‘Animal House’ Might Not Have Been Made
… If John Landis hadn’t babysat Kiefer Sutherland.
The National Lampoon magazine started in 1970 when a small group of Harvard students wrote a parody to Lord of the Rings. While more than a million people subscribed to the magazine and big names in comedy came out of it, they still didn’t have an easy time getting ‘Animal House’ made.
Source: Business Insider
The movie was turned down by eight different directors. Universal Studios finally agreed to make the movie, but they wanted a bigger star than John Belushi to be featured. Luckily, Landis knew Donald Sutherland after working with him on ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ and even babysitting young Kiefer. Thus, Sutherland agreed to star as Professor Dave Jennings to be the big name Universal wanted.