Trivia

He was one of Ray Harryhausen's early employers and mentors.

Pal and his crew (Galaxy Films and, at Paramount, the Cauliflower Ear Gang) worked special-effects miracles at a time when there were no computers to help and very little precedent on which to go. Martian military hardware, time travel, and spaceship launch systems were designed from scratch. These were high-risk ventures that required considerable imagination (genius, really), ingenuity, determination, tenacity, and courage.

The estate of H.G. Wells was so impressed with The War of the Worlds (1953) that they offered Pal an option on any of Wells's science fiction stories. Pal choose The Time Machine (1960).

Despite being born to theater parents, Pal was said to have despised the stage.

Was mentioned in the song "Science Fiction Double Feature" on the Rocky Horror Picture Show" soundtrack in the line "And When worlds collide, Said George Pal to his bride, I'm gonna give you some Terrible Thrills".

He has produced three films that have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant: Tulips Shall Grow (1942), John Henry and the Inky-Poo (1946) and The War of the Worlds (1953). He has also directed two films that are in the registry: Tulips Shall Grow and John Henry and the Inky-Poo.

Is co-author (with Joe Morheim) of a novel, Time Machine II, a sequel to the H.G. Wells classic.

All of his movies feature a cameo appearance from Woody Woodpecker somewhere because he and Walter Lantz were close friends. Andy Panda, another Lantz character, appears in Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze (1975), which also features a cameo by Grace Stafford, the voice of Woody.

Unfinished or unmade film projects to which George Pal committed his personal time, money, and energy include "After Worlds Collide" (Paramount, 1955) - a sequel to When Worlds Collide (1951) - unmade due to the poor returns of Conquest of Space (1955); "Logan's Run" (MGM, 1968) - unmade due to poor returns of The Power (1968), eventually made by Saul David as Logan's Run (1976); "When The Sleeper Wakes" (MGM, 1972), based on the science-fiction novel by H.G. Wells - unmade due to Woody Allen's parody version then in production, Sleeper (1973); "Doc Savage II" (Warner Bros., 1976) - unmade due to poor returns of Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze (1975); "The Time Traveler" (MGM, 1977-1978) aka "Time Machine II," a sequel to his movie of H.G. Wells's The Time Machine (1960) - unmade due to MGM rejecting three scripts submitted by George Pal and Nicholas Meyer's film Time After Time (1979) in production; "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" (MGM-Cinerama, 1979) - a sequel to MGM's The Wizard of Oz (1939) - unmade due to MGM not committing to a new deal with Cinerama Corp. to make this as a multi-million-dollar Cinerama film (in Super Panavision 70mm) and no script approval; "The Voyage of the Berg" (IPA-Filmways, 1979-1980) - in production several months, unfinished due to George Pal's death in May 1980; and "The Disappearance" (WB, 1980) - in pre-production planning in early 1980.

Once designed art subtitles for silent films in the 1920s to keep food on the table.