Originally produced on Broadway in 1959 with Laurence Olivier as Becket and Anthony Quinn as King Henry. When Quinn left the play to make films, Olivier took over the role of Henry and Arthur Kennedy was brought in to play Becket.
Queen Eleanor was in actuality perhaps the wealthiest and most powerful woman in Europe, and hardly the figure portrayed in the play. Although here she remarks that she will complain to her uncle the emperor, she was not related to Frederick Barbarossa. Complaining to Frederick would have been awkward for a devout Catholic anyway, as he had himself been excommunicated in 1160 and was in a power struggle with the pope, establishing several rival antipopes before reconciling with Rome in 1177. Eleanor also says she will protest to her father, but her father died when Eleanor was 15, long before she met Henry.
Shot over a period of 12 weeks.
The closeness between King Henry and Becket is depicted as being a purely platonic one. Homosexuality was illegal at the time in Britain and any suggestion of that would have fallen foul of the censor.
The first film of Peter Jeffrey.
The original Broadway play on which this filmed production is based opened at the St. James Theater in New York on October 5, 1960 and ran for 193 performances. Its script "Becket" by Jean Anouilh (as the basis for the screenplay) won the 1961 Tony Award (New York City) for Best Play.
The play - and indeed the film - are riddled with factual inaccuracies as Jean Anouilh did practically no research once he learned the gist of the real story.
The plot device of Lord Gilbert having murdered a priest is added to the film. In the play, Becket comes into conflict with the King for different, and more historically accurate reasons.
This film met with the approbation of Jean Anouilh who - up till that point - hadn't been very impressed with adaptations of his work.
When the film premiered, director Peter Glenville was aghast to discover that producer Hal B. Wallis had inserted an interval halfway through the film.
When the play was due to open on the West End in London, Peter O'Toole was cast as Henry II. He had to break his contract however as he had just landed the lead in Lawrence of Arabia.
While it won a screenplay award, this film still holds jointly a record for the most Oscar category losses - 10. The other joint holders with 10 category losses are The turning Point, The Colour Purple, Gangs of New York, and True Grit.