Charlton Heston (1923-2008)

Vandaag is het al vijftien jaar geleden dat in de Verenigde Staten de Amerikaanse acteur Charlton Heston is overleden.

Heston (rechts op de foto) is hier in Vlaanderen vooral bekend door “Ben-Hur“, een pseudo-historische film van William Wyler uit 1959, die zowat elk jaar wordt heruitgezonden omwille van Goede Vrijdag (de kruisiging van Christus komt er inderdaad in voor), maar het is zeker niet het moraliserend-religieuze aspect dat deze film het zien waard maakt. Nee, eigenlijk draait het maar om één sequentie (allé, ‘k zal het toegeven: om twéé, de zeeslag mag er ook wel zijn) en dat zijn natuurlijk de fameuze wagenrennen, waarbij de kleurloze Ben-Hur het moet opnemen tegen de Schone Slechterik, Massala. Akkoord, het zal wel geholpen hebben dat deze rol werd vertolkt door Stephen Boyd (ik zat toen nog in mijn pré-heteroseksuele periode), maar toen ik volwassen werd en hoorde dat Charlton Heston (de vertolker van Ben-Hur) tevens de woordvoerder is van de wapenlobby in de Verenigde Staten, dan was ik toch wel fier dat ik met plezier de rollen van beiden in die wedstrijd had omgedraaid!
Het leek wel alsof Wyler deze film had gedraaid als “Wiedergutmachung” tegenover Charlton Heston die hij kort daarvoor terecht als trigger happy gunslinger had geportretteerd in “The big country” tegenover de rechtschapen Gregory Peck.

In 1961 speelde hij de titelrol in “El Cid” van Anthony Mann. Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, Charlton Heston himself was not overly impressed by the finished movie, suggesting in his 1995 autobiography “In the Arena” that this movie might have been better if William Wyler had directed it instead of Anthony Mann. Conversely, he speculates that Ben Hur may have been more effective with Mann, not Wyler, helming it. Heston recalled he once mentioned this idea to Wyler, who thought little of it. According to Charlton Heston, both in his memoir “In The Arena” and his journal “The Actor’s Life”, he was very dissatisfied with the fact that director Anthony Mann was insistent on shooting the battle scenes himself, instead of leaving it to the second unit under veteran stunt coordinator Yakima Canutt. It was a prime reason why he didn’t think Mann was the right man to direct this movie.

Zijn tegenspeelster was Sophia Loren. Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren reportedly got off on the wrong foot early in filming which set a bad tone for their working relationship for the rest of the shoot. Heston later said he regretted the way he behaved towards Loren during filming, feeling in retrospect that he’d been unprofessional and unfair to her and wished he’d been kinder and less stubborn towards her. Part of the reason could be that Loren was paid more than Heston (one million dollars for ten weeks’ work, the first time a woman had been paid that sum for acting in a single motion picture; producer Samuel Bronston also agreed to pay two hundred dollars a week for her hairdresser). As can be seen in the finished movie, during many of the “love” scenes, Heston refused to look at Loren for more than a glance. Director Anthony Mann tried take after take, imploring Heston to look into the eyes of the woman he loved, but Heston couldn’t bring himself to do it. Regarding his deathbed scene, he later claimed that he was “looking into the future”, rather than into the eyes of his wife.

This movie was partly funded by the fascist regime of General Francisco Franco. It was heavily promoted as pro-Franco propaganda when it was released in Spain. Charlton Heston, then a Democrat, was unable to campaign for John F. Kennedy due to the long filming schedule. He accepted the part after turning down The Assassination of Trotsky, which would take another ten years before it began filming. (IMDb)
Later zou Heston vooral berucht worden als woordvoerder van de wapenlobby. Ik betwijfel of hij dan nog steeds tot het “democratische” kamp behoorde. Op filmgebied kwam ik Heston natuurlijk ook nog tegen in “Airport 77”, “Gray Lady down”, “Planet of the apes” en “Earthquake”.

Ronny De Schepper