✎ Editor’s notes on 12 facts

FILM · 2000 · UK

Gladiator

Directed by: Ridley Scott
Runtime: 155 min
Studio: Universal Pictures, Scott Free Productions, Red Wagon Entertainment

12 archived facts 2 topics 2 sources Last reviewed Oct 2026

After the death of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, his devious son takes power and demotes Maximus, one of Rome's most capable generals who Marcus preferred. Eventually, Maximus is forced to become a gladiator and battle to the death against other men for the amusement of paying audiences.

12 Interesting Facts About Gladiator

Name: Gladiator
Released: 2000

Interesting Facts (5)

#001
The real-life Commodus was born to a mother who was rumored to have either slept with a Gladiator or had bathed in the blood of one. Many took the myth as legend, believing that such led to the resulting "Gladiator Emperor".
Editor’s noteArka Evren
History is full of stories like this and others. Their truth is usually a mystery, but people love throwing around baseless claims about historical matters. Maybe there really was something like this, but in grand historical eras people love to make things up. There was a similar story about a woman in history. While married to a king, she slept with men from most parts of the world, and they said unseemly things about the king. That one seemed a bit more real to me, but it's hard to explain it with love. A man who swallows being cheated on is no real man. A real man, as Vito Corleone said, is "a man who spends time with his family."
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Commodus and Lucilla in close-upImage: IMDb
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#002
Trujillo, what Maximus describes to the Emperor as the place where his home is in the hills, is in present-day Spain, southwest of Madrid.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
I've always wondered why crews on films like this always pick locations in Europe. I mean, when there's a country like Turkey, a historical marvel, going and talking about Spain is like settling for worse when you have better. Turkey2s four corners are full of historical sites, and directors' choices are always wrong on these matters. Troy, for example, was shot in Turkey.
Apart from that, one of the villains in The Godfather is a Turk.
But the series Oz, contrary to the usual, shows Muslims in a good light.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Maximus and the Emperor togetherImage: IMDb
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#003
Kirk Douglas saw this movie when it was first released and liked it, but said it was nowhere near as noble as Spartacus (1960).
Editor’s noteArka Evren
As someone who hasn't seen Spartacus (1960) or this film, Kirk Douglas's opinion on the matter doesn't mean much to me. I don't see actors as artists. I see directors and screenwriters as artists, and what a director says, especially a director who's left a mark on cinema, deserves attention. But what an actor like Douglas says is just a personal opinion.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Russell Crowe and soldiers in GladiatorImage: IMDb
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#004
Russell Crowe's character is often referred to as a Spaniard, which would not have been accurate. At that time people who lived in Hispania were light complected and had red hair. The real Maximus Decimus Meridius was a Gaul which a Germanic tribe found in what would be today's north France. The Gauls were considered to be a fierce race and when the Romans conquered them the men were given the option of fighting in the army or becoming gladiators.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
That's the Romans' cruelty for you. Either join the army or become a gladiator. The rest of the world has committed barbarities like this here and there too. But the Turks aren't like that. When the Turks conquered a place, they protected the people there too. Whoever wanted joined the army, whoever wanted kept working at their trade. There was no compulsion.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Gladiator Maximus walking into the arenaImage: IMDb
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#005
It is filmmaker Atharv Goyal's personal favourite movie.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
Stanley Kubrick's favorite film isn't known, but after watching the first Godfather film about ten times he said something like "This is probably the best film ever made." About the Dekalog series he said something along the lines of "Though I learned much later how the ideas came about, you feel the melancholy inside the work to the very end."
There are various directors, various screenwriters, various actors, and they all have favorite films. Some even have favorite series. For instance, Steven Spielberg used to watch some episodes of Seinfeld in between while shooting Schindler's List because of the pain he felt. Stephen King's and Eminem's favorite series is apparently The Wire. Anthony Hopkins wrote Bryan Cranston a fan letter. The examples could go on.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Russell Crowe in the arenaImage: IMDb
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Production Story (7)

#006
Like modern day athletes, ancient Roman gladiators did product endorsements. The producers considered including this in the script but discarded the idea as unbelievable.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
It's interesting that there was advertising even back then. But I did some research just now and looked at how many people the arenas held.
Colosseum (Rome, Italy): 50,000 - 80,000 seats. It was the largest amphitheater of the ancient world and the center of gladiator fights.
Amphitheatre of El Jem (Tunisia): 30,000 - 35,000 seats. It was the second largest amphitheater outside Rome and hosted gladiator fights in North Africa.
Verona Arena (Italy): 30,000 seats. It's a well-preserved arena still standing today and used for concerts.
Arles and Nimes Arenas (France): 20,000 - 25,000 seats. They were the most popular gladiator arenas in the region of Gaul (France).
Circus Maximus (Rome, Italy): 150,000 - 250,000 seats. Note: This wasn't a gladiator arena but a massive chariot racing track, though it was Rome's largest public entertainment venue.
Yes, in places with these numbers, especially the Circus Maximus, advertising is feasible. People can turn to that thing after the ad. A good strategy for those times.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Gladiator fight in the arenaImage: IMDb
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#007
In an example of "translation convention", all characters in the movie speak modern languages: English for the most part, but also Italian (Maximus' son), German (the Barbarian chief before the battle) and even Zulu (the ancient Germanic war chant). Russell Crowe even wanted to go one step further, and speak his lines imitating Antonio Banderas' accent, in order to show Maximus' non-Italic origins, but Sir Ridley Scott disapproved the idea.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
Not imitating Antonio Banderas's accent was the right call for the sake of originality. Ridley Scott made the right decision here. I've always said, "The original of everything is the most valuable."
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Russell Crowe and friends on the Gladiator setImage: IMDb
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#008
On the Special Edition DVD, the making-of documentary, Strength and Honor: Creating the World of 'Gladiator' (2005), at nearly three and a half hours, is an hour longer than the movie.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
DVDs of films used to have lots of notes about the production. The making-of and behind-the-scenes were given like a documentary. But now that digital channels are all the rage, DVDs don't matter much anymore. Still, I think DVD collectors must be finding DVDs somewhere. I don't know if they still keep releasing DVDs, but there are collectors of this stuff. Just the other day I saw that a single old Pokemon tazo was priced at thousands of dollars. In most cases, collecting, 30-40 years of collecting, raises the price of that thing over time like a commodity.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Ridley Scott on the Gladiator setImage: IMDb
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#009
From the outset, Sir Ridley Scott made it quite clear that this "sword and sandals" movie would not feature any of the genre's clichés of people lounging around eating grapes and drinking from goblets. He intended to create a more realistic vision of ancient Rome.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
Actually, this film is a more realistic version of ancient Rome. Even though it has some slightly unrealistic things in it, it's more realistic than most ancient Rome films. Then there's a series called Rome, which is basically like a documentary, but also a series with a dash of drama. I barely finished the first episode of Rome and stopped watching.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Roman scene in front of the ColosseumImage: IMDb
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#010
This movie started shooting without a locked screenplay in place. According to Russell Crowe, the initial draft was so bad that when he was approached for the lead role, not even the producer wanted to send him a copy, afraid that he "[wouldn't] respond to it". Crowe was instead urged to meet with director Sir Ridley Scott first. Unbeknownst to the producer, Crowe had already obtained a copy of the script and disliked it, but was won over by Scott's take on the project, as well as countless re-writes.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
Sometimes the caravan gets assembled on the road. Sometimes you set off without completing a few things. Along the way you fill in what's missing. Scott's take on the project must have been a visionary one for Crowe to accept the offer. But the film really does stand apart from its peers.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott on setImage: IMDb
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#011
Luciano Pavarotti was asked to perform on the soundtrack and turned down the opportunity, something he later regretted.
Editor’s noteArka Evren
It's common to see directors, screenwriters, actors and composers regret turning down a film offer. Because after watching the film you realize what door you turned your back on. But some projects you join, and they drag down your prestige too, because you've been reflected badly on camera. Ridley Scott did important work on this film, and a big part of its success belongs to him.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Luciano Pavarotti in an interviewImage: Wikimedia Commons · Show do Esporte, CC BY 3.0
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#012
Initially, Russell Crowe had no interest in reading the script, as he was in the midst of working on The Insider (1999), and was completely focused on his portrayal of Jeffrey Wigand. He was eventually persuaded otherwise by Insider director Michael Mann, who passed him the script, and told him he ought "to take this Ridley Scott thing a bit more seriously."
Editor’s noteArka Evren
The Insider isn't a bad film either. But rather than being torn between the two, choosing Gladiator worked out better for him. Because Gladiator is the better film.
sufferwithme / Founder / Editor
Gladiator (2000): Russell Crowe 1999 PortraitImage: Wikimedia Commons · John Mathew Smith & www.celebrity-photos.com from Laurel Maryland, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Sources & editorial notes

Reference databases

Wikipedia English Wikipedia article
IMDb IMDb title page (trivia)

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