INSIDE THE MOVIE THAT Shocked 50th AMERICA
HERE’S HOW FAYE DUNAWAY & WARREN BEATTY CREATED A NATIONAL UPROAR — AND MADE A KILLING
When Bonnie and Clyde blazed a trail of sex and violence across screens 50 years ago, some people didn’t know what to make of it. The New York Times slammed it for being “as pointless as it is lacking in taste.” But it resonated with disaffected youth. “It was a time of revolution,” Estelle Parsons, who won a best supporting actress Oscar as Clyde’s sister-in-law, tells Closer. “It fit right into not following the rules anymore.”
Based on the story of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, lovers who went on a crime spree during the Depression, the film revolutionized Hollywood by depicting them as antiheroes and made superstars of Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. “You didn’t know if you were rooting for the main characters,” says film historian Mark Harris (Five Came Back). Adds Peter Biskind, author of Star: How Warren Beatty Seduced America, “It pissed off people who sensed they were giving the finger to the older generation.”
The film ultimately earned $70 million and 10 Oscar nominations, but it wasn’t a hit upon its initial release. Only after revisionist critics championed it and Time put it on the cover did it become a national sensation. “The studio had dumped it,” says Biskind. “Nobody thought it was going to become a huge hit.”
“That movie touched the core of my being. I’ve never felt so close to a character.”
— Faye
Warren, who also produced the film, originally thought he wasn’t right for Clyde and tried to cast Bob Dylan. Shirley MacLaine was considered for Bonnie, but once Warren was the male lead, he didn’t want to do love scenes with his sister and tried to convince Natalie Wood and Leslie Caron, both of whom he’d romanced in real life, to play the part. He and director Arthur Penn settled on Faye, who’d made only two little-seen films. “The most remarkable thing about Warren’s collaboration with Faye is they didn’t sleep together,” Harris says of the noted lothario.
Tensions were high on the small- town Texas set, as a nervous Faye worried about everything from her weight to her voice and Warren clashed creatively with the director. But the result was a groundbreaking masterpiece. “Warren and Arthur Penn spent a lot of time hammering out exactly what they wanted to happen,” says Estelle. “That helped make it an extraordinary movie.”
And one that still holds up a halfcentury later. “It’s aged beautifully,” raves Harris. “In every sense, it was independent in spirit. Its legacy is that it took chances. Don’t be afraid to make a movie that risks startling, unsettling or even alienating part of its audience — make the movie you believe in. A great movie is always relevant.”
— Bruce Fretts, with reporting by
Katie Bruno