SECURING THE KEYS TO VERSAILLES

Though Sofia Coppola always had her own original vision for the look of MARIE ANTOINETTE she hoped from the start to marry that with authentic locations. Her wish was granted when the French government gave her special permission to film in the Palace of Versailles, literally offering her the giant iron keys to the palace’s most off-limit rooms — from Marie Antoinette’s bedroom to the legendary Hall of Mirrors where Marie Antoinette once heard a young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart perform. Due to the Palace Director’s appreciation of Coppola’s work, she became the first filmmaker to ever gain widespread access to the vast historical monument. “I was given more access to Versailles than I was to the Park Hyatt in Tokyo for LOST IN TRANSLATION,” Coppola remarks.

One of the world’s most famous historical monuments, and an enduring symbol of wealth, royalty and luxury, the Château de Versailles was originally commissioned by King Louis XIV — who brought in the talented architect Jules Hardouin Monsart to create the largest palace in Europe on the site of his father’s old hunting lodge. The grand complex was surrounded by lavish gardens designed by André Le Nôtre, while the interiors were decorated by the celebrated painter Charles Brun. The walls were lined with the masterworks of French artists. The result, completed in the early 1680s, was a truly massive, gilded compound, capable of housing 20,000 – so large that historians note that by the 18th Century a significant portion of France’s faltering income was spent simply to maintain the palace.

With more than 700 rooms, 2,000 windows, 1,250 fireplaces, 67 staircases and some 1,800 acres of parkland lined with fountains, statues and formal gardens, Versailles provided an inimitable location for filming. “It was thrilling to shoot in the place where many of these events actually took place,” says Coppola. “And they gave us remarkable freedom. They actually let us park our trucks right in front of the palace and keep our camera equipment in Marie Antoinette’s bedroom.”

She continues: “We were able to shoot Marie Antoinette’s wedding in the real cathedral where she was married and, at the end of the film, we were able to shoot the scene where she goes out onto a balcony with the mob below where it actually happened. To be able to recreate these remarkable moments in the real places where they happened was a very spooky and unique experience.”

Yet the challenges were also very real. Production designer KK Barrett quickly realized that Versailles would be as tricky a location as it was inspirational. “When I heard that we would have unprecedented access to Versailles, I was very excited. Considering the scale of it and the wealth that was represented it would have been nearly impossible to replicate,” he says. “But the reality is that Versailles is a museum, a sort of frozen representation of how things were, and we had to find a way to somehow depict it as completely alive. Little by little, we were allowed to come in and embellish the rooms and bring in food and props and draperies to make it feel as if thousands of people were living there.”

For preservation’s sake, there were also numerous rules that had to be followed. “In some rooms, we couldn’t open the blinds because just exposure to sun could destroy the color in the fabric and or cause it to start to disintegrate,” Barrett explains. “We also couldn’t use any of the furniture in Versailles, which we immediately respected, but it meant we had the task of finding and bringing in our own furniture that would be competitive with the scale of what was already on the walls, which was pretty daunting.”

Despite the film’s intimacy, Versailles also gave Barrett a chance to indulge in a bit of wild ostentation. “There was a pattern of wealth and indulgence and decadence at Versailles that we took to heart and elaborated upon, while at the same time maintaining that kind of reckless innocence and naïveté that characterized Marie Antoinette,” he says. “It’s not the Old World of France that we see. Instead, everything is viewed through our Marie Antoinette’s rosecolored glasses.”

Once the cast arrived at Versailles, they too found themselves caught up in the grandeur of the place. “We were taken around and shown secret apartments and secret staircases and all these little rooms and buildings no one else is allowed to go into and it was truly amazing to have so much access to the past,” says Schwartzman. “One thing that I found so incredible was just the scale of it. Now when I go to London and see Buckingham Palace I think, ‘It’s so tiny.’”

Complicating matters throughout the shoot was the fact that Versailles is also a major tourist attraction, which remained largely open to the public during production. At one point, Schwartzman was walking in the gardens of Versailles in his full Louis XVI costume trying to get into character for an upcoming scene when a group of tourists came around the bend and surprised him. Comments Coppola: “He said he never broke character so I wonder if there were any reported Louis ghost sightings that day.

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Dunst's 'Marie Antoinette' sees royal court as wild party
Bowdoin Orient, ME - Oct 27, 2006
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University of South Alabama News, AL - Oct 25, 2006
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Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier, IA - Oct 26, 2006
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Chicago Sun-Times, United States - Oct 21, 2006
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Scotsman, United Kingdom - Oct 17, 2006
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French Confection
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The Village Voice: Drop-dead hip or cluelessly clueless? Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette, a candy-colored portrait of France's infamous teen queen, screening this weekend at the New York Film Festival before opening next Friday, is a graceful, charming, and sometimes witty confection—at least for its first hour.

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Thursday, October 12, 2006
The Plain Dealer: Let's get the pressing question out of the way. Did the ill-fated wife of French king Louis XVI actually say, "Let them eat cake"? Apparently not.

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Telegraph UK: Your guide to make-up and more by Lesley Thomas. This week: be a modern Marie Antoinette. - Those of us with legs instead of pipecleaners are delighted to see that skinny jeans and Galaxy-style dresses have made way for so-called boyfriend trousers and painter's smocks this season. But when sensible clothes in grey fabrics and a trend for androgyny are all around, you can't help but yearn for the frou-frou.

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The Big Question: Does Marie Antoinette deserve her infamous reputation?
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Marie-Antoinette: She's ba-a-ack
Inside Bay Area: Upcoming movie inspires traveler to trace her footsteps in Paris and at Versailles

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