Shooting eventually began in October 1947. George Oppenheimer later wrote "From the start the picture was a misery and a trial. The director, Vincent Sherman, and I not only failed to see eye to eye, but to work cheek by jowl. Before we had finished, the film had been retitled
Sherman’s March through George. In addition, Flynn, an attractive and friendly fellow off the lot, was off the lot during a large part of the shooting on a series of binges." Errol Flynn was suffering from poor health, reportedly from a mild heart condition and recurrent bouts of
hepatitis. According to film historian Tony Thomas, Flynn drank heavily during the production's shooting. Filming was frequently halted due to Flynn's physical condition and by frequent changes and replacements in production personnel. In January Flynn was hospitalised and was ill for fifteen days, causing production to halt. Flynn returned, but fell ill again and the production shut down once more. On 6 February the production shut down a third time, for a fortnight, because of Flynn's illness. In March it was estimated that Flynn had missed 64 days of shooting. The rising costs concerned Warner Bros. about the profitability of the film, particularly as Britain, which was expected to be a major market, recently introduced a heavy tax on Hollywood films, though the tax ended in 1948. In the famous on-screen leap from the head of a long staircase, Flynn was doubled by stunt expert
Jock Mahoney. In the silent film
Don Juan (1926), Flynn's idol
John Barrymore performed a similar leap without a stunt double. At the end of the picture, the young woman in the coach asking Don Juan for directions is Flynn's wife,
Nora Eddington. During filming, in November, Flynn signed a new contract with Warner Bros. to make one film a year until 1961, of which
Don Juan was to be the first. The chase scene early in the film used recycled footage from
The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), and is then followed by a grand procession with recycled outtakes from
The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939), both starring Errol Flynn and Alan Hale. The film is the last of 13 in which Hale and his close friend Errol Flynn appeared together. Hale died on January 22, 1950, just over a year after this film's theatrical release.
Music The film was originally to be scored by
Erich Wolfgang Korngold. However, production of the film was postponed until 1947, by which time Korngold had retired from scoring motion pictures. He was replaced by
Max Steiner, who incorporated several Spanish songs into his score. The score was adapted years later by composer
Ian Fraser for the
George Hamilton swashbuckling comedy film
Zorro, The Gay Blade (1981). A portion was also used in two scenes in the film
The Goonies (1985), although in the first scene, it accompanied a TV broadcast of an earlier film,
Captain Blood (1935). ==Reception==