The drinking duel between Richard and Clarence is beautifully played. According to Vincent Price, Lee let the actors ad-lib much of the sequence, and filmed it in one day. In the wine cellar, the adversaries down large mugs drawn from a butt of malmsey. Richard becomes increasingly surly as the contest progresses, while Clarence becomes almost hysterical with laughter. Eventually, Richard passes out and Clarence crows his triumph. Richard revives, however, and slams Clarence to the floor. Mord emerges, and the evil allies dump Clarence into the vat. When Clarence comes up for air, they push him under and slam the lid. Listening to the man's dying bubbles, Richard mutters, "He asked for malmsey."
Price still had vivid recollections of the sequence some 30 years after the fact. "They used watered-down cola for the wine, and Basil and I had to drink quarts of it and slosh around in it," he remembered. "I can't stand the stuff to this day. Like a fool, I volunteered to do the drowning scene myself rather than be doubled. Basil and Boris were kidding me beforehand and took great delight in throwing their cigarette butts and other trash into the vat. The stunt coordinator told me that when they dumped me into the vat and slammed the lid down I was supposed to grab hold of a bar at the bottom and count to ten before coming up. After I did all that the lid was still closed! Then I heard the crew breaking in with axes. Boris had sat on it and Basil leaned on it and it got stuck. They managed to pull me out before I drowned."
The murder of the children, which upset many patrons, is less graphic than in some earlier versions of the tale. After the king goes to bed, the little Prince falls asleep while kneeling at prayer. Mord, horrified at what he must do, picks up the Prince tenderly and then tucks him into bed. He measures the older boy's height with his hands and goes outside to show his three assassins the proper size of the graves they must dig. Returning with the men, he is reluctant to carry out his orders, but suddenly regains his composure and pushes his minions forward.
Great difficulties were involved in staging of the battles of Tewkesbury and Bosworth, which were filmed in August during a record heat wave that claimed several lives in Southern California. The censorship office warned the studio not to show much bloodshed in the battle scenes, and suggested that the filmmakers cover up the details by printing the scenes dark. Lee decided to film Tewkesbury in rain and Bosworth in fog, which would satisfy the censor's demands while yielding more picturesque visuals.
At 4 a.m. on August 19, principals, crew members, stuntmen and 300 costumed extras reported to a ranch at Tarzana, about 20 miles north of the studio. The early call was necessary to get the combatants and cameras in place on the uneven terrain, and to enable the special effects men to set up a battery of fog machines before the heat of day. Outdoor fog effects can be dicey due to the vagaries of wind, temperature and atmospheric conditions. Continuous gusts of wind shredded the fog. Only a few shots were attempted before Lee ordered the rain machines to be set up for the Battle of Tewkesbury. By then, the sun was high and the temperature hit 105°F.
When the water pump broke down, 300 increasingly angry men in armor milled around cursing under the blazing sun. After repairs were completed, the ground rapidly became a quagmire. Some of the extras reportedly wore papier mâché armor, which quickly deteriorated. Three days after this fiasco, Lee brought the extras back for another try, but soon gave up because of the heat.
Ford Beebe, Universal's serial producer-director, was brought in to do pickup shots and more warfare scenes. Somebody came up with an idea to rescue the battle scenes by intercutting new foreground action against process backgrounds of the original scenes. While not as spectacular as the original concept, the resulting montages are artistically appealing.
Costs had mounted to the extent that Lee was ordered to omit the wedding ceremony of the baby Prince Richard and Lady Mowbray. He finally was allowed to shoot the sequence, an impressive bit of pageantry, after promising to hurry the remaining scenes with the higher-paid players. After principal photography wrapped on September 4 10 days over schedule and about $80,000 over budget Beebe was still making pickup shots. The studio chiefs were livid; unlike the other major studios, Universal didn't own a chain of theaters to play their own product, and therefore couldn't afford the huge budgets lavished by MGM, Paramount or Fox.
Musical director Charles Previn and composer Frank Skinner had decided to use the quaint styles and motifs of 15th-century music for the score. Hans Salter, a composer-conductor recently arrived from Germany, had assisted Skinner on the celebrated Son of Frankenstein music and was further involved in scoring Tower of London. Much of the music was played with period instruments, such as the recorder, the tiny spinet harpsichord, the viola d'amore and the viola de gamba. Triumphal marches were scored for trumpet, drums and male voices.
At a studio screening only a few days before the scheduled November 17 release date, company executives complained that the gentle music was inappropriate for a picture they intended to exploit as horrific. Previn was ordered to provide a full-blooded, menacing score. Lacking the time needed to compose and synchronize so much original music, Skinner, Salter and Previn worked around the clock rearranging music taken mostly from Son of Frankenstein. For example, the famous theme for the Monster's walk, paced more slowly, is equally effective for the measured tread of the club-footed Mord as he stalks through his dungeon. Skinner also utilized his love theme from the Charles Boyer-Irene Dunne drama, When Tomorrow Comes (1938), and some action cues from The Sun Never Sets. It all works very well. Unfortunately, the very recognizable hand-me-down cues which were being recycled into B pictures and serials even then along with leaks about the so-called "cardboard" armor, led to the idea, expressed by some historians, that the picture was made cheaply.
A few portions of the abandoned first score remain. The longest segments are the battle marches. The 20-voice St. Brendan's Boys Choir of Los Angeles sings traditional music for ceremonies at St. John's Chapel. Light period music is heard in a sequence involving Queen Elysabeth and the baby princes. The excised "Anne Neville Suite" surfaces in the 1940 sci-fi serial Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe.
Despite some bad press, Tower of London has aged well and holds its own as a handsomely staged, beautifully acted picture from a vintage year.
[ continued on page 4-Film credits ]