Cubby Broccoli Docked Dick Van Dyke $80,000 From Chitty Wages For Visiting Sick Wife
Bond filmmaker Albert Broccoli didn’t get to where he was without having a close eye on his financials.
But according to Dick Van Dyke, who worked with the legendary producer on ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’, he might have lacked some in the empathy department.
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Van Dyke, now 90, has recalled working with 'Cubby’ on the classic family movie, which was based on the novel penned by Bond writer Ian Fleming, and written for the screen by Roald Dahl.
In an extract from his new memoirs, published in the Daily Mail, he branded Broccoli 'tight-fisted’.
“Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was a movie that I repeatedly turned down,” he writes.
“The movie’s producer, Albert ‘Cubby’ Broccoli, known for his tight-fisted control of the James Bond movie franchise, desperately wanted to re-team Julie Andrews and me after the success we’d enjoyed with Mary Poppins.
“I can’t speak for Julie’s reasons, but both of us turned him down. I thought the script had too many holes and unanswered questions. However, each time I said no, Cubby came back with more money. I’m talking serious money – more than seven figures, which in those days was mind-boggling, plus a percentage of the back end, which I never counted on. So I finally agreed.”
However, when his first wife Margie was suspected to have cervical cancer, Van Dyke had to leave the set to be with her while she underwent tests.
“When I told Cubby that I needed to go home and be with my wife while she had more examinations, he understood and wished me well,” Van Dyke went on.
“I was gone only a few days. Margie’s tests came back negative and I jetted back to Europe, only to have my agent inform me that Cubby had docked me $80,000 for missing work.
“Furious, I didn’t want to talk to him after that, which wasn’t good since I was already unimpressed with the director, Ken Hughes.
“Quite simply, I thought he was wrong for the picture. One day I heard him grouse that he had to rewrite Roald Dahl’s script. Who rewrote Roald Dahl?
“I know the film is beloved by many but for me it lacked the magic of Mary Poppins, which its producer had hoped to emulate.”
He also added that working with Julie Andrews on ‘Poppins’ was ‘a challenge’, but for the right reasons.
“[Her voice] scared me to death. It could have been used to tune a piano,” he writes.
“She was pitch-perfect – and I never was. Recording with her was a challenge.”
Image credits: Rex Features
