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Charlton Heston clearly felt some kind of kinship, or siren song, or it was “the role,” the one that all actors dream of taking on from the theatrical canon. Either which way you glance at it, Heston playing the character three times on film and television, including in his directorial debut, was a sign of a deep passion for the role and material. This doesn’t mean that this passion translated into a profound reading of the character or a good movie.
I wonder if Heston’s original choice of director, Orson Welles, would have produced a better final product. Heston’s camera is not exactly invigorating, and the scant budget shows throughout, including in leftover sea battle footage from Ben-Hur that shimmers with studio era artifice. His sense of visual language is one of overly indulgent closeups so his actors can bellow their monologues, or show off his burly physique, or lands with the leaden weight of those 50s epics that he starred in and built his cinematic legacy upon.
But those vehicles provided ample opportunity for Heston’s gritted teeth and chest-first line deliveries. He’s not a classical actor with nuance and moderation in his skill set. Rather, he is someone who needs to go big and broad and rage. This is why he’s remembered for grandiose work like The Ten Commandments, El Cid, or Planet of the Apes, and is, frankly, ill-suited to something that depends on so much vocal and emotional calibration to successfully pull off. This is where the division between classical acting and more gone-to-11 amplification he was good at.
It doesn’t help that Cleopatra is also miscast, or misdirected, as Hildegard Neil is not up to meeting the challenge of the role. She’s a lovely English Rose that demands a more vibrant inner life and reading. Her Cleopatra frequently comes off as a scorned ex, a gross simplification of “bitches be crazy,” and vaguely ridiculous in her Egyptian garb.
Antony and Cleopatra is a vision of artistic hubris, of misguided ego run amuck and producing something altogether forgettable. The disjointed quality of the finished product is evident in how comfortable the supporting players are in the Shakespearean text while the leads are a lead balloon that dooms the entire affair. It’s not as if Shakespearean adaptations always demand actors with an ease in the language. Franco Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet is successful because Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey projected the dewy innocence and ripe sensuality of the characters, not necessarily for their grasp of the rhythms of the language. The bombast and overwrought emoting drown all else out here.
