Popeye

Popeye (1980)

Timing: 1:54 (114 min)

5.532/10
678

5.779/10
1478

5.4/10
37000

All about film

Video 2

Photo 59

Actors and characters

Release date

1980-12-12

Country

United States

Production

Paramount, Walt Disney Productions, Robert Evans Company, King Features Syndicate

Genre

Action, Adventure, Comedy, Family

Budget

$20 000 000

Revenue

$49 823 037

Website

Director

Robert Altman

Actors

Robin Williams, Shelley Duvall, Ray Walston, Paul Dooley, Paul L. Smith, Richard Libertini, Donald Moffat, MacIntyre Dixon, Roberta Maxwell, Donovan Scott
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Robert Evans, C.O. Erickson

Operator

Giuseppe Rotunno

Composer

Harry Nilsson

Artist

Reg Bream

Audition

Editing

John W. Holmes, David A. Simmons
All team (50)

• The large-scale set of the fictional town of Sweethaven was built in Anchor Bay on the northwest of the island of Malta. After filming, it became a popular tourist attraction. Popeye Village is open to visitors daily, and many of the houses retain furnishings from the time of the film's production.
• Many of the actors portraying the residents of Sweethaven, especially those with unusual appearances or physical abilities, were recruited from various European circus groups.
• Paramount Pictures gave the green light to the project after losing the battle for the rights to adapt "Annie" (1982).
• The roles of Popeye and Olive Oyl were initially intended for Dustin Hoffman and Gilda Radner. Dustin Hoffman left the project due to disagreement with the choice of Jules Pfeiffer as screenwriter. Gilda Radner's candidacy was promoted by the producers, but the director preferred Shelley Duvall.
• At different times, Mike Nichols, Arthur Penn, and Hal Ashby could have taken the director's chair.
• Much of Robin Williams' mumbling as Popeye was unintelligible to viewers after filming was completed. The actor had to re-record a significant portion of the dialogue during post-production.
• The roles in "Popeye" marked Robin Williams' and Linda Hunt's film debuts.
• Many of the sunken ships in the harbor were perfectly seaworthy vessels that were bought or rented, and then deliberately scuttled in shallow water.
• Shelly Duvall sang all of her own songs in the film.
• Composer Harry Nilsson took breaks from working on his album 'Flash Harry' to write the music for the film. He wrote all the original songs and co-produced the soundtrack with Bruce Robb at Cherokee Studios.
• At one point early in production, the role of Olive Oyl was assigned to Lily Tomlin.
• The baby, Swee'pea, was played by Robert Altman's grandson, Wesley Ivan Hurt.
• Composer Harry Nilsson took breaks from working on his album 'Flash Harry' to write the music for the film. He wrote all the original songs and served as co-producer of the soundtrack alongside Bruce Robb at Cherokee Studios.