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AN ACCOUNT OF THE VAGARIES OF PRODUCTION
Capricious 'Cleopatra' Why She Will Go On
Nothing Las Vegas offers at its famed gaming tables compares to the gamble of film production. Sometimes the dice come up a sweet, easy seven; sometimes they roll to a "joe", and it has to be made "the hard way". Of course, the rewards can be giddy, which accounts for the willingness of movie entrepreneurs to lay millions on the line and risk the hazards.
For a prime example of the big movie gamble in action, witness the current case of 20th Century-Fox and its "Cleopatra". As every newspaper reader in the U. S. and beyond is aware, this multi-million dollar cinematic venture has been stymied by the strange infection that incapacitated Elizabeth Taylor, its beauteous star, inducing a king-size headache for 20th's dynamic president, Spyros P. Skouras, and causing producer Walter Wanger and director Rouben Mamoulian to suffer the tortures of the damned.
The movie queen has departed the London site of production for a recuperative vacation in sunny Palm Springs, leaving behind and unanswered the question of the ultimate fate of "Cleopatra". While insurance policies cover the reported two and one-half million dollars already invested in the production, there is no coverage on the vast amount of dreaming and hoping and planning, not to mention mental anguish, that was poured into the idea before it was actually put on the drawing boards. Nor is there insurance on the potential profits, which promise to be big, very big.
The vagaries of movie making are nothing new, especially in this day. Against the spectacular backdrop of soaring budgets, the tremendous cost involved in pre-production activities
looms large and, quite often, forbid ding to the prospective film producer. Planning a motion picture from its property stages; translating it into a screenplay; choosing locations, and, constructing sets — all these increasingly expensive items are entered on the picture's ledger during its earliest, most uncertain stages, before one camera has begun grinding out a celluloid record of the plot. Today, the risks are greater, perhaps because usually producers are working, not with studiocontrolled rosters of stars, directors and writers, but with independent, freelance talent that is available for a specified period of time.
A multitude of ifs beset any important production: a storyline suddenly may disenchant a previously eager production chief; titles or plots may conflict with those of other companies; producer may conflict with director, or both with the star on how the material should be handled; pressure groups may voice their displeasure with the tone or content of the movie, possibly making production of the film, from a technical standpoint, more difficult, and, most important of all, talent — producer, director or even star — may, for any number of reasons, suddenly become unavailable.
Some films have become bogged down in the early stages — after great amounts of money had been spent — and never left the ground. Others have overcome numerous planning difficulties and gone on to great financial success. Properties like "Ben-Hur" and "Spartacus" stand out as destined for greatness from the very first, for all the grief and tears poured into them.
Spyros Skouras and his associates at 20th-Fox believe they have just such a
Miss Taylor's stand-in nestles snugly against huge Egypt ar I on that dom nates one of the corridors on palace set
picture in "Cleopatra".
Two years of intensive planning and one month of shooting in London had gone into "Cleopatra" before Miss Taylor was struck down. (Scenes also will be shot in Alexandria and other sites along the Nile River in Egypt, with Andrew Marton, who worked on special sequences in "Cone With the Wind", and handled the famous chariot race in "Ben-Hur", slated to direct the sea battle scenes.) Initial shooting has been centered at the Pinewood Studios, where Liz, Stephen Boyd and Peter Finch will be working largely on the mammoth set reproduction of Cleopatra's royal palace at Alexandria. That single setting occupies eight-anda-half sprawling acres — the largest set ever built at the British Pinewood studio. That, however, is not all there is to the filming of the spectacle. The company also is working on 72 sets at the Shepperton and Elstree Studios, marking the first time that a single production has required the facilities of two studios.
According to the present schedule, "Cleopatra" will be before the cameras about seven months. Once Liz returns to work, little time will be wasted, since Wanger and Mamoulian expect to have it filmed, cut, edited and musical!) scored in time for its world premiere in New York next summer.
To those who ask, "Is 'Cleopatra' on or off?", the 20th Century-Fox peoplepull out photos of the enormous sets erected at Pinewood and ask: "Does this look like we re thinking of giving up the picture?"
For a long, long time Spyros Skouras has nurtured the dream of filming the intriguing tale of the Egyptian temptress who enticed some of history's mightiest men into her boudoir and into her evil machinations. It's a dream he has no intention of relinquishing, even should the ancient Nile again overflow its banks.
Film 8ULLETIN November 28. 1940 Page 23