The Pelican Brief

The Pelican Brief (1993)

Timing: 2:21 (141 min)

6.596/10
1499

6.965/10
12523

6.6/10
103000

All about film

Video 1

Photo 33

Actors and characters

Release date

1993-09-17

Country

United States

Production

Warner Bros. Pictures

Genre

Thriller

Budget

$45 000 000

Revenue

$195 268 056

Website

Director

Alan J. Pakula

Actors

Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, Sam Shepard, John Heard, Tony Goldwyn, James B. Sikking, William Atherton, Robert Culp, Stanley Tucci, Hume Cronyn
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Pieter Jan Brugge, Alan J. Pakula

Operator

Stephen Goldblatt

Composer

James Horner

Artist

Audition

Alixe Gordin

Editing

Tom Rolf, Trudy Ship
All team (64)

• John Grisham wrote the character of Darby Shaw with actress Julia Roberts in mind for the role in a future adaptation. Roberts read the book and agreed to play Darby without even reading the script.
• The scenes in the Georgetown University Law School library were indeed filmed in this library – in the main reading room on the 4th floor. Other episodes on the university grounds were also filmed in authentic settings. University security personnel can be seen in the background as extras in these scenes.
• In the 1992 novel by John Grisham, which served as the literary source, the characters played by Julia Roberts and Denzel Washington become lovers. Roberts did not object to this plot twist, but Washington did, believing that an interracial relationship should not be shown on screen. A couple of years later, during filming of Brett Leonard's sci-fi action film 'Virtuosity' (1995), Washington again demanded the removal of a romantic subplot between his character and Kelly Lynch’s character, for the same reason.
• The rights to adapt the novel were acquired even before it was fully written. At one point, John Grisham published an excerpt from the novel he was working on, and soon after signed an agreement to transfer the adaptation rights.
• To prepare for her role, Julia Roberts took classes at the Tulane University School of Law and even attended a couple of seminars. Some students even appeared in the footage during the filming of scenes in the university classrooms.
• In preparation for filming, Denzel Washington closely communicated with editors and journalists from The Washington Post.