Musicals of the 60's: Camelot

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Like How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Camelot was another movie musical that was released in 1967 and had to face the truth of selling the movie to a culture that was high on drugs, having sex before marriage, and (the most important fact) hooked on Rock and Roll music instead of Broadway songs. Based on the novel by T.H. White "The Once and Future King" the book was adapted into a Broadway play from playwright and musicians Alan Lerner and Frederick Loewe (they had done "My Fair Lady"). It made its debut in 1960 with Richard Burton as Arthur, Julie Andrews as Guinevieve, and Robert Goulet as Lancelot. Not surprisingly, the play was a huge hit and a few years later it was adapted into a movie as Warner Brothers and their boss Jack Warner (fresh off the success of My Fair Lady) bought the rights. He took over again as producer and hired Joshua Logan to direct while Loewe wrote the screenplay. The story as you know starts with Arthur (Harris)

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who becomes the king of England after he pulls out the sword from the stone after being tutored by Merlin. Along the way he meets Guinevieve (Redgrave)

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and marries her but along the way she then meets a knight named Lancelot (Italian actor Franco Nero)

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and starts to love him instead to Arthur. Then Arthur meets Mordred (David Hemmings-just coming off Blow Up with Redgrave)

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and convinces him to start a round table for the knights. He does that.

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But when rumor breaks out that Guinevieve is cheating with Lancelot she is put to trial for treason where she is found guilty and sentence to die. Then just before her head is supposed to be cut off, Arthur and Lancelot rescue her. Later towards the end of the movie Arthur finds her in the forest where she has become a nun and living in exile. He asks her to come back but she refuses.

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As you know shortly after filming was completed in the spring of 1967 Jack Warner quit as studio president and announced that he was selling the studio (that he founded in 1923) to production company Seven Arts. As for the movie itself when it was released that September it was middle of the road. Camelot would go on to win three Oscars and to make it shocking they won more Oscars than Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate combined (some say they are the two best movies of the decade). Yet another example of why Old Hollywood was still conforming.