, The Union Station, Biltmore Hotel, Griffith Park, Semi Valley, a ranch someplace near Westlake, A famous alley in the Tenderloin District, Universal Studios Courthouse Square set (Back to the Future's famed Clock Tower Set etc) and Schlitterbahn Waterpark Resort in New Braunfels, Texas.

• Kurt Russell did many of his own stunts. He also had to use hair extensions since his hair wasn't long enough for the role.

• Lawrence G. Paull (Production Designer) was inspired by his own travels in far east like Beijing, Cairo, Singapore when designing the street life in Escape From L.A. He also did research on earthquake aftermath scenarios. He studied the historic tremors that rocked L.A. and San Francisco in the first half of the century. He also studied The Great Hanshin earthquake, or Kobe earthquake that occurred in Japan in 1995 etc. He also remodeled the exteriors of the Firebase 7 set after the Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant in Van Nuys. He also used 29,000 lbs. of rubble to create Sunset Blvd. He also placed piles of rubble in strategic locations to block the L.A. skyline.

• The only returnees from the original film except John Carpenter, Kurt Russell and Debra Hill were sound crew members Joe Brennan and Tommy Causey.

• Stacy Keach (Malloy) also starred in a similar role in a similar movie prior to Escape From L.A. called New Crime City from 1994 which has many similarities with Escape From New York and Escape From L.A. 

• Isaac Hayes (The Duke of New York) was eager to come back, but Debra Hill had to declare that The Duke was dead. Isaac then said that he could be The Duke's twin brother. It didn't happen. However, when Snake is done playing basketball and tries to escape through the gate, the bald, black guard wearing sunglasses holding a gun is actually Isaac Hayes (uncredited cameo). Also, Hershe's voice was originally going to be done by Isaac Hayes.

• The President was based on televangelist Pat Robertson.

• At the beginning of the film, Kurt Russell wears his costume from the original film, which still fit after 15 years.

• The orphan in the cap that Snake Plissken makes eye contact with while being escorted down the hallway was played by 'Kurt Russell (I) 's son Wyatt.

• During the hijacking, Utopia is wearing a big pin on her suit that says "True Love Waits", according to the virginity pledge of the TLW program. During this scene cult director Paul Bartel can also be seen.

• The fabric of the Stealth Suit Snake wears was invented and custom made for the movie.

• Those two guards guarding Snake before he enters the submarine are Los Angeles morning DJs Mark Thompson and Brian Phelps (KLOS-FM). They've had minor roles in about 40 movies and TV shows. They are uncredited in the movie.

• The building Plissken crashes into is the "black tower" at Universal. It's where movie executives work. Carpenter: "I've had my own fights over there and have always wanted to take something through it."

• In an homage to the famed studio tour where Jaws pops out of the water, a shark tries to bite the mini-sub just as it passes the sign for Universal Studios.

• It took over 150 computer-generated effects to create one underwater sequence.

• Kurt Russell came up with the reoccurring line "I thought you'd be taller." based on real life commentaries from people he has met.

• The toughest physical sequence for Kurt Russell was a flood sequence cut out of the movie. Among the toughest thing of all was the Sunset Boulevard scene. This whole scene took four nights to shoot. Kurt had to put out every time when leaping over car to car so he wouldn't fall and get run over. According to himself he did this probably 50 or 60 times every night. 

• Steve Buscemi took the part in this film to help fund his directorial debut, Trees Lounge (1996).

• Bruce Campbell's (The Surgeon General of Beverly Hills) make-up was close to four and a half hours long. The make-up was all based on real plastic surgery technique, only done more crudely.

• Kurt Russell practiced playing basketball between scenes as he wanted to make all of his shots legitimately in the basketball scene later on. He made all of those shots purely on his own talent, even the full-court one. He also did all of these shots with a bad back. The first thing Kurt Russell did during this mist full night shoot was to slip on the wet floor and hurt his back.

• To get into character as a transvestite, Pam Grier would put a sock in her pants during shooting.

• There are several references to Snake Plissken and the city of Cleveland. This is an in joke reference to a friend John Carpenter's who knew a guy from Cleveland named Larry "Snake" Plissken where Carpenter got the name and inspiration for the character when he was writing Escape from New York (1981).

• Carpenter didn't think the surfing scene would be approved by Paramount Pictures, but they loved it and wanted to keep it.

• The Walt Disney Co. refused to allow Carpenter to taint the name of Disneyland so they decided to call it The Happy Kingdom instead.

• The hang glider attack at The Happy Kingdom was inspired by the flying monkeys attack in The Wizard of Oz. Neighbors started complaining about the noise while this scene and the rest of it was being shot on the Universal Studios lot. To compromise, Carpenter agreed not to fire any guns after midnight.

• According to an interview with John Carpenter, Kurt Russell not only came up with but wrote the entire ending of the movie.

• During the final escape, when Cuervo Jones fires the rocket at the helicopter, just after it's hit, you can see it narrowly avoid crashing into the Matterhorn at Disneyland which resembles the Paramount Pictures logo (Paramount produced the film).

• The Plutoxin 7 virus hoax was originally going to be part of the first movie, but was never used.

• The pack of smokes Snake picks up at the end of the movie is American Spirit and is a real brand of cigarettes. Carpenter uses it to show that Plissken represents the true nature of the American spirit.

• The line "Welcome to the human race" that ends the movie was originally used by Snake earlier in the movie in the scene where Snake's told that he'll be killed if he tries to come out of L.A. John Carpenter felt it didn't work there so he cut it out, then the editor added it at the end of the movie.

• There were almost 500 extras used in Escape From L.A.

• White Zombie contributed the track The One written specifically for the soundtrack to Escape From L.A. White Zombie's front man Rob Zombie later went on to direct a remake of John Carpenter's Halloween (1978).

• This was the last movie Buena Vista Visual Effects did before it was dissolved. It was replaced by Dream Quest Images.

• John Carpenter only had 9 total weeks of total of post-production and 1 day to look at his rough cut before it had to be sent to Paramount for release. In an interview with Robert Rodriguez, Carpenter said he wished he could've had 15 weeks of post-production time. In the same interview John Carpenter also reveals that he has 3 hours of footage.

• The movie was a notorious failure on release, making around $25 million (just half its budget) at the US box office. Many reviews criticized the film for being too violent, or for being too similar to the original film. Many also disliked the effects and campiness. Although, more and more people seems to appreciate it for what it was intended to be.

• Carpenter says his nostalgia for the original Escape turned this one into more of a remake than a sequel.