Jeff Bridges had been trying to have the film made for nearly 20 years and even filmed a version of it with his family. Speaking on the Nerdist Podcast he said: "I originally wanted to direct my father in it. As a matter of fact, somewhere in some garage, there is a version of this movie with my father (Lloyd Bridges) playing The Giver, Bud Cort narrates the whole thing, Beau's kids, one is shooting it, one is playing Jonas. We did the whole book, so that's around somewhere."
Jeff Bridges learned that his friend and fellow actor Robin Williams died by suicide on the same night that the film premiered. It is apparent that Bridges was trying his hardest to hide his pain and prevent himself from crying during interviews on the red carpet. Both men had co-starred in La leggenda del re pescatore (1991).
In the original novel, Jonas and his friends are 12 years old; however, for the film they were aged up by six years.
One of the main reasons Alexander Skarsgård signed on to the film was to work with Meryl Streep. On set, he learned that her role was a hologram, therefore, she would be shooting her scenes elsewhere. They later went on to star together in Big Little Lies - Piccole grandi bugie (2017), season 2, as mother and son.
When Jeff Bridges first bought the film rights to the novel in the 1990s, he intended to cast his father Lloyd Bridges as the Giver.