wasn't Bergman a bit old??
??
shareHell yeah! Joan was 16 when she started leading armies, and 21 when she died.
Bergman's age has been commented on ever since the film began, but face it. Finding a 16-year-old who can play the role isn't happening.
there 20 year old actresses like ann blyth
shareYes, Blyth was good enough in her range, but the role of Joan of Arc is insanely difficult. She's got to be so brilliant and charismatic that the audience BELIEVES that kings will listen to this little girl and armies will follow her! Young actresses don't usually have the capacity to grab an audience by the naughty bits and force them to take her seriously, to hold the center stage like a Diva, that sort of thing is necessary to the role and seems to require experience at being a STAR!
The best-known version of the story was the George Bernard Shaw play, which was written for Sybil Thorndyke, who was forty-odd when she bowled the world over playing a teenager onstage. But that kind of age-fudging can't be done on film, and when someone tried to make a film of the play with the young Jean Seberg in the lead, the results were disastrous. Well, I can't say I think much of Bergman in the role either, she was an excellent actress but well, charisma and grabbing the center of attention weren't her strong points. She wasn't just too old for the role, she was too subtle.