Man of La Mancha (film)

Cervantes and his manservant have been imprisoned by the Spanish Inquisition, and a manuscript by Cervantes is seized by his fellow inmates, who subject him to a mock trial in order to determine whether the manuscript should be returned. Cervantes' defense is in the form of a play, in which Cervantes takes the role of Alonso Quijano, an old gentleman who has lost his mind and now believes that he should go forth as a knight-errant. Quijano renames himself Don Quixote de La Mancha, and sets out to find adventures with his "squire", Sancho Panza.

• Peter O'Toole (Simon Gilbert, singing) as Don Quixote de la Mancha / Miguel de Cervantes / Alonso Quijano
• Sophia Loren as Dulcinea / Aldonza
• James Coco as Sancho Panza / Cervantes' manservant
• Harry Andrews (Brian Blessed, singing) as The Innkeeper / The Governor
• John Castle as Sanson Carrasco / The Duke
• Ian Richardson as The Padre
• Brian Blessed as Pedro
• Julie Gregg as Antonia Quijano
• Rosalie Crutchley as The Housekeeper
• Gino Conforti as The Barber
• Marne Maitland as Captain of the Guard
• Dorothy Sinclair as The Innkeeper's wife
• Miriam Acevedo as Fermina

In 1967, United Artists paid more than $2.25 million for rights to the show, the second most ever paid, behind the $5.5 million that Warner Bros. paid for the rights to My Fair Lady.[1] In addition to the initial outlay, UA agreed to pay 25% of the gross if the gross exceeded 2.5 times the negative cost plus $0.5 million for album sales.[1] According to both associate producer Saul Chaplin (in his memoir The Golden Age of Movie Musicals and Me) and Dale Wasserman (in his memoir The Impossible Musical),[2] the film had a troubled production history. Originally, Wasserman, composer Mitch Leigh – serving as associate producer – and Albert Marre, who had directed the original show but had never before directed a film, were hired to make the motion picture, and original cast stars Richard Kiley and Joan Diener were screen tested in anticipation of the two actors repeating their stage roles. Because of Marre's inexperience with moviemaking, however, he (according to Wasserman) used up part of the film's budget on screen tests, which angered the UA executives. Marre was fired, and as a result Wasserman, Leigh, Kiley and Diener, who was married to Marre, also left the project. British director Peter Glenville was then brought in (it was he who cast Peter O'Toole as Cervantes and Quixote), but was in turn also fired when it was learned that he planned to eliminate most of the songs. It was then that Arthur Hiller and Saul Chaplin joined the project. Hiller re-hired Wasserman to adapt his own stage libretto, although, according to Wasserman, the film's new opening sequence, showing the actual arrest of Cervantes before he enters the prison, was not by him. Writer John Hopkins, who most likely wrote the scene Wasserman refers to, had been brought in by Glenville, and had left when Glenville was fired. However, it has never been made clear whether it was Glenville or Hiller who cast non-singing actors Sophia Loren, Harry Andrews, and Rosalie Crutchley in the film, it might have been Glenville, since he had tried to eliminate the songs and envisioned the film as a non-musical. Glenville had also previously worked with arranger/conductor Laurence Rosenthal.

According to the Turner Classic Movies website, O'Toole had been eager to work with Glenville, a friend of his, on the film and make it as a "straight" non-musical drama, but was highly displeased when Glenville was fired and replaced by Arthur Hiller, referring to him constantly as "little Arthur".[3] However, according to Saul Chaplin's autobiography, O'Toole, who could not sing, assisted in the search for a voice double when he realized the film would indeed be a musical after all, eventually finding Simon Gilbert.[2]^:173 In his autobiography Absolute Pandemonium, Brian Blessed claims to have dubbed the singing voice of Harry Andrews as well as appearing onscreen as Pedro.

Although most of the roles in the film were played by British Shakespearean actors who were not noted for singing ability, Ian Richardson did go on to be nominated for a Tony for his performance as Henry Higgins in the 20th anniversary production of My Fair Lady, and the picture did feature several actors, among them Julie Gregg, Gino Conforti, and the muleteer chorus, who did have singing voices. Gino Conforti had been a member of the original stage production cast, and Julie Gregg had also appeared on Broadway in a musical.

Saul Chaplin also explains in his book that the sets and costumes, designed by Luciano Damiani, had already been made by the time that he and Hiller were brought in to work on the film, which meant that Hiller could not have them altered. Damiani was one of Italy's most noted stage designers, having worked on plays and operas in Italy, and on a made-for-television film of Cavalleria Rusticana,[4] but this was the only theatrical motion picture for which he designed the sets and costumes.

On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 50% based on reviews from fourteen critics.[7]

The fact that the film had gone through several directors and screenwriters, and that Peter O'Toole and Sophia Loren, who were not singers, had replaced Richard Kiley and Joan Diener in the leading roles, may have influenced the critics' reactions to the film at the time. Previously, it has been proven by the success of films like Gone With the Wind, The Wizard of Oz and Laura that a change in directors or actors need not affect the response to a film negatively. Upon release, and for several years afterward, the film of Man of La Mancha received overwhelmingly negative reviews, notably from Time Magazine, which not only did not consider the film worthy of a full-length review, but even threw in some criticism of the original stage production into the bargain. They referred to the film as being "epically vulgar", and called the song The Impossible Dream "surely the most mercilessly lachrymose hymn to empty-headed optimism since Carousel's "You'll Never Walk Alone."[8] Newsweek, in its review, opined that "the whole production is basted in the cheapest sentiment. Everyone gets a chance to cry over poor Don Quixote".[9] Leonard Maltin still gives the film a BOMB rating in his annual Movie and Video Guide, stating "Beautiful source material has been raped, murdered and buried".[10]

Roger Ebert, who gave the film two stars, mistakenly assumed that Peter O'Toole sang his own songs in the film, and wrote of him: "What favor were they doing us when they let us hear Peter O'Toole sing? Richard Harris is better, and he's no good. He can't sing, that is, but at least he can read lyrics. O'Toole masticates them."[11]

His colleague, Gene Siskel, had this to say upon its premiere in Chicago:

On the stage, "Man of La Mancha" was one continuous motion: after being hauled into prison on a heresy charge by the Spanish Inquisition, poet-dramatist Cervantes staves off an attack by fellow prisoners by fashioning a little play about a loony old man who thinks he's an impossible-dreaming knight. The play is improvised with props in the jail, and the action flows smoothly from reality to fantasy and-back, with prisoners assuming principal and minor roles.

In the new film version, fantasy and reality are served up chunk-style; the only connecting thread being Peter O'Toole's splendid triple performance as Cervantes, the old man, and Don Quixote de la Mancha. Whereas the play took us to the plains of Spain and a wayfarer's inn by way of the prison floor, the film gives us real Italian plains and a studio representation of an inn in front of a painted background.

The transitions hurt.

The musical numbers succeed in correlation of the acting. When O'Toole is around with his woeful, then glistening, countenance, he lights up the screen and the soundtrack. His death had much of the preview audience sobbing, and their tears were honestly won.

In his absence, however, "Man of La Mancha" always looks and sounds hollow.[12]

On the other hand, Vincent Canby of The New York Times stated that the film was "beautifully acted",[13] and both Peter O'Toole and James Coco received Golden Globe nominations for their performances. The film, according to Dale Wasserman in his autobiography The Impossible Musical, fared well financially in its first week, but ultimately did poorly at the box office. And although Wasserman praised O'Toole and Loren's acting, he nevertheless strongly disliked the film, calling it "exaggerated" and "phony" in an online video interview made shortly before his death.[14] Over the last few years, however, the film's reputation has somewhat improved, as evidenced by favorable online reviews from writers such as Phil Hall, and modern viewers as well as critics are more responsive to it.[15]

Having been released in the middle of the Christmas season of 1972, the film continued its theatrical run well into 1973 and earned an estimated $3.8 million in North American rentals.[16]

Nominated

• Academy Award for Original Song Score and Adaptation – Laurence Rosenthal
• Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy – Peter O'Toole
• Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture – James Coco

Won

• National Board of Review of Motion Pictures Award for Best Actor - Peter O'Toole (also for The Ruling Class). In addition, the board selected Man of La Mancha as one of the Ten Best Films of 1972.

Man of La Mancha was released by MGM Home Video on May 11, 2004 as a Region 1 widescreen DVD, then as region A/1 Blu-ray on April 25, 2017.

• List of American films of 1972

• Man of La Mancha at the American Film Institute Catalog
• Man of La Mancha at IMDb
• Man of La Mancha at the TCM Movie Database
• Man of La Mancha at AllMovie
• Man of La Mancha at Rotten Tomatoes