FILM · 2011 · USA
The Help
- Directed by
- Tate Taylor
- Runtime
- 146 min
- Studio
- 1492 Pictures, Harbinger Pictures
31 archived facts 4 topics 1 source Last reviewed Sep 2026
Aibileen Clark is a middle-aged African-American maid who has spent her life raising white children and has recently lost her only son; Minny Jackson is an African-American maid who has often offended her employers despite her family's struggles with money and her desperate need for jobs; and Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan is a young white woman who has recently moved back home after graduating college to find out her…
Summary: TMDB
All facts (31)
- #001
Kathryn Stockett's novel, on which the film is based, was rejected 60 times before it was published.
- #002
The film never explains how Eugenia got the nickname "Skeeter." In the book, she says that she was scrawny and long-legged at birth and that her older brother said she looked like a "skeeter" (mosquito).
- #003
The film is set in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1963 — the time and place where civil rights activist Medgar Evers was assassinated. Real-life national news headlines about the assassination are used in the film at around the one-hour-twenty-minute mark.
- #004
Director Tate Taylor and the book's author, Kathryn Stockett, were childhood friends in Jackson, Mississippi.
- #005
Bryce Dallas Howard (Hilly Holbrook) said on her official Facebook page that she hung a photo of Hilly above her own toilet, "where she belongs."
- #006
The source novel spent 103 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, including six at number one.
- #007
Contains a major spoiler — show
According to the book, Constantine died just 3 weeks after arriving in Chicago.
- #008
Sissy Spacek nearly turned down the role of Miss Walters because she felt there wasn't enough material to build a fully rounded character, but she changed her mind when director Tate Taylor told her she would be allowed to improvise during filming.
- #009
On The Graham Norton Show (2007), Bryce Dallas Howard said she is always mistaken for Jessica Chastain. Both appear in this film.
- #010
Skeeter's bookshelf includes "Native Son," Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man," Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" and Margaret Mitchell's "Gone With the Wind."
- #011
Bryce Dallas Howard was pregnant during filming.
- #012
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the book, Charlette Phelon never learns about her daughter's project.
- #013
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the book, Constantine gave Rachel up for adoption because she was very light-skinned.
- #014
Hilly's house is actually a residential property, and the prominent cream-colored sofa was already part of it.
- #015
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the film, Rachel is considerably older than Skeeter. On the door frame of Constantine's house, the growth marks read "Rachel 1944" and "Skeeter 1955."
- #016
In a March 2020 interview with Terry Gross on National Public Radio's "Fresh Air," Octavia Spencer recalled interning on the set of The Long Walk Home (1990) as a high school student in Montgomery, Alabama. Sissy Spacek also appeared in that film, as she does in this one.
- #017
The film features a total of seven Oscar winners: Sissy Spacek, Mary Steenburgen, Octavia Spencer, Viola Davis, Emma Stone, Allison Janney and Jessica Chastain, as well as two nominees: Cicely Tyson and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor. Tyson is also an honorary Oscar recipient.
- #018
The painting above Celia's fireplace was found in a hospital basement. The two chairs in the scene were found in a second-hand store.
- #019
Despite her Oscar nomination, Viola Davis expressed regret over her role in the film and apparently agrees with critics of its "white savior" narrative. Davis played Aibileen Clark, one of the Black maids in 1963 Mississippi whose stories are told by a young white woman (Emma Stone) in a book that exposes the everyday racism they faced. In an interview with The New York Times, Davis said The Help was a role she regretted. "I just felt that at the end of the day that it wasn't the voices of the maids that were heard," she said. "I know Aibileen. I know Minny. They're my grandma. They're my mom. And I know that if you do a movie where the whole premise is, 'I want to know what it feels like to work for white people and to bring up children in 1963,' I want to hear how you really feel about it. I never heard that in the course of the movie."
- #020
Katy Perry was nearly cast in "a small role" but had to turn it down due to a scheduling conflict with the launch of her album "Teenage Dream."
- #021
The bookstore in the film, "Avent & Clark Booksellers," is named after Avent Clark, a production assistant on the film in Greenwood, Mississippi.
- #022
The cast includes two groups of actors who won Oscars for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress in the same year: in the 1980s, Spacek (Best Actress) and Steenburgen (Best Supporting Actress), and in 2017, Stone (Best Actress) and Davis (Best Supporting Actress).
- #023
Allison Janney watched Eyes on the Prize III: We Who Believe in Freedom Cannot Rest (2025) to prepare for her role.
- #024
Minny Jackson is played by Octavia Spencer. In the novel, Minny's sister is named Octavia.
- #025
Bryce Dallas Howard played Gwen Stacy in Spider-Man 3 (2007). Emma Stone played Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014). Octavia Spencer also appeared briefly in the first Spider-Man (2002).
- #026
Viola Davis appeared in two films nominated for the Best Picture Oscar in 2012: this film and Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011). Jessica Chastain also appeared in two films nominated for the Best Picture Oscar in 2012: this film and The Tree of Life (2011).
- #027
In this film, Mary Steenburgen plays an editor who helps a young woman writer publish a novel about life in the South. In Cross Creek (1983), Steenburgen was the writer of such a book set in the South.
- #028
Allison Janney and Brian Kerwin are married in this film. In The West Wing (1999), Janney's character dated a park ranger played by Kerwin.
- #029
Christopher Lowell (Stuart Whitworth), Jessica Chastain (Celia Foote) and Nelsan Ellis (Henry the Waiter) appeared in various episodes of Veronica Mars (2004); Lowell and Ellis appeared in an episode of season 3, and their characters interacted. Chastain appeared in an episode of season 1 (The Girl Next Door (2004)).
- #030
Melissa Molinaro auditioned for the role of Celia Foote.
- #031
Two actresses have portrayed Gwen Stacy in film. Emma Stone played the character in The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2, while Bryce Dallas Howard played her in Spider-Man 3.
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