Trivia / The Sundowners

• Awesome, Dear Boy: Robert Mitchum signed onto the film just to work with Deborah Kerr again. He even agreed to give her top billing.
• California Doubling: Defied. Fred Zinnemann fought Executive Meddling to shoot in Arizona or Texas, and shot as much on-location footage as possible.
• Fake Australian: Most of the cast are Americans or Brits playing Aussies. Some of the supporting cast are Australian though.
• Magnum Opus Dissonance: While Deborah Kerr thought The Innocents was her best performance, she felt that this was the one of her Oscar nominated films she should have won for.
• Those Two Actors: Deborah Kerr and Robert Mitchum also starred in Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison, The Grass Is Greener and Reunion at Fairborough.
• Troubled Production: The unpredictable weather caused significant delays, irritating the cast and crew; it in fact took twelve weeks just to get scenery shots. Robert Mitchum also was harassed by fans so much, he had to live on a boat to avoid them.
• Uncredited Role:
  • Jon Cleary, author of the original novel, did an uncredited rewrite of the script.
  • Bryan Pringle as Police Constable Thomas.
• What Could Have Been:
  • This was originally supposed to be an adaptation of the novel The Shiralee. Dorothy Hammerstein, who had suggested Fred Zinnemann adapt it, accidentally sent him The Sundowners instead.
  • Gary Cooper was supposed to play Paddy but had to drop out because of his health, and got replaced with Errol Flynn...who died before filming could happen. Finally, Robert Mitchum came on board.

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