Marathon Man

Sir Laurence Olivier took the role of Dr. Szell in part to leave a great deal of money to his wife and children, as he expected to die from the cancer that afflicted him throughout production. He performed the role while undergoing treatment for his cancer, which included heavy doses of painkillers to allow him to work every day. The pain medication affected his memory, and at times Olivier could not remember more than one or two of his lines at a time. In a testament to his fierce concentration, his performance garnered rave reviews and an Oscar nomination, and despite working under such aggressive medical treatment, he experienced a full recovery, allowing him to enjoy the success of this movie, and a series of leading roles that followed.

Producer Robert Evans was set upon getting Sir Laurence Olivier to play the role of Dr. Szell. However, because Olivier at the time was riddled with cancer, he was uninsurable, so Paramount Pictures refused to use him. Desperate, Evans called his friends Merle Oberon and David Niven to arrange a meeting with the House of Lords (the upper body of the British parliament). There, he urged them to put pressure on Lloyd's of London to insure Britain's greatest living actor. The ploy succeeded, and a frail Olivier started working on this movie. In the end, not only did he net an Oscar nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, but his cancer also went into remission. Olivier lived on for another thirteen years.

Roy Scheider received the book while filming Jaws (1975). He finished the book in one night. The next day, he told the man who had given him the book that it was a great book, and would make a great movie, though he was disappointed that the character he found most interesting, Henry Levy, died halfway through the book. Only a year later, he was playing the role.

During the scene where the heavies try to drown Dustin Hoffman in the bathtub, Hoffman (always the method actor) insisted upon being made to stay underwater as long as possible to make it real. Several takes were done and Hoffman insisted on being kept down longer in the water. By the end of the scene, he had to be given oxygen. In his own words "I said 'Don't press on my Adam's apple, but try to really hold me under. Let me see how long I can stay under. Let me see if I can fight you. Let me see what happens.'"

A story circulated for a long time that Dustin Hoffman (being a "method actor") stayed up all night to play a character who has stayed up all night. Arriving on the set, Sir Laurence Olivier asked Hoffman why he looked the way he did. Hoffman told him, to which Olivier replied in jest "Why not try acting? It's much easier." Hoffman repeatedly denied the story, and finally cleared up the matter in 2004. The torture scene was filmed early in the morning, Hoffman was going through a divorce from his first wife and was depressed, and had spent the previous two nights partying hard. Hoffman told Olivier this and his comment related to his lifestyle and not his "method" style of acting.