The Big Picture
- Sydney Sweeney will star in a new film collaboration with Sony Pictures with the upcoming Barbarella.
- Jane Fonda, the star of the original 1968 film, was initially not the first choice to star in Barbarella due to media scandals.
- Barbarella faced challenges during production, including script rewrites, shared sets, and rogue birds.
Sydney Sweeney is going intergalactic with her next project: Barbarella. The film marks a continuing working relationship between Sweeney and Sony Pictures following the very successful rom-com Anyone But You and the less-than-successful Madame Web. Though it is yet to be confirmed, the new Barbarella may also feature the directorial talents of Edgar Wright (who's also slated to direct Sweeney's Anyone But You co-star Glen Powell in a remake of Stephen King's The Running Man). This isn't the first time that Barbarella has been adopted to the screen, as people are probably familiar with the 1968 adaptation that stars Jane Fonda as the titular bounty hunter. Though Barbarella is now thought of as a cult classic, it went through a tumultuous production that put far too much on the shoulders of its leading lady.
Barbarella
NONE
Action
Adventure
Fantasy
Barbarella is a 1968 sci-fi movie based on Jean-Claude Forest's eponymous comic book. Jane Fonda stars as the titular space adventurer, who goes on a mission to stop the evil scientist Durand Durand in the 41st century.
- Release Date
- 2014-00-00
- Main Genre
- Action
Jane Fonda Wasn’t the First Choice for 'Barbarella'
Barbarella drew inspiration from Jean-Claude Forest's comic series, which features the title character traveling to various planets...and engaging in sexual escapades with them. Given the risqué subject matter, it's no surprise that director Roger Vadim and producer Dino de Laurentiis wanted to cast an actress who had sex appeal. In fact, Brigitte Bardot and Sophia Loren were de Laurentiis' first choices, but they both turned down the offer. Vadim then turned to Fonda, whom he was married to at the time, and attempted to persuade her given the reception to science fiction films of the time, including 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes. "I explained to Jane that cinema was evolving and that the time was approaching when science fiction and galactic-style comedies like Barbarella would be important. She wasn't really convinced, but she realized that I had a passion for the project," he said.
Fonda, however, was dealing with a pair of media scandals at the time. While promoting the film Circle of Love in 1965, a billboard featuring her in a provocative pose made headlines, as did leaked photos from the set of The Game Is Over, which were promptly sold to Playboy. Vadim had directed both films, and also had some choice words for his approach to Barbarella. "I am not going to intellectualise her. Although there is going to be a bit of satire about our morals and our ethics, the picture is going to be more of a spectacle than a cerebral exercise for a few way-out intellectuals," he told the Los Angeles Times. Fonda had a different take: "She is not being promiscuous but she follows the natural reaction of another type of upbringing. She is not a so-called 'sexually liberated woman' either. That would mean rebellion against something. She is different. She was born free."
Related
Sydney Sweeney’s ‘Barbarella’ Remake Enlists ‘Shaun of the Dead’ Director
The remake of the Jane Fonda-led sci-fi classic has also tapped an 'X-Men' writer to pen the script.
'Barbarella' Was Hampered by Script Rewrites and Rogue Birds
Even with Fonda stepping into the role of Barbarella, production went through ups and downs. A total of 14 writers were hired, including Terry Southern (Dr. Strangelove) and Charles B. Griffith (Little Shop of Horrors). Southern would reflect on his Barbarella work in Gail Gerber's novel Trippin' with Terry Southern: What I Think I Remember:
"Vadim wasn't particularly interested in the script, but he was a lot of fun, with a discerning eye for the erotic, grotesque, and the absurd. And Jane Fonda was super in all regards."
Barbarella had to share a number of production elements with Danger: Diabolik, which was also based on a comic and produced by de Laurentiis. The producer's penny-pinching resulted in whole Danger: Diabolik sets being re-used for Barbarella, alongside Diabolik screenwriters Brian Degas and Tudor Gates punching up the dialogue. As if that weren't bad enough, Fonda became sick during a scene involving lovebirds and wrens. In an interview with Roger Ebert during the time of filming, Fonda recalled how she stuck birdseed onto her costume to feed the birds, but they wound up losing their appetites and huddling near her for nearly two weeks. Another stunt involving Fonda and Milo O'Shea went horribly wrong due to misfiring pyrotechnics...and the fact that Vadim had failed to tell them about said pyrotechnics. When all is said and done, it's a miracle that Barbarella wrapped filming.
'Barbarella' Ended Jane Fonda’s Marriage – But She Grew To Love the Film
In the years following Barbarella's release, it reached cult classic status. The band Duran Duran named itself after O'Shea's antagonist, while other filmmakers including Robert Rodriguez and Nicolas Winding Refn attempted to do a remake before Sweeney and Wright. But the person who had the most struggles with its success was Fonda. She opened up in her autobiography about how Vadim had started drinking heavily on the set, as well as how the film impacted her own health:
"Partway through the filming of Barbarella he started drinking at lunch, and we'd never know what to expect after that. He wasn't falling down, but his words would slur and his decisions about how to shoot scenes often seemed ill-considered...There I was, a young woman who hated her body and suffered from terrible bulimia, playing a scantily clad sometimes naked sexual heroine."
Fonda also has her own thoughts and worries about Sweeney's upcoming remake. “I try not to [think about it]. Because I worry about what it’s going to be...I had an idea of how to do it that [original producer] Dino De Laurentiis, when he was still alive, wouldn’t listen to. But it could have been a truly feminist movie," she told The Hollywood Reporter. Given everything Fonda went through shooting the original Barbarella, and the horror stories that have often come out of Hollywood, Fonda's concerns are justified.
Barbarella is available to rent on Prime Video in the U.S.
Rent on Prime Video
