50 Fun Facts About Lawrence of Arabia

Who directed the 1962 epic Lawrence of Arabia?

Lean had already made The Bridge on the River Kwai with the same producer, Sam Spiegel, and would follow this with Doctor Zhivago.

Which actor plays Prince Faisal in the film?

The make-up was so faithful that people who had known Faisal mistook the actor for him on set.

The film is based on the life of T. E. Lawrence and which 1926 book?

Lawrence vowed never to profit from the book and priced the first edition below cost, leaving himself in debt.

How many Academy Awards did Lawrence of Arabia win at the 1963 ceremony?

It was nominated for ten and took Best Picture and Best Director among its wins; neither of its acting nominees won.

Who composed the film's famous score?

The composer was little known at the time and only got the job after William Walton and Malcolm Arnold were unavailable; the AFI later ranked the score third of all time.

Who was the film's director of photography, shooting in Super Panavision 70?

The wide format punished quick cutting, so the crew relied on long, fluid takes and diagonal movement to avoid a projection 'flutter'.

Michael Wilson wrote the first draft, but who wrote virtually all the finished film's dialogue?

The producer brought him in to turn Wilson's political treatment of the Arab Revolt into a character study of Lawrence.

The film opens in 1935 with Lawrence dying how?

One of the doctors who treated him, Hugh Cairns, went on to research head injuries and push for crash helmets.

The memorial service that opens the film takes place at which building?

There really is a bronze bust of Lawrence by Eric Kennington in the crypt there, installed in January 1936.

Sherif Ali shoots Lawrence's guide Tafas for doing what?

Sherif Ali is a composite character; the real Lawrence never served with a single Arab leader apart from Auda for most of the war.

Which desert protects Aqaba from land attack in the film, making the overland march so audacious?

The real expedition left Wejh on 9 May 1917 and took the town on 6 July, hitting the Turkish defences from behind.

How many men does Feisal give Lawrence for the march on Aqaba?

The Howeitat under their tribal leader make up the numbers once Lawrence talks them into switching sides.

What does Lawrence promise the Howeitat leader to persuade him to join the attack on Aqaba?

When the town falls there is none, and Lawrence has to ride to Cairo to ask for money instead.

How does Daud, one of Lawrence's two teenage attendants, die?

The other boy, Farraj, is later shot by Lawrence himself to spare him Turkish torture.

The American journalist Jackson Bentley is based on which real reporter?

The real man's films and lectures were seen by over three million people in the early 1920s and turned Lawrence into an international celebrity.

Late in the film, Dryden tells Lawrence about which Anglo-French agreement to partition the Middle East?

Historians note the real Lawrence probably knew about it much earlier than the film suggests.

Which actor plays the Howeitat chief Auda Abu Tayi?

He did his own make-up from a photograph of the real man; the director reportedly failed to recognise him on set the first day.

Who plays General Allenby?

He shaved his head for the role and had played the colonel in The Bridge on the River Kwai for the same director and producer.

Which actor plays the Turkish Bey who has Lawrence beaten at Deraa?

He later called his five minutes on screen the best performance of his career.

Which veteran of Casablanca plays Mr Dryden of the Arab Bureau?

The character is a composite of Ronald Storrs, David Hogarth, Henry McMahon and Mark Sykes.

Which then-unknown actor was the director's first choice for Lawrence but turned the part down?

He passed a screen test but did not want to sign a long-term contract with the producer; Marlon Brando was also offered the role.

Noël Coward quipped that if O'Toole had been any prettier the film would have been called what?

At 6 ft 2 in, O'Toole was also almost nine inches taller than the man he was playing.

Prince Faisal was originally to be played by which actor, who dropped out?

The producer also pushed him for Allenby, but he was engaged at the Chichester Festival Theatre and declined.

Alain Delon had a successful screen test for Sherif Ali but declined the part because of what?

Horst Buchholz was the first choice but had already signed for One, Two, Three; Omar Sharif was originally cast as the guide Tafas.

The actor playing the Turkish Bey accepted his small part only for $25,000 plus what?

The fee was more than O'Toole and Sharif were paid combined.

Which actor was first cast as Bentley and shot scenes before a heart attack led to Arthur Kennedy replacing him?

Kirk Douglas had been considered earlier but demanded a star salary and second billing, so the producer turned him down.

Lawrence of Arabia may be the longest theatrical film with no what?

Women do appear, but only as extras or in crowd scenes.

What is screenwriter Robert Bolt doing in his wordless cameo in Lawrence of Arabia?

The gaffer played the motorcyclist at the Suez Canal, and the director himself is rumoured to have shouted 'Who are you?'.

The director reportedly studied which John Ford western while working out how to shoot the film?

Biographer Kevin Brownlow noted how much the film's desert locations resemble Ford's Monument Valley.

The film was originally to be shot entirely in which country, whose king visited the set several times?

Cost and illness among the crew eventually pushed the production to Spain before the Aqaba and Petra scenes could be shot there.

Which Spanish city stood in for Cairo, Jerusalem and Damascus?

The Casa de Pilatos, the Alcázar and the Plaza de España all appear; every interior was shot in Spain.

The Tafas massacre sequence was filmed in Ouarzazate, in which country?

Local soldiers stood in for the Turkish army but proved so impatient that the director could not shoot as much as he wanted.

The Bedouin extras nicknamed O'Toole Abu-'Isfanj, meaning what?

He had padded his uncomfortable camel saddle with foam rubber from a market, and the extras copied him.

How long was the composer given to write two hours of orchestral music for the film?

Sir Adrian Boult is credited as conductor but struggled with the cue timings, so the composer conducted most of it himself.

The producer wanted a two-composer score: Aram Khachaturian for the 'Eastern' half and which Briton for the other?

The idea was to sound out the Arab and British sides of the story separately; in the end one composer did it all.

Which was the only Arab nation to give the film a wide release?

President Nasser endorsed it for its portrayal of Arab nationalism, while another Arab country banned it as disrespectful.

Lawrence of Arabia, the longest Best Picture winner, runs just over a minute longer than which earlier winner?

The 1971 re-release trimmed it to 187 minutes; the 1989 director's cut brought it back to 216 minutes of film.

In the 1989 restoration, whose dialogue did Charles Gray dub because the actor had cancer?

Gray had already voiced him in several films; the other surviving actors re-recorded their own lines.

Which two directors helped restore a version of the film for its 2000 DVD release?

Spielberg has called the film a 'miracle' and says seeing it four weeks running as a teenager made him a filmmaker.

The 2012 8K scan revealed fingerprint-like concentric lines near the top of the frame. What caused them?

Sony had to hire a third party to minimise the rippling artefacts for the 50th-anniversary Blu-ray.

In the UK the film set a record by selling over a million tickets in six months from how many cinemas?

Worldwide it went on to gross about $70 million, split almost evenly between North America and the rest of the world.

Where did the AFI place the film on its original 1998 list of the greatest American movies?

It qualified as 'American' only because of Columbia's financing; on the 2007 update it slipped to 7th.

Which director calls it a favourite film that shaped where she shot The Hurt Locker?

The film's look also fed into Dune, Star Wars, Avatar, Prometheus and Mad Max: Fury Road.

Who played Lawrence in the 1990 television sequel A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia?

Alexander Siddig, later of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, played Prince Faisal.

Who won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for Lawrence of Arabia?

The Motion Picture Editors Guild later voted it the 7th best-edited film of all time; her later credits include Out of Sight and Erin Brockovich.

Peter O'Toole's record of eight unsuccessful acting nominations is shared with which actress?

The Academy gave him an Honorary Award in 2002 instead.

The real T. E. Lawrence was born in which country?

He was the illegitimate son of an Anglo-Irish landowner and a governess, born in a house now called Snowdon Lodge.

The RAF recruiter who rejected T. E. Lawrence's 1922 enlistment as 'John Hume Ross' later wrote which books?

W. E. Johns suspected the false name; Lawrence came back with a written order that he be accepted.

The real Lawrence died after crashing which make of motorcycle near his Dorset cottage in 1935?

He owned eight of them over the years; the last is on loan to museums and he swerved to avoid two boys on bicycles.

The film's desert scenes in which valley are credited with launching the host country's tourism?

Lawrence himself passed through it several times during the Arab Revolt of 1917-18.