Quiz

Crew members left constantly between pre-production and principal photography. Between the drama with Whoopi Goldberg and the stress of getting the film off the ground, nearly half the crew was different come the first day of shooting.

In the fall of 1992, producer Richard Gilbert Abramson is introduced to Larry Finch, Whoopi Goldberg's business partner at the time. Jonathan Betuel's script gets passed to Goldberg through Larry Finch. A month later, she expresses interest in the script. A lunch meeting is then had between Abramson, Goldberg and her team about her possibly being in the film. Finch calls Abramson saying that Whoopi has agreed to star in this film for $5 million plus 5% backend and that her agents request the producers to send a contract and a proposal. Jonathan Betuel is asked by the producer to rewrite the script to Whoopi's casting and is paid $500,000. The producers call Goldberg directly and she says some other commitments had suddenly come up and that she will be unable to do the movie. The producers send her the proposal and have the production schedule confirmed. They call her again a month later, and she tells them she'll do the movie. At that time, she was recovering from pneumonia and was on cold medicine when she took that call. After the call, Whoopi's attorney asks the film's attorneys for a formal pay-or-play offer, as well a request from her to the producers that they no longer contact her directly and instead speak to her lawyer. Then, Whoopi's lawyer sends a formal rejection of "Theodore Rex" to the producers, claiming that she's too busy to do the film. Two weeks later, Abramson sends a letter to Whoopi through her team saying that they needed her to do the film since all the money that was invested in the film was contingent on her involvement. On March 8, 1993, the producers filed suit against Whoopi Goldberg for $20 million, saying she went against a verbal agreement she made with the producers to star in the film. Goldberg countersued saying she never agreed to do the film. She also filed a cross complaint against Larry Finch claiming he had misrepresented the situation to her. Noteworthy is that, at one point, Goldberg called Abramson at home and he asked her if she was 100% committed to doing the film, which she said yes. But, he missed the phone ringing and he answered it as Goldberg was leaving a message. What they later realized was that when Abramson picked up, his answering machine was still recording, so he had Goldberg's confirmation on tape and it was used against her in court. Goldberg's people claimed that this was recorded illegally, but it was proven otherwise. After some time, the judge gave the impression to Goldberg that she was going to lose the case and that she should settle, which is what happened. In September 1993, Goldberg and the producers entered mediation and agreed to a settlement. Goldberg was legally obligated to star in the movie with no backend percentage, while the producers had to pay her $7 million to do the film, $2 million more than the original agreement.

Most of the actors signed on thinking the dinosaur would be computer enhanced.

Jonathan R. Betuel retired from directing after this film. He felt the studio didn't market it correctly.

Whoopi Goldberg wanted to leave the film during the production at first. But as filming went on, she was much more cooperative. She became good friends with Bruce Lanoil, the Teddy puppeteer and upgraded him from a rundown honeywagon to a nice trailer during the shoot.