Trivia / Lawrence of Arabia

• All-Star Cast: Besides Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif, who became stars thanks to this movie, most of Lawrence's supporting cast were leading men in their own right (Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Anthony Quinn) or veteran character actors (Arthur Kennedy, Anthony Quayle, Claude Rains). You even have Oscar-winner José Ferrer in a glorified cameo. O'Toole once commented that acting opposite so many seasoned stars was more intimidating than anything else about the film.
• Backed by the Pentagon: King Hussein of Jordan lent an entire brigade of his Arab Legion as extras for the film, so most of the "soldiers" are played by real soldiers.
• Banned in China: Most Middle Eastern countries banned the film during its original release, finding its portrayal of Arabs offensive. One exception was Egypt: Gamal Abdel Nasser reportedly loved the movie and it subsequently became a hit in that country. Having Omar Sharif, one of Egypt's greatest actors, certainly helped too.
• California Doubling: David Lean originally wanted to shoot the entire movie in Jordan, which is located in the same region where it takes place. Although the Jordanian government was very helpful, this proved to be impractical. In particular, Lean's plan to shoot the first battle scene at the real Aqaba simply wasn't feasible, as Aqaba (which had been a small village in 1917) had grown into a major city by 1962. (The scene was shot on a specially-constructed set in Almeria, Spain.) Many of the desert scenes were filmed in Jordan, but ultimately most of the movie was filmed in Spain. With its abundance of Moorish architecture, Seville plays the part of basically every Middle Eastern city in the movie; the Aqaba battle, the train attack scenes, and Lawrence's capture in Deraa were shot in Almeria. The climactic massacre scene was filmed in Morocco and second unit footage of the desert was shot in, yes, California (specifically the Imperial Sand Dunes in the southeastern corner of the state).
• Cast the Runner-Up:
  • Alec Guinness had a life-long interest in T.E. Lawrence and had played him in a production of Terence Rattigan's play Ross on stage. Guinness wanted very much to play Lawrence, but David Lean and Sam Spiegel both told him he was too old. Laurence Olivier was the original choice for Prince Feisal, and Guinness was shifted to that role when Olivier turned it down.
  • Omar Sharif was originally cast Lawrence's guide Tafas before being cast as Ali.
  • Jack Hawkins was originally set to take on the part of Colonel Harry Brighton. When he was shifted over to play Allenby, Anthony Quayle got the part of Brighton.
• Creator Backlash: Peter O'Toole always seemed ambivalent about his performance, even though it was his Star-Making Role. He did not enjoy the experience of making the movie at all (understandable given the Troubled Production it went through) and felt that he was too raw and untested an actor to truly capture Lawrence's complex personality. Further, O'Toole went years without ever seeing the finished film in its entirety, though when he finally watched it sometime in the 1980's he admitted that it was quite impressive.
• Creator-Chosen Casting: David Lean cast Peter O'Toole after seeing his small role in The Day They Robbed the Bank of England.
• Darkhorse Casting: Prior to this, Peter O'Toole had an impressive career on the English stage, but only minor film roles.
• Deleted Scenes:
  • Despite the extensive restoration done in 1989, the currently available cut of Lawrence (216 minutes without overture and intermission) still misses several sequences present in the original 1962 release. The most famous is a longer version of Lawrence's meeting with Allenby in Jerusalem towards the end, the so-called "balcony" or "seduction" scene. According to Robert Harris, this scene couldn't be restored because of a poor audio match. It is included in the 2012 Blu-Ray release, with Charles Gray dubbing Jack Hawkins as Allenby.
  • There's also the quicksand sequence from the original 222-minute 1962 cut. This scene was supposed to be a bit of a test of character for Lawrence just before he and Ali head off to recruit Auda Abu Tayi but was not put back for the 1989 restoration.
• Dyeing for Your Art: Jack Hawkins and Alec Guinness shaved their heads for their roles.
• Executive Meddling: Although David Lean initially took credit for cutting 20 minutes out of the film after its premiere, he later blamed producer Sam Spiegel for the edited version.
• Fake Nationality: Kind of. Half-Irish, half-Scottish Peter O'Toole, who might have been born in England or Ireland (he had two different birth certificates), as Welsh-born but half Anglo-Irish and half Scots Lawrence. At any rate, they're both from the British Isles.
  • Apparently Alec Guinness bore such a striking resemblance to the real Faisal that people who didn't know he was dead thought he was the real deal, even though it's an Englishman playing an Arab.
  • Mexican-American Anthony Quinn as Bedouin tribal leader Auda Abu Tayi.
  • Sherif Ali is played by Omar Sharif, an Egyptian of Lebanese descent—he is at least an Arab playing an Arab (with the same name, no less)..
  • Puerto Rican José Ferrer as the Turkish Bey.
• Fatal Method Acting: Averted. In the real Battle of Aqaba, Lawrence was nearly killed when his camel threw him after he accidentally shot it in the head. In a remarkable coincidence, Peter O'Toole was nearly killed himself when a gun or rocket used to signal "action" in the first take went off prematurely, and O'Toole was thrown by his panicked camel in front of the charging horses. (Another account holds that O'Toole was temporarily blinded by pellets from an effects gun and lost control of his animal.) Fortunately for O'Toole, the camel, trained for such situations, stood over him and saved him from being trampled.
• Follow the Leader: This movie was so influential in its day that practically every movie set in whole or in part in a desert since it came out has effectively borrowed or outright stolen from it. Echoes of Maurice Jarre's iconic sweeping score can be heard in everything from Stargate to The Mummy Trilogy.
• Friendship on the Set:
  • Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif became fast friends during production. Upon learning his name, O'Toole declared, "You can't be called that, there isn't a movie star in the world named Omar Sharif. Your name must be Cairo Fred". They would often go out drinking together. Sharif later reflected on how they shared a tent for a year during production, and that he felt he became a better actor because of O’Toole.
  • O'Toole also befriended Jack Hawkins, much to David Lean's annoyance, as their character are supposed to be enemies. They would annoy Lean by ad-libbing material.
• Hostility on the Set: Alec Guinness admired Peter O'Toole's talent and charm but, as he watched him drink to excess on-location, his appreciation cooled. One day, the two of them were invited to dinner at a local dignitary's house. O'Toole got drunk, quarrelled with his host, and threw a glass of champagne in his face. Guinness wrote to a friend, "O'Toole could have been killed, shot or strangled, and I'm beginning to think it's a pity he wasn't."
• Money, Dear Boy: José Ferrer was initially unsatisfied with the small size of his part, and accepted the role only on the condition of being paid $25,000 (more than O'Toole and Sharif combined) plus a Porsche. However, he afterwards considered this his best film performance, saying in an interview: "If I was to be judged by any one film performance, it would be my five minutes in Lawrence." O'Toole once said that he learned more about screen acting from Ferrer than he could in any acting class.
• Multi-Disc Work: On most formats this film was released on, this film comes on two tapes or discs. This even extends to 4K Ultra HD, which is one of the very few films on the format to have two UHD discs.
• On-Set Injury: Peter O'Toole was often injured. He received third-degree burns, sprained both ankles, tore ligaments in both his hip and thigh, broke his thumb, dislocated his spine, fractured his skull, was bitten by a camel, sprained his neck, tore a groin muscle, and was concussed twice. He also seriously injured his hand during filming by punching through the window of a caravan while drunk. A brace or bandage can be seen on his left thumb during the first train attack scene, presumably due to this incident.
• The Other Marty:
  • Albert Finney was Lean's first choice for the title role but he was fired after just two days of filming.
  • Edmund O'Brien was originally cast as Jackson Bentley but had to drop out when he suffered a heart attack. Arthur Kennedy was flown in from New York to replace him.
  • Maurice Ronet was cast as Ali and actually spent time on the set in Jordan (several scenes not involving his character were filmed while he was present), but the uncertain shooting schedule and his own difficulty mastering English convinced him to leave the project. He was replaced by Omar Sharif, who'd initially been cast in a minor role.
• Referenced by...:
  • In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders, Joseph tells his companions that he knows all there is to know about camel riding. Except he can't even make the camel sit and ridicules himself. Finally he admits to Polnareff that his so-called 'experience' about camels comes from watching Lawrence of Arabia two or three times — and falling asleep partway through each time.
  • In The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, the shot of Elendil covering the sun with his silhouette while making a shadow over Galadriel and Halbrand is inspired by the shadow scene of Lawrence adopting his savior complex and leading the Arabs to their potential freedom.
  • Referenced a few times in Better Call Saul:
    • In "Marco", main character Jimmy McGill and his friend Marco directly quote the film after reuniting. ("The Turks pay me a golden treasure, and yet I am poor, because I am a river to my people!")
    • The "A" plot of "Bagman" is an Homage to the film, complete with a few nearly-identical shots◊.
• Saved from Development Hell: T.E. Lawrence declined invitations to film his writings as early as 1926 when Rex Ingram suggested the idea. Later, Alexander Korda tried to launch a version starring Leslie Howard, written by John Monk Saunders and directed by Lewis Milestone. Over the years, such stars as Sir Dirk Bogarde, Robert Donat, Sir Laurence Olivier, Cary Grant, Laurence Harvey, Burgess Meredith, and Alan Ladd were all promoted as leads. Bogarde even suggested there was a club for actors once considered for the role. "We have even designed a tie. Dark background with motif of a burnoose and camel." Screenwriter Michael Wilson finally convinced Lawrence's brother to sell the movie rights to Producer Sam Spiegel by submitting his screenplay for approval in 1960.
• Star-Making Role: Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif. O'Toole was an acclaimed stage actor but only had a few minor film roles beforehand: Lean reportedly spotted him in The Day They Robbed the Bank of England, playing a Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist. Sharif was already famous in Egypt, but this movie made him an international superstar.
• Throw It In!: Lawrence using his dagger-blade as a mirror was something that Peter O'Toole came up with while shooting the scene.
• Troubled Production: Where to start?
  • First, it's worth noting that filmmakers had been trying to make a Lawrence movie since the mid-'20s. Two of the better-known examples were an Alexander Korda epic in the '30s with Laurence Olivier as Lawrence, and a '50s Rank Organisation picture starring Dirk Bogarde. Both films fell apart due to political pressure: the former because of fear of alienating Turkey in the run-up to World War II; the latter because of a coup d'etat in Iraq, where the film was set to shoot. Lean and Spiegel narrowly beat a competing project, an adaptation of Terence Rattigan's play Ross, to the screen.
  • Michael Wilson worked on the screenplay for over a year, then was summarily dismissed by Lean for unsatisfactory work. Unfortunately the cast and crew were already in Jordan and waited for weeks before a new writer was hired. Robert Bolt's tenure as screenwriter got off to a rocky start when he was arrested for taking part in a CND demonstration in London, forcing Sam Spiegel to bail him out of jail. Bolt then showed his gratitude by granting a press interview where he slammed Spiegel and Lean as egomaniacs. Eventually Spiegel invited Bolt to live on his private yacht in Aqaba, mostly to keep an eye on him.
  • Logistics filming in Jordan were a nightmare. For a start, gaining rights to film there required intense negotiation: Spiegel brought in Anthony Nutting, a former British Foreign Office official, to secure King Hussein's approval.
  • The crew commandeered tanker trucks full of fresh water from Aqaba and airlifted frozen food to the location every day. David Lean and the crew had to meticulously sweep the desert sands free of footprints and tire tracks between takes. Outbreaks of illness laid many crew members low. Peter O'Toole's on-set drinking caused tension with Arab extras. The Jordanian government initially cooperated with the production but proved leery about filming in cities like Aqaba and Maan.
  • Spiegel and Lean's already testy relationship soon reached the breaking point. Spiegel rarely visited the set, but constantly complained long-distance about Lean's "wasting" money and allegedly poor footage. On one visit he showed up with William Wyler in tow, threatening to replace Lean if he didn't work faster. Lean eventually got back at Spiegel by sneaking into the dailies a shot of him flipping Spiegel off... in 70mm. Unsurprisingly, Lawrence marked their last collaboration.
  • Eventually shooting in Jordan got so expensive that the production moved to Spain. More difficulties arose: production designer John Box had to build the Aqaba set from scratch. The crew had difficulty finding camels and camel riders. O'Toole nearly died filming a battle scene when he fell off his camel and injured himself on another occasion. Edmond O'Brien (playing Bentley) had an onset heart attack and Arthur Kennedy was flown direct from New York to replace him. Flash floods in Almeria delayed filming. Lean and his actors grew increasingly tense; Lean once exploded at Jack Hawkins for trying to lighten the mood on-set. Finally, Lean couldn't find suitable locations for the climactic battle and there was a final move to...
  • Morocco. The crew took up residence at an old Foreign Legion encampment in Ouarzazate, with no air conditioning in 100-plus degree F temperatures. Lean argued with his second unit directors on how to film the battle, firing one (Andre de Toth). More diseases broke out among crew-members. Procuring camels again proved a problem. The main difficulty however came with the extras. Soldiers from the Moroccan army were employed without pay, which they understandably resented. During off-hours they actually took potshots at cast and crew, Lean included. Others deserted between takes and never came back.^note And even this didn't end the location shooting: Lean reportedly sent a small second unit crew to California to film some additional desert footage just as he began editing the film.
  • Having survived an arduous production, the film encountered several PR disasters up to its release. Professor A.W. Lawrence, the title character's brother, threatened to sue the filmmakers, then tried to discredit the movie through interviews and editorials. An ugly scandal arose when Spiegel again refused to credit Michael Wilson. A Writers' Guild arbitration found in Wilson's favor, but Robert Bolt still received sole credit. Peter O'Toole attended press interviews drunk, drawing more bad attention. Finally, Lawrence received its American premiere during a newspaper strike in New York, and the few critics who saw it gave overwhelmingly negative reviews. For all that Lawrence became a smash hit, and eventually an all-time classic, but it overcame a lot getting there.
• Uncredited Role:
  • Norman Rossington as Corporal Jenkins.
  • James Hayter as an Arab Shiekh.
  • Bryan Pringle as a driver.
• Wag the Director: Anthony Quayle argued with David Lean about his character. Quayle thought he was an idiot, while Lean thought he was the only true noble character in the film.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Several actors were offered the leading role, including Marlon Brando, but Lean initially seemed set on Albert Finney, an unknown theater actor with only a few film roles to his credit. Finney received an elaborate, four-day screen test, performing scenes from early script drafts with several actors and reciting passages from Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom. Finney impressed Lean and producer Sam Spiegel, but Spiegel demanded Finney sign a multi-picture contract. Finney refused, instead performing his Star-Making Role in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning while Lawrence was still in production. Enter Peter O'Toole and the rest is history.
  • Montgomery Clift and Anthony Perkins were both interested in playing Lawrence.
  • Alain Delon tested for Ali but ultimately declined because of the brown contact lenses he would have had to wear.
  • Sam Spiegel wanted either Cary Grant or Laurence Olivier for General Allenby.
    • Olivier was also offered the role of Auda abu Tayi, but he was engaged at The Chichester Theatre Festival.
  • Jackson Bentley originally had a bigger role and was meant for Kirk Douglas. He expressed interest but demanded a star salary and the highest billing after O'Toole, and thus was turned down by Spiegel.
  • David Niven was considered for Colonel Brighton.
  • Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar was offered the role of Sherif Ali, but he declined.
  • The original idea for the score was that it be divided between Maurice Jarre for the dramatic score, Aram Khatchaturyan for the Middle Eastern themes, and Benjamin Britten for the British Imperial themes. The latter two had to pull out so Richard Rodgers was hired. Then when Lean and Spiegel listened to his contributions and Jarre's, they loved Jarre's so much they gave him the whole job instead.
• Word of Gay: When interviewed, David Lean was pretty straightforward about this issue. He thought that one of Lawrence's key conflicts throughout the film was his inability to come to terms with his own homosexuality, and if you keep this in mind there are a lot of moments in the film that can be read in this way. He also compared the relationship between Lawrence and Ali to the doomed love affair in his heterosexual romance Brief Encounter.
• Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: Shooting was just about to start when David Lean threw out Michael Wilson's original script completely. Robert Bolt was brought on to rewrite the script as filming began. As a result, the movie was filmed almost chronologically - a rarity then or indeed now, especially on such a large-scale film.

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