Trivia for
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

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• Morgan Fairchild, who was active in Dallas theatre, began her film career in this film as Faye Dunaway's stand-in.
  
  
• Jane Fonda turned down the role of Bonnie Parker. Living in France at the time, she did not want to relocate to the U.S. for the part.
  
  
• The film has a dynamic soundtrack that gets much louder during the gunfights. The British premiere of the film was notable because the projectionist previewed the film and thought the volume changes were a mistake, so he made careful notes for when to turn it up and when to turn it down so that the volume was "corrected."
  
  

• Visitors to Alcatraz Island near San Francisco might be interested to see where the couple's real-life driver Floyd Hamilton was imprisoned. It was cell #26 located in the D Block.
  
  
• The character "C.W. Moss" is a fictionalized composite of two members of the Barrow gang: William Daniel "W.D." Jones, and Henry Methvin.
  
  
• Michael J. Pollard's character, C.W. Moss, is a conglomeration of all of Bonnie and Clyde's minor sidekicks including: Ralph Fultz (their first sidekick), W.D. Jones (who was an attendant at the gas station owned by Clyde's father), Ray Hamilton, and Henry Methvin (who's father made the deal with Frank Hamer to set Bonnie and Clyde up).
  
  
• The first choice for director, François Truffaut, expressed a keen interest in the project and may have even been involved in the development of the screenplay (it was supposedly at Truffaut's insistence that the real-life Clyde Barrow's bisexuality was eliminated from the film). However, before filming could begin, the opportunity arose for Truffaut to make Fahrenheit 451 (1966), a long-cherished project of his, and he dropped out to make that film instead.
  
  
• After François Truffaut's departure from the project, the producers approached Jean-Luc Godard. Some sources claim Godard didn't trust Hollywood and refused; other allege he planned to change Bonnie and Clyde to teenagers and relocate the story to Japan, prompting the film's investors to force him off the project.
  
  
• Warner Bros. gave the movie a limited, "B" movie-type release at first, sending it to drive-ins and lesser theaters. When critics began raving about the film and young people began to show up at screenings, it was better promoted, given a wider release and became a huge hit.
  
  
• For the climactic massacre, Faye Dunaway's leg had to be tied to the gear shift to prevent her from falling completely out of the rocking car
  
  
• The real Clyde Barrow was rumored to be bisexual and Warren Beatty was willing to play the part that way, but director Arthur Penn talked him out of it. He was impotent instead.
  
  
• Thousand of berets were sold worldwide after Faye Dunaway wore them in this film.
  
  
• Other actresses considered for the role of Bonnie Parker included Tuesday Weld, Ann-Margret, Carol Lynley and Sue Lyon.
  
  
• The poem that Bonnie is reading as the police open fire on the rented flat is "The Story of Suicide Sal" written by Bonnie Parker in 1932.
  
  
• In a 1968 interview, Warren Beatty mentioned that his last conversation with ex-girlfriend Natalie Wood took place in the summer of 1966 when he tried unsuccessfully to get her to play Bonnie Parker in his film. Later that evening, she attempted to take her own life and was discovered by her live-in housekeeper.
  
  
• The movie that Bonnie and Clyde go to see after their botched bank robbery when C.W. Moss parallel parked their get away car was Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933).
  
  
• C.W. Moss mentions, in the first scene with Buck and Blanche, that Myrna Loy is his favorite movie star. Loy was supposedly a favorite actress of John Dillinger. In fact, when he was gunned down outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago, the film he had just seen was Manhattan Melodrama (1934), in which Loy starred.
  
  
• Gene Hackman was on the set one day when he noticed a guy standing behind him and staring. The man said, "Hell, Buck would've never wore a hat like that." Hackman turned around and looked at him and said, "Maybe not." He looked like an old Texas farmer. The man introduced himself and said, "Nice to meet you - I'm one of the Barrows."
  
  
• The movie's line "We rob banks." was voted as the #41 movie quote by the American Film Institute (out of 100).
  
  
• In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked this as the #42 Greatest Movie of All Time.
  
  
• Cher auditioned for the role of Bonnie Parker, but when her husband/manager at the time, Sonny Bono, heard about the audition, he was furious at Warren Beatty for letting his wife audition for such a "controversial film".
  
  
• Premiere voted this movie as one of "The 25 Most Dangerous Movies".
  
  
• During one of the bank robberies, Buck Barrow (Gene Hackman) does a leap over the tellers' cage. This was a stunt routinely pulled by John Dillinger, who in turn learned it from watching Douglas Fairbanks in the “Zorro” movies.
  
  
• The family gathering scene was filmed in Red Oak, Texas. Several local residents were watching the film being shot, when the filmmakers noticed Mabel Cavitt, a local school teacher, among the people gathered. She was chosen then and there to play Bonnie Parker's mother.
  
  
• The car that the real Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow met their fate in is currently on display (along with Barrow's bullet-riddled shirt) in Primm Valley Hotel and Casino in Primm, NV, 20 miles outside of Las Vegas near the California border. The prop car used in the film was displayed as part of a "Bonnie and Clyde" diorama at Planet Hollywood Dallas, in Dallas, TX. The Planet Hollywood in Dallas closed in 2001 and the car is now owned by a private collector.
  
  
• When Warren Beatty was on board as producer only, his sister Shirley MacLaine was a strong possibility to play Bonnie. But when Beatty decided to play Clyde himself, for obvious reasons he decided not use MacLaine.
  
  
• Bonnie Parker was 4'10" tall, nine inches shorter than Faye Dunaway.
  
  
• Warner Brothers had so little faith in the film that, in an unprecedented move, it offered its first-time producer Warren Beatty 40% of the gross instead of a minimal fee. The movie then went on to gross over $50 million.
  
  
• A crucial fact left out of the movie was that Bonnie Parker was virtually incapacitated for the last year of her life from a car wreck. Clyde Barrow was driving fast down a lonely country road in Texas when he came upon a washed-out bridge. Unable to stop in time, the car went over the edge crashed and into the creek. The force of the impact jarred Bonnie's seat forward, pinning her in the car as it began to catch fire. She received severe burns on the backs of her legs that made it difficult to walk. She would either limp or was carried by Clyde. She was, in fact, injured at the time of the nighttime tourist court shootout and the field shootout (where Buck was killed) that occur near the end of the film.
  
  
• The story of Bonnie Parker smoking a cigar in a picture is accurate. She did it as a joke. But after the shootout at the bungalow in Joplin, MO, police found the photos the gang had taken and published the photo of Bonnie, thereby leading to her unearned rep as a "Cigar Smokin' Gun Moll".
  
  
• Debut of Gene Wilder.
  
  
• In one scene, while holding up a bank, Clyde Barrow tells a farmer he can keep his own money. ("Is that your money or the bank's?" "It's mine." "You keep it then.") In real life, it was bank robber Pretty Boy Floyd who allowed a farmer to keep his own money during a holdup.
  
  
• Morgan Woodward was originally slated to play Frank Hamer, but he was held up when filming of Cool Hand Luke (1967) fell behind, so the part was given to Denver Pyle.
  
  
• In a TV interview director Arthur Penn pointed out that this film shows for the first time the firing of a gun and the consequences in one single frame. Before that you would see a gun being fired, then cut and the next scene shows the bleeding body. In Bonnie and Clyde you see a gun being fired into the face of a person without inter cut. This was incredible at the time and would have been censored in the past.
  
  
• According to the film makers in the Special Edition DVD Documentary, the scene in which Clyde shoots the man on the running board marks the first time in film in which the shot being fired and the man being shot are both in the same frame.
  
  
• According to Warren Beatty in the Special Addition DVD documentary, in the death scene, the make up department fixed a fake scalp over his real hair with a line so that while he was being shot, it would look like his head was being blown off. Beatty says that partially the reason why he had the fruit in his hand was that the moment he squeezed the fruit was supposed to signal the make up artist to pull the line and rip the scalp off. However, when the scene was being filmed, the artist was so nervous that he forgot to pull the line. By the same token, Faye Dunaway mentions that the make up artists also put appliances over her face that were also wired so that when she was being shot they would yank off the flesh colored covers.
  
  
• In the Special Edition DVD Documentary, Estelle Parsons says she was the only member of the cast who actually researched the history of the Barrow Gang. She also says that early in the filming, she wanted to meet the real Blanche Barrow but Warren Beatty, in his capacity as the producer, was against the idea. Finally, after a week, Warren relented and set up a meeting with Blanche, but at that point Parsons lost interest and never met Blanche.
  
  
• Future film maker Curtis Hanson, who began his career as a photographer, took a series of modeling photos of Faye Dunaway which helped to get her the job as Bonnie Parker. According to Hanson on the Special Edition DVD Documentary, when Dunaway came under consideration, Warren Beatty called him and asked Hanson to bring a slide show presentation of the photos to show to both Beatty and Arthur Penn. After viewing the photos, Dunaway was cast. According to Hanson, Warren Beatty wanted to pay him for the photos but Hanson instead asked to accompany them to Texas so he could observe the filming to which Beatty agreed.
  
  
• Screen writer Robert Towne did uncredited work as a story consultant on the movie. He is featured in interviews for the Special Edition DVD Documentary.
  
  
• Another aspect of David Newman and Robert Benton's script, which was apart the idea of Clyde being bi-sexual, is that there was a three-way relationship between Bonnie, Clyde, and C.W. As part of Arthur Penn's decision to cut out Clyde's bi-sexuality, that aspect was eliminated as well. Also, according to Arthur Penn, C.W. was originally written as a "dumb stud" built like a football player. This idea was also dropped when Warren Beatty recommended Michael J. Pollard for the role.
  
  
• Near the end of the film, Bonnie and Clyde are lying in bed discussing marriage. It is interesting to note that in real life, Bonnie was already married. She had married her high school sweetheart, Roy Thorton before meeting Clyde. Thorton was a petty criminal who was sent to prison for life for murder. Despite his conviction, Bonnie never divorced him and to the day she died, Bonnie Parker was officially "Mrs. Roy Thorton".
  
  
• As incredible as it may seem, Blanche Barrow really did run out of the house in hysterics during the first shoot out. As shown in the movie, the gang really did have to drive through withering gunfire to pick her up.
  
  
• The final moment of the field shoot out in which the posse surrounds a dying Buck and a hysterical Blanche is based on the rare "action" photo taken of that moment.
  
  
• The characters Eugene Grizzard and Velma Davis (played by Gene Wilder and Evans Evans) are based on Dillard Darby and Sophia Stone of Ruston, Louisiana. On the night of April 27, 1933, Darby and Stone were briefly kidnapped by the Barrow gang, who had stolen Darby's car. After driving around Ruston for several hours, Darby and Stone were released unharmed. During the drive, when Darby mentioned that he was an undertaker, Bonnie Parker remarked, "Well, maybe you'll work on me someday." A year later, Darby did just that. He was one of the undertakers who worked on Bonnie Parker's body after she and Clyde Barrow were killed in the roadside ambush near Gibsland, Louisiana, in May, 1934.
  
  

• SPOILER: Contrary to the film's portrayal of Blanche Barrow inadvertently divulging the identity of C.W. Moss to Texas Ranger Frank Hamer, thereby setting Bonnie and Clyde's deaths in motion, in real life Hamer found Bonnie and Clyde through simple tracking methods. Hamer knew that they traveled in a loop. They would routinely start in Dallas, move north through Oklahoma and Kansas, cut east to Missouri, south to Arkansas and Louisiana, and west back to Dallas. Knowing that gang member Henry Methvin (on whom the C.W. Moss character is partly based) had family in Louisiana, Hamer struck a deal with Methvin's father (as seen in the movie) to set up Bonnie and Clyde.
  
  

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