Cleopatra
is the movie that nearly destroyed 20th Century-Fox. About
everything that could go wrong during production went wrong. The script kept
getting rewritten. Actors and actresses were replaced. Monumental salaries kept
getting bigger even as production scheduling dragged on. Elizabeth Taylor and
Richard Burton’s relationship developed from a mere movie relationship into an
epic in its own right. Elizabeth Taylor became deathly ill and had to be
hospitalized. A new director was brought in. Several factors led to a new shooting
location, and with scenes incomplete, this meant the huge sets and props had to
be completely and perfectly reconstructed there. The new director,
Joseph Mankiewicz, tried to convince the studio that their story was huge, and
they had more than enough material to produce two films, Caesar and Cleopatra
and Anthony and Cleopatra. The studio, however, was well into financial crisis
by then and wanted to take advantage of the public’s infatuation with Taylor
and Burton’s romance. So they pushed for the story to remain one single film.
As a result, the final editing was brutal and removed large sections that would
have made for a truly compelling story. Taylor was not pleased and said that
they gutted key scenes from the film and kept war scenes to placate the
audience. Watching Cleopatra, you
can feel how Mankiewicz was right: Cleopatra
should have been two films. Cleopatra
is still a wonderful spectacle, but as daring and ambitious as it was, it would
be the last in a long series of movie epics. The likes of it would not be seen
again until the advent of CGI would allow grand shots on a reasonable budget.
