Marlon Brando is considered one of the greatest actors of the 20th century. In his vast career span of more than six decades, he gave numerous blockbuster hits including A Streetcar Named Desire, The Wild One, and One-Eyed Jacks, among others. He was awarded two Academy Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and one Cannes Film Festival Award for his fabulous acting. Apart from his exuberant performances, he was also known for his eccentric way of speaking dialogues on film sets.
In the film Superman, Brando’s way of learning dialogue became a laughing stock and is remembered to date.
Marlon Brando memorized dialogues for Superman in a unique style
The Godfather actor played the role of Superman’s biological father in the 1978 superhero fictional film. Superman featured Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent aka the caped superhero. Brando was paid a whopping amount of $3.7 million for playing the character of Jor-El. However, as per reports, the actor had refused to learn his lines in the script and demanded that they are printed on cue cards and placed around the film sets.
It was quite a difficult task for the crew as they had to continually adjust the cards so that they adjusted with the camera angles.
However, keeping the cue cards also resulted in some hilarious moments, as Brando was very serious about the cards. A popular anecdote from the shoot is the not yet line, which Brando improvised during the shot. The cue card read,
“I will see you again, but not yet. Not yet.”
Brando added his own twist by saying,
“In the meantime, there’s a lot of work to do on the Earth. Farewell.”
The whole crew reportedly started laughing, but director Richard Donner was impressed by the line and decided to keep it in the film.
Brando’s cue card demands on sets became quite popular in Hollywood. His ad-libs on the set of the film Superman, are still appreciated by fans.
About Marlon Brando and Christopher Reeve’s Superman
The Christopher Reeve starred film, Superman, was based on the character by DC Comics. It was produced by Pierre Spengler and written by Mario Puzo, from the story by Puzo. The director of the movie was Richard Donner and it was the first installment in the Superman film series. The cast included Marlon Brando, Gene Hackman, Christopher Reeve, Jeff East, Margot Kidder, Glenn Ford, Phyllis Thaxter, Jackie Cooper, Trevor Howard, Marc McClure, Terence Stamp, Valerie Perrine, Ned Beatty, Jack O’Halloran, Maria Schell, and Sarah Douglas.
The 1978 film revealed the origin of Superman, comprising his infancy as Kal-El, son of Jor-El of Krypton. It also focussed on his youth days when he lived in Smallville as Clark Kent, where he worked as a reporter in Metropolis and developed a romance with Lois Lane. The villain of the film, Lex Luther, was played by Gene Hackman.
Superman is available on Max.
Source- Aliens of Cinema
