Behind the Scenes
Facts About Charlie ...

Wonka's Chocolate Room
206,563.48 US gallons of fake chocolate was made for the River area.

38,430.41 US gallons of fake chocolate were made for the waterfall.

Total on stage 244,993.89 US gallons of fake chocolate.

Fake chocolate bars
110,000 plastic candy bars were made and wrapped by Nestle. These were mostly used for Mr. Salt's Nut Factory when his 500 employees ripped the wrappers off to find the Golden Ticket for his daughter Veruca.

1850 real chocolate bars were made by Nestle for the film

A special walk-in trailer was acquired to hold all the chocolate. It was kept at a certain humidity to preserve and safe guard the chocolate. All chocolate was made with real ingredients.

Other real candy made for the film included ..
All the lollipops on the trees, the giant pink sugar canes, the giant humbugs and the red & white swirls of the sweeping tree were all real.

The Nut Room
Animal trainer Michael Alexander and his team spent 19 weeks training 40 squirrels for the squirrel room scene. The squirrels were trained to sit on stools while they opened nut shells and dropped the nuts onto a conveyor belt.

The Glass Boat used on the Chocolate River
Measuring 30 ft x 9 ft., the boat took 20 weeks to build. It was designed to float on the chocolate river and later put onto a track for the tunnel scene.

Words to Live By
"Invention, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration,
6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple.."
- Willy Wonka