Episode 16: Cleopatra, the 1963 Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton Version

Holy sh%t you guys. Rena and Sara dive into this colossal fiasco of a motion picture and come dangerously close to anhedonia as they stare into the void for four boring hours. Get on board for a lengthy history lesson about one of the film industry’s greatest cautionary tales. How did everyone involved do so little with so much? Was Richard Burton’s Roomba charging station filled with whiskey? How long was Cleopatra standing expectantly at the top of that giant plastic Sphinx?

The ridiculous props, excessive premature use of marble, Joe Mankiewicz’s gift for creating job security, the chaos of Burton and Taylor’s love affair, and Rex Harrison’s dark personal history come up as Sara and Rena wander through this dull as dirt abyss of excess.

Cleopatra stars Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra, Richard Burton as Mark Anthony, Rex Harrison as Caesar, Roddy McDowall as Octavian, and Martin Landau as Rufio.   

Sources: 

The Cleopatras: The Forgotten Queens of Egypt by Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones

Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff

Richard Burton: Prince of Players by Michael Munn

Fiasco: A History of Hollywood’s Iconic Flops by James Robert Parish 

The Worst Movies of All Time by Michael Sauter

The Studio by John Gregory Dunne 

Pictures at a Revolution by Mark Harris 

My Life with Cleopatra: The Making of a Hollywood Classic by Walter Wanger

Furious Love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, and the Marriage of the Century by Sam Kashner and Nancy Shoenberger 

CaroleLandis.net 

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/1998/03/elizabeth-taylor-199803

https://frockflicks.com/cleopatra-1963/

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/jul/15/how-we-made-cleopatra

Promised link to the first episode of the BBC’s The Cleopatras, a more entertaining rendition of this story that will take up only 45 minutes of your time. This thing is bonkers.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x35sa5m

Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.

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