Cleopatra

LA LIZ AND HER DICK.

"I [bold]AM[/bold] Isis! I am worshipped by MILLIONS who believe it!"

I hope the scenery was low calorie.

Well....it gave us Century City which gave us the Shubert....

The budget cost Marilyn her movie! Do you remember Marilyn's death OP?

i like this cleopatra better

Its not a movie to sit down and WATCH, dumb dumb. One puts it on, makes cocktails, irons shirts, sets one's hair, does Queen Helene Mint Julep masque, makes a snacks, eats a snack, makes cocktails, orders groceries online, orders poppers, trolls for sex, waters the window window boxes, finds a fuck for the evening, cleans out the refrigerator, washes out one's butthole, puts on a slinky outfit, smokes a joint, and before one goes out the door, takes off 1 thing and watches the camera pan out from Liz on her tomb, then one goes out the door.

Personally, I'd.....

Rex Harrison is the only one trying to act in that film. And it is a bore and so historically wrong. Watch the episodes of " Rome" about Cleo - far better- and shorter!

Isn't there a cleopatra film based on Shaw? I caught part of it once I think and was tickled by it.

Visually, Elizabeth Taylor made a great Cleopatra but the movie wasn't very good.

R7... It's like you were in the room!

Throw rugs! They had throw rugs in ancient Egypt! We learn so much from movies.

Caesar and Cleopatra, R10, starring Claude Rains and DL darling Vivien Leigh.

Wit, charm and even some history.

And there's absolutely no basis in history for the line about Cleo being worshiped as an embodiment of Isis.

Her procession into Rome is pretty good.

I prefer this one.

It's so weird watching June Allyson sing in that horrible foghorn voice and realize she got her start in musical theater.

Elizabeth's voice was horrible, she sounded like a fish hag, and the script was laughably bad. Atrocious really. IMO the best part of the movie is the first part. Rex Harrison Once he meets Cleopatra it's all downhill from there. Too bad too, because it looked good and the musical score was haunting. Roddy Macdowall made a good Octavius. I liked the very end. When he summons her and she kills herself. And he asks her servants, who are also dyng, "Was this well done of your lady?" and she says, "It is very well done." But the two or three hours in between stink. Oh. I liked the costumes. Fabulous.

R18, the legitimate theater?

Oh great Caesar! Oh great Caesar! Oh great Caesar! screech, rinse ,repeat for 3 hours.

I like the Colbert one too.

Stephen, R22?

Kiss this side of my face, R23.

The woman at R25 has a very short neck.

The woman at [R25] has a very short body and NO nose at all.

Cecil Beaton said she is very hard to photograph.

Forget the leads. My favorite actors to watch in this movie are:

Martin Landau as Rufio

Hume Cronyn as Sosigenes

After those 2, but not as much , I also like Roddy McDowell as Octavian.

Martin Landau, whose role spanned both parts of the film, claimed when the cut the original 6 hour version down to 4 hours, his best scenes were cut. Too bad. Because his was a great character.

^ I disagree, I think those Americans are out of place and look cheap.

The great William Wyler said he had to cast according to race to make his religious propaganda movie, 'Ben-Hur', seem true.

Explain please, R29.

Dear R30, the great William Wyler made his great movie, 'Ben-Hur' resonate on a deeper level by casting Brits as the evil Romans and Americans as the humble but proud Jews.

It kinda predates 'Exodus'.

Have any of you ever googled Phil Donahue Show back in the 80s...the one on Super Models….Christy Cindy etc. along with, the now crazy, Beverly Johnson. Johnson was stunningly beautiful and knew it...the men in the audience were taken aback at the beautiful woman of color and Donahue was almost smitten when interviewing her, and the TV took delight in capturing these reactions...all of that to say, SHE is more closely what Cleopatra looked like...beautiful woman of color, onyx eyes and probably mixed race/middle eastern and some African...but certainly not from Sweden or Europe! I'm not demonizing Liz or Colbert, just calling this to your attention in the age of Rosanne!

R14 Vivien's 'Cleopatra' needs to be cut down to 60 minutes. Shaw's jokes aren't funny.

The Mankiewicz 'Cleopatra' needs to be cut down to 90 minutes. How come Mankiewicz could make the clever 'Eve' and 'Suddenly' but get so lost in this thing and that Volpone[?] thing with Rex and Maggie?

R32, Cleopatra was a Ptolemy. They were a Macedonian dynasty from the Balkans (Greece and modern day “Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”). They married their own siblings to keep their line free of outside blood. Thus, I doubt there’s was much intermarriage to make her Middle Eastern or African looking.

Liz looks fat in it.

R35 = Richard Burton

Didn't they cast Stephen Boyd for the role of Marc Antony originally? And there were so many delays and problems he finally bailed?

R37 Yes they did, and you see the rushes via Google.

R33 That insufferable, studio-bound Mankiewicz talk-fest was an updated version 'Volpone'—

R38, Susan Hayward, Capucine, AND Maggie Smith in one film? That’s DL nirvana. Why isn’t this film better known on here?

You would have gotten more for your time and money with Miss Cleo.

The Colbert film is honestly quite sexy.

Henry Wilcoxon as Marc Antony is incredibly hot.

Behind the scenes

[quote]How come Mankiewicz could make the clever 'Eve' and 'Suddenly' but get so lost in this thing and that Volpone[?] thing with Rex and Maggie?

All About Eve and Suddenly, Last Summer were small-budgeted pictures, shot mostly on soundstages, featuring mostly professional actors, acting around tight, finished scripts. Mank inherited Cleopatra after Rouben Mamoulian was fired, and after a prolonged delay due to Miss Taylor's near death from pneumonia. The script was a rambling mess, and Mank begged Darryl Zanuck for time off to do proper rewrites. But Zanuck wanted to get the picture done right away so that he could release it and recoup his losses. Mank also intended to release Cleopatra in two parts, at 3 hours a piece, with Burton making his appearance in the 2nd part. However, Zanuck wanted to make bank off of the Burton-Taylor hullabaloo and didn't want audience to wait until the 2nd part to see Liz and Dick together, so he had the film edited down to 3 hours, thereby cutting lots of crucial exposition. Also, the two spoiled lovers acted like such primadonnas, taking off on retreat whenever they felt like it, further delaying the production. It was a big mess, and Mank was deep in the middle of it.

Since for all intents and purposes, Elizabeth Taylor was an American, then she must also have been out of place and cheap too.

R44 She was. She sounds like a fishwife.

R43 It Mankiewicz were alive today he'd demand a Director's Cut.

During Liz and Dick's interminable delays Zanuck cannily redeployed Roddy into the role he was born to play. An American Ranger on D-Day.

The film began shooting in London in 1959 starring Joan Collins. The screentests and early rushes are available on youtube. There was a huge fire that destroyed the sets and costumes so everything had to start over from the beginning. In the interim, Fox decided to film it as an A list production rather than the B list production originally intended with a different cast since most of the original cast was no longer available. There were additional delays when Taylor's bout with pneumonia almost killed her. resulting in her tracheotomy scar and production had to be shifted from London to Rome. And the scandal from the various adulteries of the new principal cast.

Joseph Mankiewicz, brought in to replace original director Rouben Mamoulian and rewrite the screenplay, intended the film to be in two three hour plus parts. Fox cut it to less than four hours as one film and later to under three hours and discarded the unused footage. By all accounts the film worked much better in Mank's original cut. The cut footage is among most film collectors most sought after items but appears to be lost.

The film cost so much in the end that only the huge profits from the studio's next major release, The Sound of Music, saved the studio from bankruptcy. Cleopatra eventually recouped years later after re-releases and TV rights sales. Home video sales then produced profits, decades later.

Liz and Dick. Without notifying production, the adulterous pair spirited away from Rome for an Easter weekend tryst in Porto Santo Stefano in Tuscany. However, by Sunday, Taylor abruptly left Porto Santo Stefano solo and checked into the Salvador Mundi Hospital in Rome. The old standbys of "exhaustion" and "food poisoning" were given as the reasons, but the truth was Dick had given Liz two black eyes and a broken nose. It took 22 days for Taylor to heal and look well enough to resume filming.

The costly delays left Fox nearly bankrupt and the studio ended up firing most of their contract players, including, ironically, Joan Collins, and rapidly fading sexpot Jayne Mansfield. Jayne was off in Italy filming "Panic Button" with Maurice Chevalier when she got word of her firing, and it sent her in a tailspin of booze and wanton affairs.

Jayne's studio-mate, Marilyn Monroe, meanwhile was being pressured by Fox to quickly wrap up production on "Something's Got to Give" so that a quick release would net the studio much-needed income. Alas, poor Marilyn was either too ill or uncooperative, and was fired. A Fox insider claimed, "We can't afford her and Cleopatra too!"

[quote] Jayne's studio-mate, Marilyn Monroe, meanwhile was being pressured by Fox to quickly wrap up production on "Something's Got to Give" so that a quick release would net the studio much-needed income. Alas, poor Marilyn was either too ill or uncooperative, and was fired. A Fox insider claimed, "We can't afford her and Cleopatra too!"

That sounds about right, r48.

And Elizabeth had chili flown in from Chasen's . . . I love the score by Alex North--it's perfect for long road trips!

Elizabeth's entrance into Rome in 70mm Todd-AO is among the most wonderful things ever committed to film. Seriously!

Cleopatra, one of the most insufferably boring, overblown epics of all time that would've been much better if it hadn't hired an editor who was in love with every second of every frame that was shot. I always LOL at that scene when the dead body is thrown over the fence; the movie actually shows Cleopatra, her attendants and Caesar exiting the scene.

Richard Burton was his usual hammy, screaming self.

Liz Taylor was completely miscast. Cleopatra by all accounts was a very intelligent, ambitious and cunning woman. Taylor acted like a dumb, immature schoolgirl trying to sound grown up. I think Joan Collins would've made a much better Cleopatra. No, she wouldn't have been Oscar material but she would've been a better fit.

BTW, 50 posts and not one mention of Archie Bunker?

That's the one. Ftatateeta was a hoot! Thanks r14

How can anyone look at that minute of footage of Joan Collins as Cleopatra and think she's be a better fit for......anything?

The only effective parts of the movie are the scenes with Rex Harrison. This is because Caesar is the kind of worldly, amused character that Joseph L. Mankiewicz understood. Great lovers and wild passions? No. Not in his wheelhouse.

The thought of six hours of this sluggish hoopla is too stupefying to contemplate.

In the documentary included with the Dvd ("Cleopatra: the Film that Changed Hollywood") the narrator states that after Elizabeth Taylor saw the London premiere of this movie, she went immediately to the restroom and vomited.

R47 Joan Collins was more beautiful than Liz and would have made a better Cleo.

^ No, Vivien was more beautiful!

In the early 1970's I used to go to the Hollywood YMCA. Many of the older members who went there had been involved in the film industry dating back to the 1930's ( Lawrence Tierney was my fav.) I got to know this elderly man who had worked as an extra forever. He also looked like Rex Harrison. Turns out he was Harrisons stand-in during the filming of Cleo. in Italy and USA. Tales of drugs, sex and debauchery on set and off. Years later i went to Madrid to be with a lover who was an Amer, actor working on a Spaghetti Western. I ended up staying for two years. We lived in this tightly knit colony of expat American actors who went to Rome for Cleo. Discovered they could get more work in Europe and remained (playing Amer. Gangsters and cowboys in Euro. pics}.

[quote]How can anyone look at that minute of footage of Joan Collins as Cleopatra and think she's be a better fit for......anything?

I didn't look at one minute of footage. I remembered that she played one of the most iconic TV villains of all time, Alexis Carrington. You remember Alexis Carrington, who was the scheming villainess on Dynasty?Oh, wait. Never mind. Millennials aren't aware of anything that happened before 2010. My bad.

If only Angelina could have made her Cleopatra, with Brad as Antony. And she would have directed, of course. I can see it now: updated to the 70s...the hair....the makeup...the slowness of it all.

R56, I thought Liz vomited after seeing "Butterfield 8".

W&W for r7.

Or was it the Chasen's chili? Rumor has it that Elizabeth Taylor, while on location in Rome in 1962, wrote the following note to Dave Chasen, owner of Chasen’s Restaurant: “The chili is so good. All gone now. Please send me ten quarts of your wonderful chili in dry ice to 448 Via Appia pignatelli. – Love and kisses, Elizabeth Taylor.”

To [R19]: Those final lines are quoted directly from Plutarch, one of the few vaguely contemporary chroniclers of Cleopatra.

[quote] The only effective parts of the movie are the scenes with Rex Harrison.

I agree the film petty much dies with Caesar. Landau, McDowell, and Michael Horden were excellent. But subtract Dick and Liz and it's a fine movie. And MAYBE John Doucette isn't the strongest choice to play an Egyptian general.

Are any of you acquainted with the best-selling novel BEAUTIFUL RUINS by Jess Walter?

It's quite a funny book about an actress who played one of Cleopatra's handmaidens in the Taylor film and has a secret affair with Burton during his affair with Liz. It's about a lot of other stuff, too, and well worth reading. It's being made into a film though I have no idea what state of pre-production it's in now.

In a DL thread a few months ago I was introduced to the BBC series The Cleopatras - about the 7 queens in succession who shared the same name. It's on Youtube and quite entertaining in parts. I liked the pharaoh who was called Fluter - pictured on the left.

She was the last of the Ptolemys. They should have taken better care. I wish someone would do justice to Cleopatra and to Alexander. The shiteous bilge that we have is truly unworthy of two important figures from ancient history.

Honestly, I think with Cleopatra I could have loved that movie had it not been for Elizabeth. She ruined it for me.

R69 Who would you have cast in Elizabeth's place?

Honestly? I don't know. Maybe Sophia Loren? Or maybe some foreign actress. Someone classically trained who could hold their own against Rex Harrison or Richard Burton. There were a lot of beautiful accomplished actresses out there if you were willing to reach a bigger world instead of the narrow world of Hollywood.

OK. At least someone ethnic, not necessarily someone with this unfortunate nose...

OMG. Cleo looked like LAdy Gaga!!!!!

Did she really wear a halter dress, as pictured??

"What You Gonna Do, Boy?" by Cleopatra is on the October 1999 GapKids In-Store Playlist!

[quote] OMG. Cleo looked like LAdy Gaga!!!!!

And we know Gaga has a very nice asp.

Maybe so, R33, but it's still more fun than the Taylor/Mankiewicz version.

[quote]Taylor acted like a dumb, immature schoolgirl trying to sound grown up.

In other words, R52, the same way as always. And, no, Collins would not have been an improvement. The Lands of the Pharaohs is proof of that.

I want to see the Colbert version, though.

Aw kids, let an old pro show ya how it's done!

R70 Vivian Leigh would have been great but she was to old by the time they made this film so I would probably also concur with Sophia Loren, especially if she looked like she did in “El CID”. Another person that would have fun to see as Cleopatra but again was to old by then would have been Hedy Lamarr-I know she was a poor actress but her beauty and seductive nature of would have been fun to see in that role.

R79 I personally think Loren has an ugly mouth but I agree she was the most likely star for this big movie at that time.

This seems relevant.

Rumored Rivals Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor Actually Shared a Surprising Connection Aug 5, 2018 10:00 am By Closer Staff

They were two of the biggest female sex symbols of the 50s and early 60s, but Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor didn't consider each other competitors. "In many ways [they] were pitted against each other by the press," Charles Casillo writes in his new book, Marilyn Monroe: The Private Life of a Public Icon. "In reality, they barely knew each other, and the two had no animosity toward each other."

Quite the opposite! Casillo writes of an incident in 1962, when 20th Century Fox was bleeding money on Liz's over-budgeted extravaganza Cleopatra. The studio simultaneously fired Marilyn for alleged absences from the set of her never-completed final film, the aptly titled Something's Gotta Give.

Marilyn felt she was being sacrificed so Fox could save on her salary and spend it on finishing the bloated Egyptian epic. Two decades later, Liz revealed to a friend that she had reached out to Marilyn to offer her support during this difficult period.

"Liz told Marilyn she was willing to publicly demonstrate her solidarity," Casillo says, offering to quit Cleopatra unless Marilyn was rehired. "Marilyn was very moved by Liz's kindness toward her, but she didn't want to make matters worse for either of them," so she declined the generous offer.

Instead, Liz gave Marilyn an invaluable piece of advice. "No matter what they write about me, Marilyn, I never deny it," Casillo quotes Liz as saying. "I never confirm it. I just keep smiling and walking forward. You do the same." Tragically, Marilyn didn't live long enough to put those words into action.

R79, been there, done that.