The Wicked Lady

The Wicked Lady (1983)

She's wild. She's wicked. And she really knows how to whip up a good time!

Caroline is to be wed to Sir Ralph and invites her sister Barbara to be her bridesmaid. Barbara seduces Ralph, however, and she becomes the new Lady, but despite her new wealthy situation, she gets bored and turns to highway robbery for thrills. While on the road she meets a famous highwayman, and they continue as a team, but some people begin suspecting her identity, and she risks death if she continues her nefarious activities.

Date of release
1983-04-21
TMDB
4.9 / 10 (27)
Runtime
1h 38m
Genres
Drama, Adventure
Director
Michael Winner

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Awards: 0 · Nominations: 1

The Wicked Lady is a 1983 British-American period drama directed by Michael Winner and starring Faye Dunaway, Alan Bates, John Gielgud, Denholm Elliott, and Hugh Millais. It was screened out of competition at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival. It is a remake of the 1945 film of the same name, which was one of the popular series of Gainsborough melodramas.

Production

Michael Winner bought the rights to The Wicked Lady from the Rank Organisation and took the film to Faye Dunaway, who agreed to star in the leading role. Winner then raised financing from The Cannon Group in February 1982. In March 1982, John Gielgud and Alan Bates agreed to star and the budget was set at $15 million.

Menahem Golan of Cannon said that "stars who would never have worked with us before are now happy to sign. We pay them peanuts — but we give them big percentages. Faye, Alan and John were happy to sign for The Wicked Lady because they have 50% of the film. And we have small overheads, so they'll get their money." Dunaway said, "I really feel it will be a fun picture. A period romp, it's a mixture between Bonnie and Clyde and Tom Jones."

"This is the only film I've ever enjoyed making," said Dunaway on set. "Everything I've done in the past has been so full of anguish, though that's partly my fault, I'm sure." She said the film "came at the right time for me. I needed something light after making Mommie Dearest, which was decidedly harrowing."

The actor Mark Burns appeared in The Wicked Lady as King Charles II, but during the filming director Winner could not afford to pay him even the Equity union minimum fee. Burns told him to make a donation to the Police Memorial Trust, which was run by Winner.

The film included a scene where Dunaway's character Lady Barbara Skelton has a whip fight with Jackson's Girl (Marina Sirtis). The British censor insisted this scene be cut lest the film be given an X certificate. Winner got various colleagues to watch the film and write letters of protest to the censor in support of the film and the scene. These included Derek Malcolm, Kingsley Amis, Lindsay Anderson, and Fay Weldon.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

Recommended