BYU

Harold B. Lee Library

The Robe

The RobeRichard Burton, Jean Simmons, Michael Rennie, Victor Mature, Jay Robinson, Dean Jagger

  • Time: 7:00 PM
  • Date: Friday, March 21, 2008
  • Place: HBLL Auditorium, 1st Floor; Admission is free; arrive early for seats.


About the Event
Lloyd C. Douglas’s popular novel of the robe of the Christ and its effect on the Roman tribune who crucified Him and the tribune’s slave was chosen to be the first motion picture produced in the revolutionary widescreen process of CinemaScope. Advertising copy hailed it as the “Modern Miracle You See Without Glasses!,”taking a swipe at the then-current fad of 3-D movies requiring cumbersome eyewear. The Robe made a star of Welsh actor Burton (as Tribune Marcus Gallio) and set the standard for a decade-long series of religious and historical spectacles, as well as large format movies, that are enjoyed today. Producer and studio head Darryl F. Zanuck and screenwriter Philip Dunne took an innovative approach to the subject, creating, in Dunne’s words, “an example of the right way to dramatize the story of Jesus: obliquely, through other characters.” We are screening an extremely rare CinemaScope print so that The Robe may be seen as record-number audiences saw it in 1953. The papers of Director Henry Koster are preserved in the L. Tom Perry Special Collections. 20th Century-Fox. 1953. 135 mins. Dye-transfer Technicolor. CinemaScope. Director: Henry Koster.
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