Trivia / A Breath of Scandal

• Completely Different Title: The film was known as Olympia in Italy. This is an interesting case in that Olympia was the title of the stage play the film was based on, so if anything, it's more of a case of going back to the original title.
• Creator Backlash: John Gavin later called the film a "turkey", saying that director Michael Curtiz didn't know what he was doing and that Sophia Loren playing a princess was "not what she does best." He also mentioned, with regards of Loren getting coached by Vittorio De Sica, that he "wouldn't have minded a little help myself."
• Disowned Adaptation: Despite Walter Bernstein being anxious to re-establish himself in movies after years on the blacklist, he asked that his name be removed from the credits of the film as he disliked it so much. This created an odd situation in which the only name credited with adapting the screenplay was Sidney Howard, who actually translated the original Hungarian play into English in the 1920s; by the time this film appeared, he had been dead for over twenty years.
• Fake Nationality: Italian Sophia Loren and French Maurice Chevalier playing Austro-Hungarians.
• Money, Dear Boy: According to Bernstein, when Vittorio De Sica made uncredited reshoots for the film, he insisted on being paid in cash at the end of each working day.
• Troubled Production: John Gavin would later recall that being directed by Michael Curtiz "sounds so good on paper," but apparently, he soon realized the director was past his prime, telling Sophia Loren during the shoot, "We're in a terrible picture. He may have been a great director once but he doesn't know what he's doing." Gavin added that the next he knew, Loren brough Vittorio De Sica on set to give her coaching before shooting started, and when he asked him him about suggestions, he said "Don't change a thing. Everything you do is so American," which left Gavin "up in the air without a compass." There's also the fact that according to Bernstein, De Sica also ended up reshooting certain scenes with Loren behind Curtiz's back.
• Wag the Director: According to Bernstein, besides coaching Loren, De Sica also reshot certain scenes with Loren after hours without Curtiz's knowledge.

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