Elizabeth Taylor was also offered a disguised cameo (as a grizzled sailor named Chesty) but declined the role after she realized how intense and painful the makeup would be.
According to some reports, Frank Sinatra's heavily disguised cameo appearance in film was actually the work of facially similar actor Dave Willock; Sinatra only appeared at end of the film in unmasking sequence where he peeled off makeup.
Actor Jan Merlin reportedly played several of the alleged star cameos in the movie (including Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum); according to Merlin, the big-name actors never appeared in the film proper and only shot close-ups for an epilogue peeling off their heavy make-up. Merlin used his experiences as the basis of a thinly-veiled novel about the filming of the movie titled 'Shooting Montezuma'.