Trivia
- Paul is the first person to accept a Razzie Award in person when receiving his "award" for Worst Director for the 1995 film Showgirls. While attending, he also personally accepted the Worst Picture "award."
- Rutger Hauer has appeared in five films Paul has directed.
- In 1987, Paul worked as a scenario adviser for the film Vroeger is dood. This is the only time in Paul's film work that he would work as a scenario advisory.
- In 1969, Paul served as a camera operator for the film Palaver. This is the only time in Paul's life that his job would be operating a camera.
- In 2002, Paul was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Amsterdam Fanatic Film Festival.
- Paul drinks Diet Coke quite often.
- In 1996, Paul "won" the Razzie Award in the category of Worst Director for the 1995 flop Showgirls.
- Salaries:
Basic Instinct -- $5,000,000
Showgirls -- $2,000,000 - In 2007, Paul served as a member of the jury at the 64th Venice Film Festival.
- Although born in Amsterdam, Paul's family lived in the village of Slikkerveer.
- Paul has said that he considers John Landis as his only friend in Hollywood.
- In 1989, Paul won the Readers' Choice Award at the Kinema Junpo Awards in the category of Best Foreign Language Film
for the 1987 film RoboCop.
Quotes
- Paul: The sooner we admit our capacity for evil the less apt we are to destroy each other.
- Paul: People love seeing violence and horrible things. The human being is bad and he can't stand more than five minutes of happiness. Put him in a dark theater and ask him to look at two hours of happiness and he'd walk out or fall asleep.
- Paul: There is a fear about sex in motion pictures, as if sex would undermine morality.
- Paul Verhoeven: People seem to have this strange idea that films can influence people to be violent, but in my sincere opinion film only reflects the violence of society.
