Trailer
Plot summary
King Arthur tells Guenevere, four years into their arranged marriage, of his plan to seat the knights of the realm at one Round Table. On the night of the wedding neither had seen the other, and she learned who he was only when they spoke. Word of it reaches Lancelot, a French knight, who comes to England and boasts of his virtues. Arthur is impressed and the two become friends, while many of the other knights dislike him. Guenevere dislikes Lancelot too and arranges for three of Arthur's finest knights to meet him in a joust. Mordred, the king's illegitimate son, reaches Camelot to break up the fellowship of the Round Table.
Cast
- Gary Marshalas Sir Lionel
- Anthony Rogersas Sir Dinadan
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Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Camelot (1967)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Richard Harris learned of Camelot while filming Hawaii and spent four months sending letters and cables to Alan Jay Lerner, Joshua Logan and Jack Warner for the role; Logan refused him for lack of singing ability until Harris ambushed him after a morning jog and offered to pay for his own screen test.
- The Castillo de Coca inspired the film's production design, which was rebuilt on the Burbank backlot; at 400 by 300 feet and nearly 100 feet tall, the finished castle was the largest set ever constructed at the time, with a reported cost of half a million dollars.
- While filming, Richard Harris required 12 facial stitches after falling in his shower; the stitches reopened when he went out to party against doctor's orders, delaying his recovery, and plastic surgery was later used to disguise the wound.
- Although Joshua Logan knew Franco Nero had a thick Italian accent, he let him sing at first; after the first scene shot, "C'est Moi", Logan found his singing incompatible with the arrangement, so playback singer Gene Merlino dubbed him and Nero got a speech coach for his English.
- Shooting began in Spain in September 1966 with a 30-day schedule, using seven mainland castles plus one on Majorca, including the Alcázar of Segovia as Lancelot du Lac's castle; rain and high temperatures put the shoot 12 days behind and yielded half an hour of usable footage.
- The studio was at first reluctant to cast Vanessa Redgrave because of her left-wing activism, but Joshua Logan negotiated for her until after she finished her stage commitments; she was signed in November 1966 for $200,000 and allowed to do her own singing.
- Warner Bros. approached Richard Burton to reprise his stage role as King Arthur, but he asked for a higher salary than the studio would pay and talks ended; Peter O'Toole, Gregory Peck and Marlon Brando were considered instead.
- Camelot was one of the last big-budget American films to build a large-scale, full-size set on a studio backlot to stand in for an exotic foreign location; American filmmakers have since used location shooting for exterior shots.
