RAD's video: E T the Extra Terrestrial - Read Along Story book - DigitalHD - Spielberg - Read by Drew Barrymore

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) - A group of aliens visit earth and one of them is lost and left behind stranded on this planet. The alien is found by a 10 year old boy, Elliot. Soon the two begin to communicate, and start a different kind of friendship in which E.T learns about life on earth and Elliot learns about some new values for the true meaning of friendship. E.T. wants to go home, but if Elliot helps him, he'll lose a friend... ► Cast of the full movie version were... Henry Thomas as Elliott Robert MacNaughton as Michael Drew Barrymore as Gertie Dee Wallace as Mary Peter Coyote as "Keys", a government agent K. C. Martel, Sean Frye and C. Thomas Howell as Michael's friends, Greg, Steve and Tyler Erika Eleniak as the young girl Elliott kisses in class. ☆ Trivia After his parents' divorce in 1960, Spielberg filled the void with an imaginary alien companion. He said that the imaginary alien was "a friend who could be the brother I never had and a father that I didn't feel I had anymore." During 1978, he announced he would shoot a film entitled Growing Up, which he would film in 28 days. The project was set aside because of delays on 1941, but the concept of making a small autobiographical film about childhood would stay with him. He also thought about a follow-up to Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and began to develop a darker project he had planned with John Sayles called Night Skies. Filming Raiders of the Lost Ark in Tunisia left Spielberg bored, and memories of his childhood creation resurfaced. He told screenwriter Melissa Mathison about Night Skies, and developed a subplot from the failed project, in which Buddy, the only friendly alien, befriends an autistic child. His abandonment on Earth in the script's final scene inspired the E.T. concept. She wrote a first draft titled E.T. and Me in eight weeks, which he considered perfect. The script went through two more drafts, which deleted an "Eddie Haskell"-esque friend of Elliott. The chase sequence was also created, and he also suggested having the scene where E.T. got drunk. Columbia Pictures, which had been producing Night Skies, met him to discuss the script. The studio passed on it, calling it "a wimpy Walt Disney movie", so he approached the more receptive Sid Sheinberg, president of MCA. ► Director: Steven Spielberg ► Writer: Melissa Mathison