i want you to hit me as hard as you can...
Are you not entertained? Are you not entertained? Why yes as a matter of fact we were entertained,
Maximus Decimus Meridius. My name is gladiator. Okay we can do that, Gladiator. Makes sense,
it's the title of the movie: Gladiator! But although Ridley Scott's historical epic ended up
an award-winning, crowd-pleasing success, battling through the difficult production was harder than
wrangling tigers. Get your thumbs ready and find out what the [ __ ] happened to this movie!
By the 1990s the swords and sandal movie genre had fallen out of favor in Hollywood
but the story behind Gladiator started long before that. While on a motorcycle tour around
the world during the 1970s David Franzoni had been inspired by the ancient coliseums he saw.
Around this time he was also introduced to Daniel Mannix's book Those About To Die,
detailing the sadistic spectacle of the Roman games.
The idea stuck with Franzoni and years later when he was a screenwriter working for Dreamworks on
Steven Spielberg's slavery drama Amistad, the script for Gladiator came to life.
Franzoni was intrigued by the connection between the Roman era of worshiped arena heroes and modern
day sports celebrities, and he successfully used that in his pitch to get approval from Dreamworks.
Putting the period on screen certainly wouldn't be cheap but the parallels of stadiums filled
with obsessive fans felt timely enough that the producers considered it worth the financial risk.
Dreamworks producer Walter Parkes convinced Ridley Scott to direct the movie in the simplest way
imaginable - he showed him one image of Jean-Leon Gerome's famous 19th century painting Pollice
Verso, depicting an armored gladiator seeking a final decision from the crowd and emperor.
Scott immediately committed to the project without even hearing what the story was about.
Thanks for watching Joblo videos, if you enjoy our shows please like and subscribe and click
the bell to be notified when new videos go live. Now back to the show! For the movie's lead role
Mel Gibson was approached but at age 43 he felt he was too old for the part.
Antonio Banderas and Tom Sizemore were also considered. Russell Crowe had made an impression
on Hollywood thanks to his fierce performance in LA Confidential but he was hesitant about taking
on such a physical role - at the time he was 40 pounds overweight to portray whistleblower Jeffrey
Wigand in The Insider and he could not envision himself as a muscular Roman general. He also had
not connected with the script which he described as "substantially underdone." But Parkes persuaded
him with the prospect of working with Ridley Scott on a big-budget movie. Crowe was further urged by
his Insider director Michael Mann who had actually passed on directing Gladiator himself. Crowe got
into arena condition the old-fashioned way: by working on his farm in Australia. To play Maximus,
often referred to as the Spaniard, Crowe had wanted to employ a Spanish accent which he modeled
ironically on Antonio Banderas, but Scott was not convinced by the attempt and also wanted to
maintain consistency with the other screen Romans to avoid audience distraction. For the other major
roles Jude Law was in contention to play Commodus but Scott was determined to have Joaquin Phoenix
play the twitchy temperamental tyrant. Jennifer Lopez auditioned to play his sister Lucilla,
which ultimately went to Connie Nielsen. Richard Harris was considered for the part of gladiator
owner Proximo, which instead went to Oliver Reed. Crowe had wanted his Insider co-star Christopher
Plummer to play emperor Marcus Aurelius, which ended up going to Harris. Peter O'Toole had
passed on the part of senator Gracchus, and Scott filled the robes with Derek Jacobi.
Djimon Hounsou would play Maximus friend and fellow enslaved fighter Juba. Scott would draw
influence from period classics like Spartacus, The Fall of the Roman Empire and Fellini's Satyricon.
As pre-production began and storyboards were developed it became clear that replicating the
necessary scope was going to be expensive and logistically complex - as Walter Parkes said,
"we committed to do the movie with very little evidence we could do the movie."
When Scott visited the real coliseum in Rome he actually thought it was too small
for his vision - he wanted to present what he called a "Rome of the imagination"
inspired by artistic depictions of the city and arena games. But he also strived to
balance a sense of realism and hoped audiences would feel they had watched a documentary.
In addition to the impressive sets the film would ultimately require ten thousand costumes
including fifteen hundred suits of armor and all the necessary weapons used by the gladiators. But
the script would be a primary source of headaches throughout the entire production - Franzoni's
original draft followed an athlete named Narcissus, loosely based on an actual historical
figure who trained and later assassinated emperor Commodus. Scott and Crowe both loved the broad
strokes of a military commander forced into slavery as a coliseum combatant but they thought
there was huge gaps in the narrative. Crowe also demanded a name change for his character:
my name is Maximus Decimus Meridius. John Logan, a playwright who had also done Oliver Stone's
Any Given Sunday, was brought in to rewrite the script. Logan would add some depth and nuance to
the characters and also established the catalyst for Maximus's journey by killing off his family.
But even that didn't solve the problems. A table read with the cast just two weeks before principal
photography was a disaster. Writer William Nicholson was brought in for what was meant
to be a quick rewrite. He would end up working on the movie until cameras finally stopped rolling.
Filming began in January 1999. To achieve the wide scale fiery carnage for the opening battle
sequence with the Roman army unleashing hell on Germanic tribes, the production went to Bourne
Woods in England, which conveniently had been marked for deforestation by the royal forestry
commission. so all that combustion and destruction served a positive purpose. All the equipment used
by the Roman army was built practically and fully functional including catapults, scorpions and
20000 arrows. Scott also wanted snow for the scene and somehow the weather fortunately complied,
although the resulting mud and slush added yet another layer of complication to the shoot.
Still despite the conditions and the complexity of costuming and coordinating hundreds of extras,
this portion of the shoot was wrapped in three weeks. The production then moved to Morocco
where an actual arena was constructed right beside an existing village. Shooting the script
chronologically proved challenging because it was constantly changing. Scott embraced a spirit of
collaboration with his actors, partly out of necessity - they would each contribute ideas
and moments for their characters, and Scott and Crowe would convene with the writers each
evening to make changes, which would be sent for overnight approval to Parkes back in Hollywood.
That convoluted process didn't necessarily provide adequate results - for example Crowe had ad-libbed
describing his home to Marcus Aurelius using details of his own home in Australia.
Maximus's encouraging phrase strength and honor
was repurposed from crow's school motto. Crowe was even initially reluctant to say what would become
one of the movie's iconic lines as he thought it sounded silly: "and i will have my vengeance
in this life or the next." Even the final fate of Maximus was determined during the course
of filming - the character did not die in the original script, but it was eventually determined
that Maximus's true objective was to meet his wife in the afterlife. Or as Crow bluntly put it,
"What else is he going to do, run a [ __ ] pizzeria by the coliseum?"
We all know that Crowe gained a reputation for volatility and Gladiator may be the origin. He
was deeply committed to the project and his ongoing frustration with the
lack of a viable script was evident, and he would often lash out or storm off the set.
He later admitted it was his first experience entering production without a complete script.
Crowe was also known for hard drinking and brawling with local villagers.
The owner of his rented villa in Morocco claimed that the actor's behavior
"violated every tenet of the Quran." A Dreamworks executive said that Ridley Scott was "the
voice of reason dealing with many unreasonable factors, not the least of which was his lead."
Crowe developed a close friendship with Richard Harris during the production but the same could
not be said of Oliver Reed despite their chemistry on screen. Crowe would later say "i don't know
where his demons came from but he definitely took against me from our very first reading, it's just
the way it goes sometimes." Joaquin Phoenix was often anxious about performing in his first big
budget movie. Before shooting a confrontational scene with Maximus he had asked his screen rival
to psych him up by smacking him around. Crowe was uncomfortable with this method so instead he and
Richard Harris helped calm Phoenix's nerves by getting together and downing a few pints.
After Morocco the production headed to Malta where the massive Rome sets were built, although the
ongoing script modifications meant the production designers were constantly scrambling to dress
sets for new or altered scenes. One side of the coliseum was constructed, including retractable
fabric awnings to cast shade. Scott would use reverse angles and post-production CGI
assistance to expand the scale of the arena. The first day filming with 3000 Maltese extras
had an unexpected complication: when shooting had wrapped for the day the production team was nearly
stampeded by the extras all simultaneously rushing to change clothes and get paid.
Subsequent shooting days needed to employ stadium security to release the extras by sections.
Even for such a costly production the fluidity of the script meant the cast and filmmakers
had to be nimble and constant problem solving was necessary. During one of Maximus's early contests
Crowe had suggested decapitating his foe as a final strike, so Scott had the effects department
repurpose ahead intended for another scene. When Maximus returns home to find his murdered family
in what Crowe vividly describes as a "full snot performance," he wanted to break down in front of
his crucified wife. But only the legs had been fabricated so Crowe worked with what he had.
When Maximus removes his helmet to face Commodus. Crowe's hair refused to lay down on every take
so Scott simply pushed into a close-up to eliminate the distraction.
The famous sequence with ferocious tigers would also be one of the most complicated parts of
the movie. Tigers are heavy, fast and generally unpredictable. As animal wrangler Paul Reynolds
put it, "tigers don't act, they are." In other words if they look angry it's because they are
angry. Scott had fully storyboarded the sequence but because of the animals' uncooperative nature
getting the necessary footage took weeks. Editor Pietro Scalia would assemble a cut of the scene
each night to determine what bits were still needed. But Scott had been reluctant to use
expensive digital shots and the entire sequence was ultimately accomplished with very little
digital assistance. Although safety was a priority the actors were still dangerously close to the
tigers - in one moment of misjudged distance a tiger swipe only missed Crowe by inches.
As precarious as that was, Maximus nearly faced an even larger foe:
Scott had originally wanted a scene where the gladiator has to battle a raging rhinoceros.
Although the sequence was storyboarded an animal could not be appropriately trained and
animatronics or convincing CGI would have been expensive and may not meet intentions.
Speaking of unpredictable performers, Oliver Reed had an established notoriety for heavy drinking
and rowdy behavior. In fact, Ridley Scott referred to Reed, Harris, Jacobi and David Hemmings as "the
four horsemen of the apocalypse." But Reed had promised Scott that he wouldn't touch a drop of
alcohol during the day's filming as long as nights and weekends remained his own, and he stayed true
to his word. But one Sunday morning three weeks before principal photography was completed, Reed
was getting an early start at a pub when he died suddenly from a heart attack. This tragic loss
also created a major production problem. Insurance would cover reshooting all of Reed's scenes
but that prospect was a logistical nightmare and everyone involved had been inspired by his
performance and wanted to honor the actor. Using extra footage, a body double and some digital
trickery, Oliver Reed was effectively resurrected to complete his final performance. His planned
scene at the end was instead given to Djimon Hounsou's Juba, which made sense thematically
as the character had organically become closest to Maximus during the evolution of the script.
Through all the pressure, tragedy, frustration, danger and complications, the film finally came
together. At an eventual cost of $103 million for a story in an unfashionable genre, it
also presented considerable risk. At that time a budget crossing 100 million was mostly unheard of
in Hollywood, with rare exceptions like Titanic, Armageddon and the notorious Waterworld. And while
Ridley Scott was a respected director, most of his 90s output was overpriced and had underperformed.
There had even been studio discussion of somehow trimming the movie to avoid an R rating.
But when Gladiator opened in May of 2000 it was a runaway box office success,
ultimately collecting 460 million dollars worldwide. The majority of critics cheered
the blend of period drama and visceral spectacle. That praise extended to the academy awards with
the movie earning a dozen nominations and taking five Oscars including costume design,
best picture and a statue for star Russell Crowe, launching him onto the Hollywood A-list. Perhaps
unsurprisingly its accomplishments revived a genre that was practically extinct. A wave
of similar expensive historical epics followed, including more efforts from Ridley Scott himself,
but while there were some exceptions not many would achieve the same levels of success or
acclaim as Gladiator. A sequel was long discussed somehow, but has yet to materialize.
Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott would reunite four more times and the actors seemed to grow
more accustomed to a loose production process, once joking to his director "one of these days
we should actually do a film where we know what we're going to do before we start."
More than two decades later their first collaboration has demonstrated its lasting power.
The ambitious and expensive gamble paid off and while Gladiator was driven by the vision and
confidence of its director, the sum was greater than the parts. As Crowe told Empire magazine,
"there were a lot of bullets heading our way but by sticking together - one of the
fundamentals of Maximus's beliefs as a general - we dodged those bullets.
Every single [ __ ] one of them." Or in the words of Maximus: what we do in life, echoes in eternity
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