The William Tell trail- Errol Flynn`s swashbuckling swansong

Dear Flynn Fans,

thanks David for welcoming me aboard (schooner or pirate ship that is?).

I`ve been a big fan of Errol since the age of ten when I saw Robin Hood for the first time on TV.

Now 33 years later I dig for bits and pieces in all four corners of the globe concerning his abandoned William Tell- film.

We all agree that it would have been his second coming of Robin Hood and an instant resurrection of his career.

I dub this project: “The greatest film never seen on the silver screen.”

Fortunately one Austrian actress which was part of the cast still lives  in Vienna and granted me an interview.

Mrs. Waltraut Haas remembered well her role of Mary and recalled some of the circumstances of the shooting in Courmayeur.

Most of all she was full of praise of Errol, his humour and gentleman attitude (he liked to flirt, but respected boundaries).

She told me when present, he was the first on the set, knowing well his lines.

She was rented out from German production firm “Herzog Film” for a rehearsing scene and beat out Vira Silenti by choice of Jack Cardiff.

She was friendly with Pat Crawley, wife of  the “whats-his-name- boxer” and had a daily budget of 1000 Lira, which sometimes they used for movie tickets instead of meals.

One night Errol and his entourage went out to a Hillside Casino and meet with Gina Lollobrigida and her Serb husband, which was speaking German well, so they got along well.

When they met again years later at a Biennale in Berlin and greeted each other, la Lollo had forgotten about their brief encounter and asked Mrs. Haas, where from she knew her husband?

“From the Casino!”, replied Mrs. Haas, unaware that casino means also “brothel” in Italian when not pronounced perfectly right.

She confirmed that in her dying scene her dress was torn up by the Habsburgian henchman Jost and her bussom would have shown- the mother of all Nipplegate affairs so to speak.

This might have attracted the interest of King Farouk, which wanted to meet her in Rome.

When she resisted, Mrs. Haas said, that she took some heat from cast and crew (not from Errol!) for shunning the possible sponsor.

Quite interesting was that she mentioned filmmaker Roberto Rosselini being interested in helping out to finish the film some time later on.

By then young Guido Martufi had grown considerably and that in reality this was the final deathblow to the project.

For unpaid hotel bills the Cinemascope lense, which the camera man (Hermann?) had personally vouched for, was taken away.

He promptly suffered a heart attack. I will now search for more information south of the Austrian border, in Italy and will try to contact the other female lead, Mrs. Antonella Lualdi and her husband Franco Interlenghi in Rome.

If I succeed, I plan to write everything into a book called: “The William Tell trail- Errol Flynn`s swashbuckling swansong.”

But you will read it  here first, since you are all good sports!

Bye for now, Heinz

— shangheinz