GENERAL KLYTUS: From Behind the Mask

Written by Peter Wyngarde

For those of you who don’t know, General Klytus was the characterization of Lorenzo Semple Jr; he never appeared in Alex Raymond’s original comic strips. According to some sources – including Dino de Laurentiis, the character wasn’t supposed to be in the film we now know and love, but was to take over from Ming in the sequel. I heard this when I was summoned to Dino’s office at Shepperton Studio’s before filming commenced on the original film.

He wasn’t there when I arrived, so I was met by his secretary. I was told he’d had to make a trip to Amsterdam to pay for a piece of the set which hadn’t as yet been paid for. The shoot couldn’t begin until that piece of backdrop arrived.

The secretary asked me if I’d like a drink so I said, “Yes. A large Scotch”, but was told that they didn’t have any of the hard stuff in the office, so I was offered a cup of tea!

When Dino finally arrived, the first thing he asked me was if I’d read ‘The Invisible Man’ by H.G. Welles. I said I had, to which he inquired if I’d be interested in starring in a remake of the film. I was flabbergasted, but then I’d come across Dino before (although he didn’t remember [1]), so I knew he was capable of dropping just this kind of thing on people.

Some years ago, I’d been asked to appear in a film version of Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’. After I’d done the make-up test with the lovely Audrey Hepburn, I was told to wait for a shooting date. This never seemed to come, so when I was given the opportunity to do a Peter Schaffer’s film, ‘The Salt Land’ [2], I jumped at the chance. Peter Schaffer, of course, won the Academy Award for writing the script for ‘Amadeus’.

We’d just got to the last part of the shoot on ‘The Salt Land’, when I received a call to be in Rome the next day to start on the huge ballroom scene on ‘War and Peace’.

I immediately rang my agent to tell him of the ridiculous situation I was in, so he ‘phoned the producer, Dino de Laurentiis, who replied in no uncertain terms that, if I wasn’t in Rome within the next 24 hours, not only would I be out from the film, but my contract with Paramount would be null and void!

Well, that’s exactly what happened, as I chose to finish ‘The Salt Land’. And yet, strangely, here I was – not only about to play Klytus in a de Laurentiis production, but also I was being presented with an opportunity to play the lead in his remake of ‘The Invisible Man’! Should I tell him we’d met before and risk getting sacked? I’m glad I did, as he told me in the strictest confidence about the sequel which had already been written by Semple. It was then that he divulged to me that, at the end of the first film, after Ming dies, that a gloved hand would reach from out of shot and pick up the Emperor’s mystical ring. That gloved hand would belong to Klytus.

The idea for the sequel was that Klytus would find the lost city of Atlantis, from where he’d rule a far more ghastly kingdom than had been run by Ming. Unfortunately, I didn’t get much more from him as he was called away.

The original black and white version of ‘Flash Gordon’, had a slightly podgier Flash, and a wonderfully saturnine Ming played by Charles Middleton, who often played the baddy in cowboy and gangster films. Above all, I remember fondly the little Sky Rockets in the series – suspended on wires which were clearly visible on the screen – going ‘Phuff! Phuff! Phuff!’ I loved that! I think they were shown every Saturday morning at the cinema.

The one thing I remember most about shooting the film was the weight of the costume; it was an absolute ton! We were provided with these sort of ironing board things that we could lean on between takes. Another difficulty was not being able to see the other characters, all of whom were wonderfully cast, with a mask over my face.

We tried several shots with me wearing the mask, but found that there was just a muffled sound coming out; there was certainly no personality. Klytus was in danger as coming across as a very bad Darth Vader – or Man in the Iron Mask: lovely to look at, but completely MUTE!

Below: Peter in the white version of the costume, with Ornella Muti as Princess Aura

Finally, we discovered that the problem was all to do with the mechanism in the jaw. To begin with, all we heard was a loud ‘Click! Click! Click!’ That was until the correct angle was found. It took seven more takes before the clickety-click was solved. During a scene with another character, it sounded as if the actor opposite me was wearing false teeth! At one point, we almost gave up. I thought that I might have to forfeit the part, but we persevered until, finally, we found the right balance.

As many of you will know, the senior designer on the film did many of the Fellini movies, so when I visited the set for the first time and saw all the costumes, I felt that I could be in any of his fabulous movies. I loved looking around the sets, even when I wasn’t shooting just to soak up the atmosphere. I saw my mask recently at Yardo in Piccadilly. How I wish I’d kept it as it really was a work of art, and even without me in it, it had a personality of its own.

The mask was designed and made in Italy, and cost around £5,000 to make at the time. Originally had two costumes; a black and a virgin white version – the latter of which I was to wear in the scenes with Princess Aura. I felt, though, that the white one looked a bit like something that’d be worn in a pantomime, so I decided to stick with the black one throughout the film.  

Notes: [1] In the 1950’s, Peter had signed a five-year contract with Paramount. [2] Click here for ‘International Theatre: The Salt Land’. Broadcast: 8th November, 1955.

Click below for more on General Klytus and Flash Gordon…

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