After battling a competing production featuring Yul Brynner, Spartacus became a passion project for Kirk Douglas that rapidly transformed into a disaster. Throughout filming that ran drastically over schedule and budget, actor Tony Curtis allegedly told co-star Jean Simmons, “Who do I have to f— to get off this film?” Douglas himself spearheaded the project’s creation, driven by his frustration over missing out on Ben-Hur to Charlton Heston.
Determined to secure his own Roman epic, he brought Howard Fast’s novel to Universal and served as executive producer. Douglas’ confrontations with Fast marked just the beginning of a turbulent production, with the writer dismissing the actor as an “exhibitionist stuntman.”
The 1960 film ultimately cost over $12million against a $5million budget, exceeding the entire value of Universal Studios at that time (the studio was subsequently sold to MCA for just over $11million. ) More than 50,000 extras participated, including 8,800 actual Spanish soldiers.
The cast members feuded with one another (especially Laurence Olivier and Charles Laughton), Kubrick battled with Douglas along with his writers and cinematographer. John Wayne and the conservative National Legion of Decency condemned the movie as ‘Marxist propaganda’ and subsequently protested its release – mainly because blacklisted screenwriter and suspected Communist-sympathizer Dalton Trumbo received official credit for his script work.
In the sweltering heat of Spain, tensions flared between Douglas and his director after filming a particularly intense scene for Spartacus, reports the Express.
Spartacus is an iconic film that tells the story of a Roman slave who led a rebellion against the Empire. The most memorable scene is the “I am Spartacus” moment where all his fellow captured revolutionaries refuse to reveal his identity, choosing to sacrifice themselves instead.
Douglas and Trumbo were fond of the scene, but Kubrick, known for frequently revising the screenwriter’s work daily, dismissed it as “a stupid idea.”
This led to a heated confrontation on set, with Douglas ultimately having his way.
The pair would publicly butt heads even more dramatically over another pivotal scene. It began innocently enough with a seemingly harmless, albeit extremely uncomfortable prank during the preparation for Spartacus’ crucifixion scene.
Simmons reminisced, “I remember a long, long day of filming and it took forever to get Kirk Douglas up on his cross. We played a terrible joke. As soon as he was safely installed the assistant director called lunch and left him up there.
“He could have had the lot of us fired, but he was very good about it. You have to have a sense of humor in this industry.”
However, Douglas found absolutely nothing funny when he witnessed what Kubrick had accomplished with the footage. He later remembered that the filmmaker initially eliminated all close-up shots of his lengthy, agonizing and grueling performance on the cross.
Work that the performer was especially proud of.
Douglas confessed that, in a furious outburst, he grabbed a folding chair from the set and threatened to hit Kubrick with it unless he restored the close-ups. The completed film, naturally, contains many.
Shortly before his 100th birthday in December 2016, Douglas declared: “He was a b——! But he was a talented, talented guy.
“Difficult? He invented the word, but he was talented. So, we had lots of fights, but I always appreciated his talent.”
Though Kubrick’s dissatisfaction with his absence of desired complete authority over the production led him to disown it, the picture became the largest box office hit of 1960 in North America and ultimately earned $60million.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.the-express.com ’
