The iconic ‘Gladiator’ scene that was “made up on the night”
As far as historical epics go, certainly from a 21st-century perspective, they don’t get much bigger than Ridley Scott’s 2000 film Gladiator. Focusing on the journey of betrayed Roman general Maximus Decimus Meridius and his thirst for vengeance against the corrupt Emperor Commodus, Gladiator is a true masterpiece of historical cinema.
Russell Crowe’s turn as Maximus is imbued with honour, strength and spirit, just as Joaquin Phoenix’s effort as Commodus is one of greed and cowardice. Throw into the fact that Scott’s team gave the production an unrivalled sense of reality with its incredible set design, intense action sequences and an emotive, earth-shattering score by Hans Zimmer, and it’s easy to see why Gladiator earned the acclaim it did upon release.
Gladiator is absolutely brimming with brilliance, but most impressive is the fact that Scott and Crowe seemed open to working things out as they went along while still sticking to the excellent script. When Crowe spoke about the film with Vanity Fair, he explained that one of the film’s most iconic scenes had been “made up on the night”.
The scene in question sees Maximus offer up a prayer after a battle to his wife and children, but according to Crowe, it was invented on the spot by the film’s director and its lead actor. “Ridley wanted to shoot me doing this after battle prayer and amongst the trinkets on the shelf that the art department had left there – they had these little figurines,” Crowe explained.
He added, “So I picked up these figurines and directed a prayer towards them as if they are my wife and child.” Crowe then noted that this moment in the scene ended up becoming a huge point in the story of Gladiator, so to have it made up on the very night, it was filmed was all the more impressive.
There was another consequence to the moment, too, relating to another of the film’s actors, Tommy Flanagan, who played Cicero, who was himself in the room for the scene. Flanagan, according to Crowe, had been booked as a “day player” for Gladiator, but after the battle prayer scene was shot, Scott felt that he could play a further role in the film.
Crowe noted, “Ridley was, like, ‘there’s something about those figurines we have to figure out… there’s something about that – so we had to hang onto that actor’. That led to Tommy Flanagan being flown to Malta for months… he was there for months.”
Scott and Crowe didn’t know how Flanagan as Cicero would be used again, but the actor was being paid for essentially waiting around in Malta. In the end, the production found a use for him. Crowe signed off on the matter, “And then, as it turned out, we came up with the idea of him not only coming to see Maximus but bringing the figurines.”
Gladiator is rife with moments of true cinematic quality, from the prop and costume design to the sheer brilliance of its actors. Scratching a little beneath the surface also reveals that Scott and his team were willing to allow things to play out naturally, though, as did the tender moment in which Maximus dedicates a prayer to his wife and son.
