Richard III (1955)

Richard III: A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!

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George, Duke of Clarence: [speaking about Edward IV, who has sent Clarence to the Tower] He hearkens after dreams and prophecies / And from the crossrow plucks the letter 'G', / And says a wizard told him that by 'G' / His issue disinherited would be. / And for my name of George begins with G / It follows in his thoughts that I am he. /These and such like toys /Have moved his Highness to commit me now.

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Richard III: Look how my ring encompasseth thy finger. Even so thy breast encloseth my poor heart. Wear both of them, for both of them are thine.

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Filming of Clarence's murder in the Tower of London could have been completed in one day, but was lengthened to three days. The actor playing one of the murderers was short of work and Laurence Olivier was helping him out.
The liner notes on the Criterion Collection's DVD of this film states mistakenly that NBC-TV's premiere broadcast of the film in March 1956 was in black-and-white. Actually, NBC, the network that prided itself as the color pioneer of the three major U.S. TV networks at the time, did indeed run the movie in color. In fact, the Arts and Leisure section of the New York Times, dated March 11, lists numerous advertisements by Manhattan merchandisers for new color television sets, coinciding with the Sunday afternoon broadcast of the movie.
The first film to have its U.S. premiere in theaters and on TV simultaneously. This occurred on the afternoon of 11 March 1956, when NBC-TV broadcast the film on the same day it had its U.S. premiere in New York. (It had already had its world premiere and first run in London in 1955.) The telecast was the longest single presentation of a film or play (three hours counting the commercials) ever shown on TV up to that time. Classic British films presented by J. Arthur Rank, such as Caesar and Cleopatra, had already made their network TV debuts on an ABC-TV program titled "Famous Film Festival", but many of these were either drastically cut to fit a ninety-minute time slot or shown in two parts. Walt Disney had already begun, on his Disneyland TV program, to telecast some of his theatrical films, but these were shown in two or more one-hour segments, one segment per week, or edited down to one hour, as in the case ofAlice in Wonderland . It was not until CBS showed The Wizard of Oz in 1956, that an uncut, full-length theatrical film was shown on network TV during prime time in one evening.
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