Trivia: Filming was delayed for several weeks after Anthony Hopkins fell from a horse and broke his arm. In several scenes, his armor is concealing a plaster cast. Director Anthony Harvey was stricken with hepatitis, causing further delays in post-production editing. Only Katharine Hepburn's intervention stopped the film's Hollywood backers from handing editing duties off to someone else and from possibly shelving the entire project. (From the director's DVD commentary.)
Trivia: When Vincent Price, "The King of Hams", once got into an argument with the very promising 25-year-old British director Michael Reeves during this film's shooting, he said: "I've made eighty-seven movies." Reeves responded: "I've made three good ones."
Trivia: Ava Gardner plays Empress Elizabeth, the mother of Archduke Rudolf (Omar Sharif). In real life, Gardner was only ten years older than Sharif.