Development In 1955, producer
Samuel Bronston entered into cooperation with the
United States Navy to film the biopic
John Paul Jones (1959). The country of
Spain was recommended to him as a filming location by
Jose Maria Areilza, then-
Spanish Ambassador to the United States when they were seated together at a dinner party in
Washington, D.C. Bronston agreed and established his
namesake production studio near
Las Rozas in
Madrid. During filming, the production was allowed by the
Francoist Spanish government to film sequences inside the
Royal Palace of Madrid. After
John Paul Jones (1959) was completed, Bronston and director
John Farrow began developing their next project,
King of Kings (1961). While the project was in development, in 1958, Bronston began considering
El Cid as a potential project, but it would be set aside until
King of Kings reached completion. At the time,
Francisco Franco had compared himself to
Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, the Cid, and Bronston readily agreed to assist the Franco government. The
Spanish Ministry of Information and Tourism had initiated 'Operación Propaganda Exterior' to increase Spanish trade and tourism, to which Bronston attended frequent meetings to discuss issues of common interest. In April 1960,
Variety announced that Bronston was independently producing three films in Spain, one of which included
El Cid. It was also reported that Bronston had purchased the rights to
Fredric M. Frank's 140-page treatment for the film. In July 1960,
Anthony Mann had signed on to direct the film. In an interview, Mann called the film "a Spanish Western". However,
principal photography was nearly delayed when
Cesáreo González's Aspa Films filed an infringement claim against Bronston over the project's thematic similarities. Previously, in July 1956, it was reported that two biopics of El Cid were in development: an American-Spanish co-production with
Anthony Quinn set to star, and a collaboration between
RKO,
Milton Sperling, and Marvin Gosch. By August 1960, Bronston reached a deal to have Aspa Films and
Robert Haggiag's Dear Film involved in the production making the project an American–Italian–Spanish co-production. By their mid-November start date, the script had been rewritten, with Heston describing it as an improvement over the first draft. Two days prior to the start of filming,
Sophia Loren had read the latest draft and was displeased with her dialogue. She then recommended hiring blacklisted screenwriter
Ben Barzman to revise it. Mann subsequently got Barzman onto a plane to Rome, after which he gave him the current screenplay draft. Barzman read the draft and found it to be unusable. Since filming was set to begin, Barzman received a copy of the seventeenth-century play
Le Cid by
Pierre Corneille from the library of the French embassy in Madrid and used it as the basis for a new screenplay. Years later, in 1967, Mann told
Bertrand Tavernier that "not one line" in the shooting script was written by Yordan. However, Barzman's screen credit would not be added to the film until 1999. However, Barzman's script lacked powerful romantic scenes, which again displeased Loren. Screenwriter
Bernard Gordon, who was also blacklisted, was hired to rewrite these scenes. He stated: "So [Philip] Yordan yanked me from what I was doing in Paris and said, 'Write me three or four love scenes for Loren and Heston.' Well, what the hellhe was paying me $1500 a week, which was a lot more than I made any other way, and I just took orders and I sat down and I wrote four scenes, about three or four pages each. Whatever love scenes there are in the picture I wrote. And they sent them to Loren and said, OK, she'll do the picture, so I was a little bit of a hero at that point". Loren had also hired screenwriter Basilio Franchina to translate the dialogue into Italian and then back into simpler English, with which she felt comfortable. For script advice and historical truth, Spanish historian
Ramón Menéndez Pidal served as the historical consultant to the screenwriters and the director of the film. The naturalist
Felix Rodriguez de la Fuente also helped to use
raptors and other birds.
Casting in the province of Cuenca
Charlton Heston and
Sophia Loren were Bronston's first choices for the two leads. As he conducted research into his role, Heston read
El Cantar de mio Cid and arranged a meeting with historian Ramón Menéndez Pidal. Initially, Loren was unavailable to portray Chimene, and
Jeanne Moreau was briefly considered as a replacement. Ultimately, Loren became available but only for ten to twelve weeks, Bronston also agreed to pay $200 a week for her hairdresser.
Orson Welles was initially approached to play Ben Yusuf, but he insisted that a double do his on-set performance while he would dub in his lines during post-production. Bronston refused. British actors were primarily sought for the other male roles, for which most of the principal casting was completed by early November 1960. That same month, on November 30,
Hurd Hatfield had joined the cast. At least four actresses screen-tested for the role of Doña Urraca.
Geneviève Page won the part, and her casting was announced on December 16, 1960.
Filming Principal photography began November 14, 1960 at Sevilla Studios in Madrid, Spain. Filming was reported to spend at least four months of exterior shooting in Spain which would be followed by a final month of interior shooting at the
Cinecittà Studios in
Rome. 15 war machines and siege towers were constructed from historical artwork, and 35 boats were decorated with battlements to serve as the Moorish fleet. Tensions between Mann and Canutt rose as Mann sought to shoot the sequence himself. With the sequence nearly finished, Canutt spent three days filming
pick-up shots, which would be edited within the longer,
master shots that Mann had shot earlier. In his autobiography, Heston expressed his dissatisfaction with Mann's insistence on shooting the battle scenes himself, feeling Canutt was more competent and efficient. In April 1961, the last sequence to be shot for the film—the duel for Calahorra—was filmed near the
Belmonte Castle. The scene was directed by Canutt. Prior to filming, Heston and British actor
Christopher Rhodes trained for a month in the use in weaponry under stunt coordinator Enzo Musumeci Greco. The fight took five days to shoot, totaling 31 hours of combat before editing. of film was shot for the sequence, which was ultimately edited down to remaining in the film.
Music The instrumental score was written by
Miklós Rózsa, who had scored Bronston's previous film
King of Kings (1961). Rózsa had been assigned by
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) to score
Mutiny on the Bounty (1962) but was appalled after reading the script and backed out. Because
El Cid was an Italian co-production,
Mario Nascimbene, a native Italian composer, had been hired but he refused Bronston's demand to adapt
Jules Massenet's opera
Le Cid into the score. Bronston turned to Rózsa instead. Regardless, Italian financiers insisted Nascimbene be credited, to which Bronston asked Rózsa for his permission to have him credited on the Italian film prints. Rózsa agreed, as long as Nascimbene make no claim for royalties and his credit appeared only on the Italian prints. After meeting with Ramón Menéndez Pidal, Rózsa began an extensive one-month study into medieval Spanish music. He took inspiration from the 12th-century musical piece titled the
Cantigas de Santa Maria, compiled by
Alfonso X of Castile; the
Llibre Vermell, a 14th-century manuscript collection from the monastery of Montserrat, and a collection of Spanish folk songs from
Felipe Pedrell. For the weaponry, Samuel Bronston Productions sought several local Spanish companies. Casa Cornejo provided 3,000 war helmets and hundreds of iron-studded leather jerkins. The Garrido Brothers factory, located in Toledo, Spain, worked under an exclusive contract for eight months producing 7,000 swords, scimitars, and lances. Anthony Luna, a Madrid prop manufacturer, crafted 40,000 arrows, 5,780 shields, 1,253 medieval harnesses, 800 maces and daggers, 650 suits of mail (woven from hemp and coated with a metal varnish), and 500 saddles. ==Release==