Trivia / The Mummy (1959)

• Actor-Inspired Element: Peter Cushing claimed that he suggested the scene in which he drives a spear through the mummy. He was inspired by the pre-release poster which shows the mummy with a shaft of light passing through it.
  Peter Cushing^note Narrating the documentary "Flesh and Blood: The Hammer Heritage of Horror": Pre-production art puzzled me. I saw a poster of the mummy striding through the countryside and a light shining through his body as though he had a car headlamp or something. Now I said to Terry Fisher, "We mustn't cheat the audience. Could I take the harpoon in the study and run it right through old Christopher, and he can just break it off and carry on regardless?"
• Acting for Two: Yvonne Furneaux portrays both Princess Ananka and Isobel Banning.
• Enforced Method Acting: Christopher Lee's stiff movements as the mummy were partially caused by all the injuries he suffered through the filming; he dislocated his shoulder in the scene where he crashes through the door, hurt his back when he carried Yvonne Furneaux in his arms and and he hurt his legs on various pipes in the tank that was used to create the swamp in the ending.
• Fake Nationality: The English Christopher Lee and Cypriot George Pastell play Egyptians.
• On-Set Injury: Christopher Lee really suffered making the film:
  • A door through which he was supposed to crash was accidentally bolted by a grip before the scene was shot. Lee's shoulder was dislocated when he broke down the door, but the shot remains in the movie.
  • He was burned by squib marks and threw out his back carrying Yvonne Furneaux.
  • He also injured his knees and shins while doing scenes in the studio-tank "swamp". He couldn't see where the various pipes and fittings under the swampy water were.
• Recycled Set: Stephen Banning's nursing home room was a set recycled from The Man Who Could Cheat Death (1959), while the swamp set was previously used in Yesterday's Enemy (1959).
• Throw It In!: A door that Kharis crashes through was accidentally bolted by a grip before the scene was shot. Christopher Lee's shoulder was dislocated when he broke down the door, but the shot remains in the movie.

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