Well, I just checked the running commentary for
Cast Away, and no one paid anyone else in connection with FedEx being chosen as the real delivery company. The filmmakers wanted a real company, they asked FedEx, and FedEx said 'yes.'
(heheh, in discussing why he wanted a
real company, Zemeckis also uses the laughably bad example of TransGlobal Airlines. Great minds think alike.)
And yes, the DaVinci Code used only the exterior of the real Westminster Abbey. Apparently, the Abbey didn't mean Ron Howard's price for featuring the inside.
