By today’s standards, it cost over $300 million and you can see that in almost every shot of the historical drama Cleopatra. In 1963, the legendary large-scale project about the Egyptian ruler and her Roman lover was considered the most expensive American film of all time. But the headlines didn’t stop there.
The epic length of filming involved multiple directors, numerous script revisions and hospitalizations by lead actress Elizabeth Taylor. Today you can see for yourself on television whether the nerve-wracking production drama of the more than 230-minute film paid off in terms of quality.
Cleopatra took Elizabeth Taylor to the hospital (and into the arms of her great love)
In 1960, filming began on the long-planned major project in cold, damp England, initially directed by Rouben Mamoulian (spoiler: he dropped out a year later). The Cleopatra actress endowed with enormous influence and profit sharing Elizabeth Taylor contracted meningitis, was hospitalized and there was a first break in filming, which was to last for almost three years. A few months later, Taylor was on the sick bed with pneumonia for the second time, when Joseph L. Mankiewicz (All About Eve) had already been hired to direct.
20th Century Pictures
Cleopatra
After that, the epic set in Rome and Alexandria appropriately moved to the Italian Cinecittà studios, but Cleopatra stayed in the conversation. Elizabeth Taylor and Mark Antony actor Richard Burton fell in love, which would later result in 2 marriages and 2 divorces. The shooting, however, was marked by chaos, constantly changing script drafts and threatened dismissals (even of the leading actress).
The studio Fox was teetering on the brink of ruin from the growing cost of stars, crowd scenes and gigantic sets. Anyone who sees the replica Roman Forum, huge ships and ports built out of the ground will have an idea of why the film had a budget of 31 million dollars at the time.
What is the historical epic about now?
In 48 BC, the Roman ruler Gaius Julius Caesar (Rex Harrison) meets Cleopatra, who is involved in a civil war. With his help, she soon rules over Egypt. Caesar and Cleopatra marry, but the intrigues and conspiracies against the power-hungry “dictator for life” also cast their shadow over the pharaoh. After Caesar’s assassination, a power struggle begins for the future of Rome, in which Marcus Antonius, out of love, sides with the Egyptian woman and her son, who was conceived with Caesar.
Is Cleopatra worth it?
The miracle happened three years after the first take. Cleopatra was formed into a coherent and thoroughly entertaining film that was released in cinemas and was even in the black.
Cleopatra cannot compete with the greats of monumental film (e.g. the Soviet war and peace, Spartacus, Ben Hur or Gone with the Wind, which also tells a tragic love story). But the Shakespearean light drama about the pharaoh, Caesar and Mark Antony offers enough personal drama, twists of fate and star power to bring the intimidating crowd scenes to life.
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