As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride (31 page)

T
he Princess Bride
had been originally scheduled for a big summer release. The film’s distributor, 20th Century Fox, was enthusiastic about the movie’s chances and slated it to open on July 31, 1987. But since Rob was still editing at that time, the date was postponed. I do recall a few months later being invited to view a rough cut of the film on the Fox lot with my then agent, Ed Limato (who has, sadly, since passed away). I remember being particularly nervous at the time, as some of the giants in the comedy world—Mel Brooks, Gene Wilder, Gilda Radner, and Carl Reiner—were going to be in attendance along with the rest of Rob’s family and close friends.

It’s a strange thing, seeing a film again after such a length of time has passed, in part because you’ve moved on to other projects, but also it seems like eons ago when you made it. It’s almost like a dream that has begun to fade slowly from one’s memory. However, watching the film
even in its rough form, with all the temp music and cue lines running through the picture, I thought it was a joyous, heartwarming, funny, sweet, and sincerely memorable movie. But perhaps I was just biased. I do know that the audience appeared to love it, too. But maybe, being Rob’s friends and family, they were biased as well. After the screening, I remember feeling overwhelmed as I received perhaps some of the greatest and most treasured compliments of my career when Mel, Gene, Gilda, and Carl each took turns congratulating me on my performance.

When
The Hollywood Reporter
suggested in an article on September 15 that the movie would be “a challenge for the marketing department,” the studio decided to push the release date even further back, opening with a limited run (meaning fewer theaters) in New York and Los Angeles on September 25, to see how it fared before going wide (meaning more theaters) a few weeks later.

The first time I saw the final version was at what was then known as Toronto’s Festival of Festivals (now the Toronto International Film Festival) on September 18, a week before the official release date in the States.

Even after all this time we still didn’t know what to expect. As Bill Goldman says about our industry in his fascinating book
Adventures in the Screen Trade,
“Nobody knows anything!” For if they did, he correctly reasons, everybody would be making hit movies all the time. Nobody sets out to make a bad movie. You work hard, put your faith in the material and the director, and then . . . well, you hope for the best. Truthfully, there is so much that can go wrong that it’s advisable not to dwell on it, which is also Goldman’s advice. If it had been up to the audience at the festival, we would’ve been a smash hit. They loved it. They laughed in all the right places and appeared to be moved in all the right places as well.

After the credits rolled and the lights came up, the audience stood and cheered. It was truly overwhelming. I remember looking over at Rob.
He was beaming. The audience really took the film to heart and voted it as the winner of the People’s Choice Award at the festival. It seemed like the movie had a real shot.

Then came the heartache.

As we were flying back to LA, Rob unfurled a copy of what the studio had chosen for the movie poster to show us, and we were all pretty shocked.

Apparently
The Hollywood Reporter
had been correct in their assumption. The studio’s marketing department had been at a complete loss as to how they should sell the film. The poster had no image of the title character, Buttercup. No Westley. No Miracle Max. No Inigo. No Fezzik. No swordfight. Not even an R.O.U.S. in sight! Instead they opted for a one-sheet depicting a silhouette of Fred Savage and Peter Falk sitting together against a Maxfield Parrish–type background. Very sweet, but it seemed to be an odd, static choice for a movie that promised so much more. Clearly they were scrambling at the time, trying to figure out what type of movie to promote. And for some reason they decided to push the story of the Grandfather and the Grandson—in essence, a kid’s movie. Granted, that relationship was an integral part of the story, but we all felt, including Rob, that perhaps it wasn’t the best angle to promote the movie. And we were right, as it obviously left audiences confused and some potential filmgoers deterred.

To give you a sense of how clueless even the foreign marketing folks were, I remember someone showing me an Italian one-sheet that, granted, had an R.O.U.S. and Buttercup, but it also bizarrely featured a hawk and had Inigo as an Arnold Schwarzenegger lookalike from
Conan the Barbarian
holding his giant Barbarian sword up to his face in that iconic pose. I guess the theory was that if Arnold could sell tickets, why not give it a shot. Compounding this was the fact that, domestically, Fox had opted out of publicizing the movie at all in the media. We had no
paid ads on TV or even a trailer in the theater. Indeed, the first and only trailer was considered so confusing, it was subsequently pulled from the cinemas by the studio. It all seemed like a recipe for disaster. And yet . . . despite all this the reviews, upon opening, were generally positive. A sampling:

 
The Philadelphia Inquirer:
“Given that Reiner’s first feature was the riotously parodic
This Is Spinal Tap,
there is a built-in expectation here that he satirize swashbuckler derring-do. But what’s captivating about
Bride
is the sincerity with which Reiner tells his story, which is sweet like cider and (fortunately) not like honey.”

 
The New York Times:
“
The Princess Bride
has sweetness and sincerity on its side, and when it comes to fairy tales, those are major assets. It also has a delightful cast and a cheery, earnest style that turns out to be even more disarming as the film moves along. Even the little boy, who’s a tough customer, is eventually won over.”

 
Chicago Sun-Times
(Roger Ebert): “
The Princess Bride
reveals itself as a sly parody of sword and sorcery movies, a film
that somehow manages to exist on two levels at once. While younger viewers will sit spellbound at the thrilling events on the screen, adults, I think, will be laughing a lot.”

Some critics, though, were reluctant to give the film anything more than a backhanded compliment, with the attitude, “Hey, it’s a cute movie, and if you need something to do in the afternoon, go ahead and take your kids.”

Others were simply put off by the apparent meshing of genres.

One critic, for example, had this to say: “This is a post-modern fairy tale that challenges and affirms the conventions of a genre that may not be flexible enough to support such horseplay.”

Hmm. Really? I think Mr. Goldman put it best when he wrote, “Cynics are simply thwarted romantics.”

Two weeks after the Toronto festival, and after the initial wave of mostly positive reviews, we all gathered once again for a screening at the New York Film Festival at the Ziegfeld Theater on 54th Street. Rob went onstage and introduced the film, then invited us all afterward to join him up there so he could introduce us. Later that night, we all gathered for dinner, where Rob got up and gave a speech:

“I just want you all to know that whatever happens with this movie, I am very proud of the work we did. But more importantly of all the hard work you did to help make this one of the most memorable experiences of my career. It’s a very special film. And one, I think, we can all be proud of.”

Everyone applauded. There was a general feeling in the room of camaraderie where we felt that we had made something special.

Sadly, Rob’s comments about the success of the film turned out to be somewhat prophetic. The numbers were not what we had hoped for. Nor what the studio had hoped for, for that matter. After the opening weekend, we could already tell that the movie wasn’t going to be a huge box office draw, something that confounded us all. Looking back I only wish the Internet had existed in 1987. I suspect that social media would have raised awareness of the film’s unique quality and helped propel it
to blockbuster status. Alas, movies in those days relied on traditional platforms for publicity and we didn’t even have that going for us.

After dinner, when everyone was about to go their separate ways, André asked if I wanted to go out for a nightcap. Why not? I thought. Who knew when we would get to see each other again, and I always enjoyed his company.

So I joined him as he squeezed into the large chauffeured van he had and set off in search of . . . well, when you’re with André, you know it’s always going to be an adventure.