Mr. Strangelove_ A Biography of Peter Sellers - Ed Sikov [131]
Filming began in June on the island of Ischia, where Peter and Britt lodged at the Hotel Isobel Regina. For their residence in Rome, where the production moved at the end of July, they rented an elegant villa on the Appian Way, which Peter, true to form, had outfitted with multitudinous gadgets. They included his-and-hers walkie-talkies so that he could stay in touch with his wife when she was in a different part of the house.
With Peter assuming the role of de facto executive producer as well as star, his tendency to second guess his directors became even more detrimental than usual, since De Sica had to contend not only with a demanding star but a demanding financier as well, all wrapped up in the same moody man. De Sica’s own attitude didn’t help; he started telling friends and associates how much he detested Simon’s screenplay. He didn’t think too highly of Peter’s performance, either.
The feeling was mutual; Peter grew equally disenchanted with De Sica. “He thinks in Italian, I think in English,” Peter complained to Bert Mortimer. According to Hattie Stevenson, there was an even more intimate and painful problem: Peter “wasn’t happy with Britt’s performance at all, and so therefore that made home life very difficult.”
At first, Peter took his frustrations out only on the film’s unit publicist; in a typically roundabout way, Peter had him fired. But to spare Peter his characteristic spasm of remorse, he was told that the publicist had simply gone away on his own accord.
It was then that the color purple became not just a problem but one of the biggest and most long-lasting terrors of Peter’s life. A script girl showed up one day in a purple outfit. Naturally she had no idea that this fashion decision would send Vittorio De Sica into an uncontrollable arm-waving frenzy. “It’s the color of death!” De Sica revealed to Peter, who, suggestible and superstitious as ever, was haunted by purple for the rest of his life.
On at least one occasion Peter attributed the superstition to Sophia Loren, though he credited De Sica much more often. But no matter who planted the notion that purple could kill, Peter latched onto the belief fiercely. The mere hint of purple became a consistent trigger to Peter’s easily erupting temper. In later years, publicists would scour Peter’s proposed hotel rooms in search of the color of death; if they found it, the room would be changed. For Peter Sellers, the color ruined everything it touched. Purple was to life itself as Fred had been to Rembrandt.
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Filming in Rome one day in early September, Britt was playing a scene with Victor Mature. Peter had stayed home that morning, but he just couldn’t help himself but appear at Cinecittà later that day and, with the camera rolling and De Sica miming the expression he wanted from his leading actress, Peter came creeping up to his wife’s side, so close that he was barely out of camera range, and whispered, “Play it as though you were dreaming of being beautiful!” De Sica took this usurpation in stride. To placate his star, who was also his boss, De Sica asked him to serve as Mature’s stand-in for some close-ups of Britt that were taken later that day. But Sellers was growing even more irritated by De Sica—his English was too bad, his obvious distaste for the material too debilitating, and De Sica was simply the most obvious target for Peter’s ire.
So he told John Bryan to get rid of him. Bryan resisted on financial as well as artistic grounds. Then, bizarrely, Peter demanded that British sausages be flown in for the cast and crew, De Sica objected,