The designer of the 1976 version of "King Kong," Carlo Rambaldi, had much more success creating the animatronic version of the lovable alien in "E.T." The aluminum and steel skeleton for the machine had a musculature of fiberglass, polyurethane and foam rubber, with each layer connected to mechanical or electronic controls. All in all, it was capable of 150 separate motions, including wrinkling its nose, furrowing its brow and delicately bending its long fingers. Its eyes, which director Steven Spielberg wanted to entrance the audience, were constructed by a craftsman who made glass eyes for the blind.
