Christopher Plummer thought ‘The Sound of Music’ was “awful”
Cherished and loathed in equal measure, 1965’s The Sound Of Music is made of sweet stuff. For some, it’s nothing short of heartwarming, a reminder of all the goodness in the world. For others, the classic family musical has all the charm of a sticky toddler with lolly fingers. Christopher Plummer, who played Baron Von Trapp, falls into the latter category.
Back in 2011, Plummer was joined by fellow award contenders Albert Brooks, Gary Oldman, George Clooney, Christoph Waltz and Nick Nolte for a Roundtable interview for The Hollywood Reporter. At 82 years, Plummer’s career was coming to a close, and he held nothing back in sharing his honest thoughts on some of his most famous films.
On being asked to name the toughest role he’s had to play, Plummer replied: “I think the part in The Sound of Music was the toughest. When asked to explain, he laughed and said: “Because it was so awful and sentimental and gooey. You had to work terribly hard to try and infuse some minuscule bit of humour into it.” Humour was clearly very important to Plummer. Before revealing his distaste for a film generally regarded as being universally-loved, the revered actor explained that Shakespeare’s King Lear isn’t the “magisterial piece that they all say it is – not the second half anyway.”
Recalling his stint in Lear, Plummer said: “The first parts alright, but the second, once he’s on the heath…forget it. And then it becomes an entirely other play; it’s a play about [The Earl of] Gloucester and Edmund, and you’re sitting in your dressing room getting stoned, waiting to come on again, and then you come on finally, and the audience says: ‘hey, that looks like King Lear’. They’d forgotten all about him.”
Directed by Robert Wise, The Sound of Music stars Julie Andrews as Maria, who, uncertain if she wants to become a nun, takes a job as the governess to the seven Von Trapp children, introducing them to a new love of music. Their father, a widowed naval captain, finds his principles put to the test when he, an opponent of the Nazis, is ordered to accept a commission in the German navy. Captain Von Trapp was played by Plummer, who was just 36 when the film was made. “It’s a very good picture [for] what it is,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “But somebody had to be Peck’s bad boy and I chose myself.”
