Olivier’s interpretation of Richard is one he created for the Old Vic in 1944 and was famously modeled after the American theater director Jed Harris, who had directed Olivier in 1933 and who Olivier described as “the most loathsome man I ever met.” (Harris, in fact, also inspired another famous cinematic villain: the Big Bad Wolf in the Oscar-winning Walt Disney short The Three Little Pigs.) Olivier’s portrayal has the black page-boy haircut familiar to us from the known portraits of Richard, a majestically prominent fake nose, and a clipped nasal delivery that was instantly and widely parodied by many British comedians. And Richard III’s wide-angle, brightly lit Technicolor production design looks like many Hollywood musicals of the period, most especially The Court Jester , which appears at first glance to have the exact same historical setting, arrived in US cinemas just six weeks ahead of Richard III, and starred Olivier’s friend Danny Kaye. The opening trumpets, hand-painted credits (inspired by the medieval Book of the Hours), and shots of chanting monks reminded me instantly of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which uses similar flourishes (but adds the hilarious business of the monks smacking themselves in the head with bits of wood that Shakespeare wishes he thought of). These thoughts occurred to me recently as I had occasion to watch Olivier’s 1955 film again, for the first time in probably over 15 years, and I was struck by how familiar it seemed.
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