Owen Wilson and Wes Anderson on the set of Rushmore.

Max’s play, “Heaven and Hell,” contains several references to Apocalypse Now.

Director Wes Anderson drummed up publicity the old-fashioned way by traveling across the country in a tour bus that was kitted out with two big screen TVs, two VCRs, a CD player, cellphones, a satellite dish and a Sony Playstation. This largely came about because Anderson hates to fly.

Bill Murray genuinely found Ronnie McCawley and Keith McCawley (the two actors playing his sons and who were very much like their screen characters) annoying and many of the scenes where he lashes out at them and insults them were improvised.

Like Max Fischer, Owen Wilson was expelled from his prep school in the tenth grade.

On the first day of principal photography, Wes Anderson delivered his directions to Bill Murray in a hushed whisper, so awed was he to be working with the actor. Graciously, Murray deferred publicly to Anderson, helped haul equipment and - when Disney denied a helicopter scene that would have cost $75,000 - he gave Anderson a blank check to cover the cost.

Director Trademark: Wes Anderson: [peanuts] Max’s dad is a barber, as was Charlie Brown’s & “Peanuts” creator Charles Schulz’s. Max flies a kite, which Charlie Brown was often seen attempting. Max is seen wearing a winter cap and carrying a plant, similar to a scene with Charlie Brown in A Charlie Brown Christmas. In the beginning of the “December” sequence in the barber shop, a musical interlude from A Charlie Brown Christmas can be heard playing in the background.

In the scene where Max is picking up a crate of explosives, he shows the clerk his I.D. and tells him to “make it out to Ready Demolition, Tucson, Arizona”. This is a reference to Val Kilmer’s first scene in Heat.

The scene where Max Fischer rats to Mrs. Blume about her husband’s affair (when his voice gets drowned out by the sounds on the street) is an obvious reference to the scene in On the Waterfront, where Marlon Brando’s character finally confronts Eva Marie Saint’s character.

The Bentley used in the film was used in exchange for the owner’s daughter to appear in the film.