Interesting Facts & Useless Trivia
Tonight’s feature, chosen by popular demand, is The Princess Bride, directed by Rob Reiner & starring Cary Elwes (elwis), Robin Wright, Christopher Guest, Chris Serandon, Andre the Giant & Mandy Pakankin. The title came about when Acadamy Award winning writer William Goldman quizzed his daughters about what he should write about next. When one screamed “princesses” & the other “brides”, he had his title. While now regarded as a classic, this timeless fairy tale had a circuitous path to production, taking 14 years to go from book to screen with no fewer than 4 separate studios attempting to make it. Directors as diverse as John Boorman (Deliverance), Robert Redford, Norman Jewison (Moonstruck) & French director Francios Truffaut each was at one time attached to direct. Goldman, who also wrote Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid & All the President’s Men grew frustrated, bought back the rights & set out to make the film himself. At the same time Reiner, a big fan of the book, approached Goldman about directing. At the time Reiner had only directed the underrated teen rom com The Sure Thing & the as yet unreleased This is Spinal Tap. Reiner set up a screening of Spinal Tap for Goldman & his now adult daughters, who loved the film & Reiner was hired. To finance the film the duo turned to Norman Lear, the creator of TV hits Maude, Sanford & Son, & The Jeffersons & he agreed, having given Reiner his first break playing Meathead in All in the Family.
Casting created its own challenges, with Colin Firth, Danny DeVito, Richard Dreyfuss, Sting & Arnold Scwazenegger at one time attached to star. Goldman, however, insisted on Andre the Giant to play Fezzick. At 7’5” tall & weighing 525 pounds, Golden had written the part for him. Carrying all that weight & wrestling had taken its toll on him, however, & only alcohol could help with the pain, so Andre drank a lot; one day reporting that he had gotten a little tipsy the night before, having polished off 3 bottles of cognac & 12 bottle of wine. Watch the scene when buttercup drops into his arms. Andre was so debilitated that she had to be attached to wires because Andre couldn’t carry her 100 pounds. Robin Wright was the last of 500 women to audition for Buttercup & left her job on the soap opera Santa Barbara to take the part. Carry Elwes almost lost his part because he was shooting a film less than 500 miles from Chernobyl & Reiner didn’t want to visit to audition him. Peter Falk, as the grandfather, & Fred Savage, as the boy never met the rest of the cast, but had they shot a planned alternate ending that would have changed. In the scene, Buttercup, Westley, Indio & Fezzick appear on horseback below the boy’s window & beckon him to join him on their next adventure. That scene was clearly better left off the shooting schedule.
The most famous scene in the film, called “the greatest swordfight in history” took a week to shoot, but months to prepare with Cary Elwes & Mandy Patakin spending up to 8 hours a day for months to learn how to fight first left handed& then right handed. The scene was choreographed by the same team that created Darth Vader’s & Luke’s light saber scene in Empire Strikes Back.
The film was shot primarily in central England, with the castle of Florin actually the original home of William the Conqueror’s illegitimate son. Look for Ireland’s Cliff of Mohr to double as the cliffs of insanity.
When the film opened it was a critical hit, but a box office dud, based primarily on distributor 20th Century Fox’s inability to market it. was it a comedy? An adventure film? A kids movie? A swashbuckling pirate story? Only after it arrived on VHS did word of mouth start to spread about the joy in watching it & allow it to become “the modern day Wizard of Oz” while also being named the 50th funniest movie according to Bravo & the 88th most romantic movie according to the American Film Institute simultaneously. Featuring fencing, fighting, torture, revenge & a love story, here is The Princess Bride.
Tonight’s feature, chosen by popular demand, is The Princess Bride, directed by Rob Reiner & starring Cary Elwes (elwis), Robin Wright, Christopher Guest, Chris Serandon, Andre the Giant & Mandy Pakankin. The title came about when Acadamy Award winning writer William Goldman quizzed his daughters about what he should write about next. When one screamed “princesses” & the other “brides”, he had his title. While now regarded as a classic, this timeless fairy tale had a circuitous path to production, taking 14 years to go from book to screen with no fewer than 4 separate studios attempting to make it. Directors as diverse as John Boorman (Deliverance), Robert Redford, Norman Jewison (Moonstruck) & French director Francios Truffaut each was at one time attached to direct. Goldman, who also wrote Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid & All the President’s Men grew frustrated, bought back the rights & set out to make the film himself. At the same time Reiner, a big fan of the book, approached Goldman about directing. At the time Reiner had only directed the underrated teen rom com The Sure Thing & the as yet unreleased This is Spinal Tap. Reiner set up a screening of Spinal Tap for Goldman & his now adult daughters, who loved the film & Reiner was hired. To finance the film the duo turned to Norman Lear, the creator of TV hits Maude, Sanford & Son, & The Jeffersons & he agreed, having given Reiner his first break playing Meathead in All in the Family.
Casting created its own challenges, with Colin Firth, Danny DeVito, Richard Dreyfuss, Sting & Arnold Scwazenegger at one time attached to star. Goldman, however, insisted on Andre the Giant to play Fezzick. At 7’5” tall & weighing 525 pounds, Golden had written the part for him. Carrying all that weight & wrestling had taken its toll on him, however, & only alcohol could help with the pain, so Andre drank a lot; one day reporting that he had gotten a little tipsy the night before, having polished off 3 bottles of cognac & 12 bottle of wine. Watch the scene when buttercup drops into his arms. Andre was so debilitated that she had to be attached to wires because Andre couldn’t carry her 100 pounds. Robin Wright was the last of 500 women to audition for Buttercup & left her job on the soap opera Santa Barbara to take the part. Carry Elwes almost lost his part because he was shooting a film less than 500 miles from Chernobyl & Reiner didn’t want to visit to audition him. Peter Falk, as the grandfather, & Fred Savage, as the boy never met the rest of the cast, but had they shot a planned alternate ending that would have changed. In the scene, Buttercup, Westley, Indio & Fezzick appear on horseback below the boy’s window & beckon him to join him on their next adventure. That scene was clearly better left off the shooting schedule.
The most famous scene in the film, called “the greatest swordfight in history” took a week to shoot, but months to prepare with Cary Elwes & Mandy Patakin spending up to 8 hours a day for months to learn how to fight first left handed& then right handed. The scene was choreographed by the same team that created Darth Vader’s & Luke’s light saber scene in Empire Strikes Back.
The film was shot primarily in central England, with the castle of Florin actually the original home of William the Conqueror’s illegitimate son. Look for Ireland’s Cliff of Mohr to double as the cliffs of insanity.
When the film opened it was a critical hit, but a box office dud, based primarily on distributor 20th Century Fox’s inability to market it. was it a comedy? An adventure film? A kids movie? A swashbuckling pirate story? Only after it arrived on VHS did word of mouth start to spread about the joy in watching it & allow it to become “the modern day Wizard of Oz” while also being named the 50th funniest movie according to Bravo & the 88th most romantic movie according to the American Film Institute simultaneously. Featuring fencing, fighting, torture, revenge & a love story, here is The Princess Bride.
