I, Claudius 40th Anniversary: A Touch of Murder

In honor of the 40th Anniversary of the BBC-TV serial I, Claudius, I have decided to revive my old talkback threads (originated from the 30th anniversary of the American broadcasts in 2007-2008).

All Rome thought him a fool, but his genius was survival!

Episode 1: A Touch of Murder
Premiere Date UK: September 20, 1976. US: November 6, 1977)
Studio BBC/London Film Productions Ltd.
Producer Martin Lisemore
Director Herbert Wise
Writer Jack Pulman (Based on the book by Robert Graves)
Introducing Derek Jacobi as Claudius, Sian Phillips as Livia, Brian Blessed as Augustus, George Baker as Tiberius, Frances White as Julia, Sheila Ruskin as Vispania, Renu Senta as Musa, Freda Dowie as the Sybil.
Guest starring Christopher Guard as Marcellus, John Paul as Marcus Agrippa, Angela Morant as Octavia

Emperor Tiberius Claudius Drusus Nero Germanicus writes his autobiography about himself and his Imperial Family...
24 BC. Six years have passed since Augustus became Emperor of Rome. The Republic has been dissolved, taking with it its power struggles, its civil wars, and presumably the thirst for power. Rome is now under a monarchy by Augustus. His influential wife Livia intends to maintain that power. She plans to make her son Tiberius the successor. But two men stand in her way: Marcus Agrippa, Augustus’ best friend, and Marcellus, Augustus’ nephew and son-in-law to his daughter Julia. Livia takes some drastic measures to have her way. Things don’t happen the way she wants.

Death(s) of the episode: Marcellus: Food Poisoning (Livia says so!)
Memorable quotes: (Some of these lines are paraphrased, but I think I got the point through)
"I ought to begin by saying that some people are going to be more shocked by this series than most of the dramas we've shown on Masterpiece Theatre. But Robert Graves did not make it more cruel or more gamey than the manuscript of Suetonius from which he worked...Graves left in only what is essential to the historical plot. Violence is not known for titillation. And there's no pretense that a sexual orgy is some sort of launch pad into a liberating Playboy philosophy. Vice is shown for what it is, and even the monster Caligula described his court as a sink of degradation- he did not think of incest or group sex as a new form of freedom. He knew it as a certain sign of the decadence of his times." - Alistair Cooke’s introduction for Episode 1 in the Masterpiece Theatre broadcast.

"And when he's dumb and no more here, nineteen hundred years or near, Cla-Cla-Claudius shall speak clear." -Sybil

"The Theatre isn't what it was." -Thallus
"No, and I will tell you something else. It never was what it was." -Aristarches

"I took the entrails of you [Tiberius] and they were very favorable." -Livia
"Not that old chicken story again." - Tiberius

"Frankly, I wouldn't have thought you'd care whether Marcellus lives or dies." -Tiberius
"Oh I care very much whether Marcellus lives or dies." -Livia

"Aren't you forgetting something? Julia is still married to Marcellus, and Marcellus isn't dead yet." -Tiberius
"When I start forgetting things, you can light my funeral pyre with me on it, alive or dead." -Livia

"There ought to be an inquest I suppose." - Musa
"There is no need for that. We know what he died from." -Livia
"Do we?" -Musa
"Food poisoning! Why you said it yourself!"- Livia

"I wish, for once, you'd behave like a normal woman!" -Tiberius
"To be a normal woman you'd need normal men around you!" -Livia

Trivia:
-The Battle of Actium (31 BC) was the decisive naval battle between Egypt and Rome. Augustus’ fleet (thru Agrippa’s fine naval skills) defeated the ships of Marc Antony and Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, eventually establishing his dominance as ruler of the known world.
-Augustus and Livia’s children came from previous marriages. Augustus' wife Scribonia gave him his only child Julia. Livia's marriage to Tiberius Claudius Nero bore Tiberius and Drusus. Likewise, Augustus' sister Octavia had two children from her first marriage (Marcus Claudius Marcellus), Marcellus and Marcella. Her marriage to Marc Antony bore Antonia the Elder (who is absent from the series) and Antonia the Younger (who appears as a child in this episode, soon to play an important role later). Marcus Agrippa had two marriages before Julia. His first gave him a daughter, Vispania (seen here as Tiberius' wife). His second wife was Marcellus' sister Marcella (no wonder the marriage was a failure!).
-The 'Uncle Julius' Augustus refers to at the games is his grand uncle Gaius Julius Caesar: General, Statesman, and Dictator.
-This series was the first successful filming of Robert Graves’ book. The last attempt was a 1937 Alexander Korda production directed by Josef Von Sternberg and starring Charles Laughton (Claudius), Emlyn Williams (Caligula), Flora Robson (Livia), and Merle Oberon (Messalina). Oberon's injury in a car accident led to the production's demise after only a few scenes of footage was shot (The unfinished footage was seen in a 1965 BBC documentary The Epic That Never Was, which is available in most VHS/DVD collections of the BBC adaptation). This sparked the rumor of a curse following every adaptation. Indeed, some problems plaguing the production of this series were attributed to this curse.
-John Paul (Agrippa) has appeared in a previous TV serial about the Julio-Claudians, Granada's The Caesars (1968), which starred Roland Culver as Augustus, Andre Morell as Tiberius, Freddie Jones as Claudius, Barrie Ingham as Sejanus, Ralph Bates as Caligula, Sonia Dresdel as Livia, and Caroline Blakiston as Agrippina.
-Production was delayed due to copyright negotiations with the owners of the last adaptation.
-Both Charlton Heston and Ronnie Barker were considered for the title role.
-George Baker (Tiberius) and Frances White (Julia) were about the same age or older than the actors playing their parents, Sian Phillips (Livia) and Brian Blessed (Augustus). Incidentally, the ages of Augustus and Livia in this episode were actually near their players' ages, quite unlike Baker and White playing teenagers at their mature ages.
-To play his part, the 46-year-old George Baker had to take a serious diet and massive exercise of jogging, bicycling, and swimming to be in the right build for the younger Tiberius. Seventeen years earlier, Baker had done a screen test for Ben-Hur (1959; featuring George Relph as Tiberius and another Tiberius- from the 1968 TV serial The Caesars- Andre Morell). This test scene exists in that film's extras on DVD and Blu-Ray.
-Peter O’Toole, Sian Phillips' husband at the time, would portray Tiberius in Bob Guccione’s Porno epic Caligula, filmed around the same time. When his own production Rogue Male got the cover of the BBC Radio Times Magazine instead of this serial, the cast shunned him.
-It was decided by the BBC to broadcast this episode and the second episode ("Family Affairs") together on its premiere. As a result, certain parts were excised: the Nubian dance at the Actium anniversary banquet was shortened, Livia's talk with Octavia about Antonia was shortened, and the ending about Old Claudius was removed.
-When the series was broadcast in the United States, its subject matter was a major problem for WGBH-TV, the station that aired Masterpiece Theatre. The station had already received controversy for earlier programs like Jude the Obscure (for showing an exposed breast), and Poldark (sex scenes). For I, Claudius, certain edits were made in its original US broadcast. The banquet dance with topless Nubian women, deemed too racy and racially condescending, was the first to be excised.