Trivia / Rushmore

• Ability over Appearance: Wes Anderson originally pictured Max, physically, as Mick Jagger at age 15, to be played by an actor like Noah Taylor in the Australian film Flirting - "a pale, skinny kid". When Anderson met Jason Schwartzman, he reminded Anderson much more of Dustin Hoffman and decided to go that way with the character.
• Breakthrough Hit: For Wes Anderson.
• Channel Hop: The film was originally going to be made by New Line Cinema, but they couldn't agree on a budget. Wes Anderson, Owen Wilson, and Producer Barry Mendel held an auction for the film's rights in mid 1997 and struck a deal with Joe Roth, who was then chairman of Walt Disney Studios. A budget of ten million dollars was agreed upon.
• Doing It for the Art: Bill Murray liked the script so much he agreed to work for scale. When Disney denied a helicopter scene that would have cost seventy-five thousand dollars, he gave Wes Anderson a blank check to cover the cost.
• Hostility on the Set: According to Bill Murray, he disliked Jason Schwartzman's personality during their first meeting. But he eventually warmed up to him while they worked together. Murray genuinely found Keith McCawley and Ronnie McCawley, who play his sons, annoying (much like their screen characters), and many of the scenes where he lashes out at them and insults them were improvised.
• Release Date Change: Touchstone hadn't planned on releasing the film until February 5th, especially in light of the heavy holiday release schedule, but when they saw the finished product, they rushed it into limited release for one week in December to qualify for Academy Award consideration, specifically Bill Murray for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.
• Star-Making Role: For Jason Schwartzman.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Macaulay Culkin, who by that point was retired from acting, was sent a script anyway, but despite liking it he still turned down the role of Max Fischer; by his own admission many years later, it's the one part he regrets turning down.
  • Culkin's The Good Son co-star Elijah Wood auditioned for Max Fischer.
  • Wes Anderson originally intended the film's soundtrack to be entirely made up of songs by The Kinks.
• Write What You Know: Like Max Fischer, Owen Wilson was expelled from his prep school, St. Mark's School of Texas, in the tenth grade, while Wes Anderson shared Max's ambition, lack of academic motivation, and had a crush on an older woman.

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