Steven Spielberg has weighed in on a viral question over whether E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial was slimy or dry.
Spielberg directed the iconic 1982 film about a loveable alien stranded on Earth who befriends Henry Thomas’ Elliott while searching for a way home. The movie was a runaway success, becoming the highest-grossing film of all time for 11 years until Spielberg’s own Jurassic Park surpassed it.
The title character is one of the most recognisable figures in movie history, but as explored while Spielberg was a guest on a recent episode of The New York Times podcast The Daily, there has been some discussion about whether E.T. was slimy to the touch, or dry.
The director gave his definitive verdict on a debate that he described as “wild”, asserting that “E.T. was a little moist but never slimy”, and was “only dry when he got sick”.
He gave an example of a movie creature that he would describe as slimy, citing the xenomorph in Ridley Scott’s Alien. “That’s slimy!” he said. “E.T. never had the tendrils of drool. We didn’t go that far.”
Last year, Spielberg revealed that he flirted with the idea of making an E.T. sequel set in space. It would have been situated on the character’s home planet, citing the novel The Green Planet by E.T. novelisation author William Kotzwinkle, but he concluded that it “was better as a novel than it would have been as a film”.
Spielberg is synonymous with aliens, and an avowed believer, having also helmed Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, War Of The Worlds and his new film Disclosure Day, which is currently riding high at the global box office.
It sees Josh O’Connor play a whistleblower racing against time to expose a conspiracy by the government to conceal knowledge of extra-terrestrial life having visited Earth, with Emily Blunt, Colman Domingo and Colin Firth also in the cast.
In a four-star review of the film, NME wrote: “Aside from marshalling some beautiful emotive moments and the frankly stunning action sequences, he devised the original story which was then turned into a script by regular collaborator David Koepp. Some will balk at moments in the conclusion which veer too sentimental, while others will wish for a shorter running time. Ultimately, even not-quite-top-tier Spielberg is well worth seeing. It’s big, smart and very satisfying cinema.”