They’re young, they’re in love … and they kill people

6 comments April 8th, 2008

This week’s Movie Man column (which can be found by clicking here) is a review of the new BONNIE AND CLYDE DVD. It’s a truly great movie, one that sparked a revolution of sorts in Hollywood, and I highly recommend giving this remastered disc a look.

My column mostly focuses on the movie itself, but here are a few bits of making-of trivia I picked up, both from the documentary included on the disc and from Mark Harris’ excellent new book about the 1967 Oscar nominees, PICTURES AT A REVOLUTION: FIVE MOVIES AND THE BIRTH OF THE NEW HOLLYWOOD:

1. Originally, Warren Beatty only planned to produce the movie, not star in it. He thought Bob Dylan (yes, the Bob Dylan) would be good as Clyde, and as for Bonnie, he thought about casting Shirley MacLaine. Once he decided to play Clyde himself, he wisely stopped considering Shirley for the Bonnie role. (She’s Beatty’s sister, if you didn’t know.)

2. It’s Gene Wilder’s first film.

3. When Warren Beatty was arguing with Warner Bros. chief Jack Warner about making the movie (Warner did not want to make it), Warner told Beatty to look out the window and see who’s name was painted on the studio’s giant water tower. Beatty says he went to the window and said “I don’t know — all I see are my initials.”