Trivia / The Butterfly Effect

• Dawson Casting:
  • Odd examples. Twelve-year-old Logan Lerman plays Evan at the age of seven. Seventeen-year-old John Patrick Amedori plays Evan at thirteen.
  • The main characters are all meant to be around 20 years old in the present day (2004). Ashton Kutcher was 26, Amy Smart was 28, Elden Henson was 27, and William Lee Scott was 31. Ashton and Amy play the characters at their own ages in the theatrical ending.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Elden Henson gained twenty pounds in the space of a month for the scenes in which Lenny is crazy.
• Fake Nationality: White French-Canadian actor Kevin Durand portrays Carlos, a Mexican.
• One-Hit Wonder: Writer/directors Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber made something of a name for themselves with Final Destination 2, had a surprise hit with this film, and then just as quickly vanished, albeit with Bress later popping up again to write Final Destination 4 without Gruber's involvement.
• Reality Subtext: As the film was shot in a real prison, some of the extras were in fact real prisoners.
• Spared by the Cut: Evan comes to the conclusion that somebody suffers through his actions no matter what he does to avert it (he's able to go back to certain times in his life and remember what effects his actions had in previous runs), so in the director's cut he strangles himself in the womb. His mother had several miscarriages, implying this happened to all her stillborn children.
• Throw It In!: The lights flickering in the background of the psychiatrist's office while Evan is being hypnotised? The wiring on set actually shorted out. But they loved it and kept the take in the final cut.
• Tom Hanks Syndrome: This was one of Ashton Kutcher's first dramatic roles following his established comedic image from That '70s Show.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Josh Hartnett, Joshua Jackson and Seann William Scott turned down the role of Evan.
  • Ali Larter was also cast as Kayleigh but dropped out.
  • As mentioned on the main page, Evan's name was originally Chris Treborn. However, the producers feared religious protests, and had the name changed to the more stilted pun of Evan Treborn (Event Reborn).
  • In addition to the Director's Cut ending, there are two others. The first has Evan following Kayleigh on the street. The second has him actually talking to her.

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