#The pink panther play script movie
Sellers, naturally a somewhat pudgy man, wanted to be in better shape for the film, in part because he wanted to rival the movie star looks of co-star Robert Wagner. PETER SELLERS WENT ON A DANGEROUS DIET FOR THE FILM. Edwards was “unsuccessful” in getting Hepburn to take the role, and Claudia Cardinale was cast instead.
To play the captivating Princess Dala, owner of the titular Pink Panther jewel, Edwards originally wanted Audrey Hepburn, whom he’d previously worked with on Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961). AUDREY HEPBURN WAS THE FIRST CHOICE FOR PRINCESS DALA. With only weeks to go until filming, Capucine replaced Gardner, and Sellers replaced Ustinov. When Gardner backed out of the film over disagreements with the producers, Ustinov followed. Edwards originally cast Peter Ustinov in the role, and cast Ava Gardner as Clouseau’s wife, Simone. Though it’s hard to imagine anyone but Sellers in the film now, he was not the original Jacques Clouseau. PETER USTINOV AND AVA GARDNER WERE ORIGINALLY CAST. By the end of filming, it was very much Clouseau’s movie, and Niven was so disappointed that he requested The Pink Panther theme not be played when he appeared at the Academy Awards in the following years.
Then, Peter Sellers was cast as Inspector Jacques Clouseau, and he and Edwards began improvising various comedic bits, which greatly expanded Sellers’s screen time. When Blake Edwards and co-writer Maurice Richlin first conceived the idea for The Pink Panther, it was a story "about a detective who is trying to catch a jewel thief who is having an affair with his wife." To play the debonair jewel thief Sir Charles Lytton, Edwards chose David Niven.
DAVID NIVEN’S CHARACTER WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE LEAD. So, to remember the beloved bumbling inspector, here are 12 facts about the film. Though its sequels often left something to be desired, The Pink Panther is still almost universally hailed as a comedy classic more than 50 years after its release. With Edwards’s comedic instincts and Sellers’s natural gift for transformation, the detective became the star, and Inspector Clouseau was born. Then he cast Peter Sellers as the detective, and everything changed. In the early 1960s, director Blake Edwards came up with an idea for a heist movie in which a jewel thief is having an affair with the wife of the detective who’s pursuing him.