The director’s new movie, about powerful people covering up evidence of aliens, struck a chord with some members of a growing group of government skeptics.

Speaking to the New York Times recently, director Steven Spielberg answered an E.T. question he said he’d never been asked before.

A clip of the interview has gone mildly viral, featuring interviewer Rachel Abrams straight-out asking Spielberg “Was ET slimy or dry?” before suggesting that this is a decades-old conundrum that had ...