cog:
I think we had a couple of um, genuine conversations about sequels. As I
recalled, we were gonna create another character called Joe, who was gonna be a
long, spindly guy. He was sorta gonna be like the uh, the Fred Astaire
to E.T.’s Gene Kelly And we had fun sort of playing around with the idea, but
at one point I actually remember us sort of shaking hands on the fact that
there would never be a sequel.
(cut)
cog:
On many levels
swallows
cog:
this is a story that was very, very personal to Steven and, I think he f-
always felt, and I think he was right to feel this way, that it would cheapen
the movie and the experience of the movie, and what it meant to him and
what it meant to audiences to just go try and... duplicate the movie in
some way. And on so many different levels it was an experience for him and for
all of us, that we weren’t... going to duplicate.
(cut)
cog:
I never made a sequel to “E.T.” because I can’t ever make an E.T. movie as good
as what I did. I mean, I would only shame the memory. I would only... show
people the flaws. “E.T.” isn’t a mechanical cottage industry that invites
further adventures of E.T. and other kids on the planet Earth. It is a one-time
event, and to do two or three or four movies based on that one character is
creating a franchise that I didn’t, frankly, think was the honest and right
thing to do. I I I think it was a one-time event in my life, it was a
one-time event, I think, in a lot of people who saw the movie’s lives,
and there was no way to replicate it with another movie. I could only further
denigrate the memory of the first one by doing a second one, so I’ve just held
out all these years, and I don’t ever plan to make a sequel to “E.T.”.
(cut)
