And congratulations to our winner …… . that Cecil B de Mille cast himself as the voice of God in the Ten Commandments. The great director was 75 when he made the film and suffered a heart attack during the production after climbing 130 feet to check a faulty camera perched on one of the giant gates used in the exodus sequence. He took a couple of days off and then, against his doctor’s orders, returned to work to complete the film.
Production costs for The Ten Commandments blew out to $13 million but the film went on to become Paramount’s biggest-grossing film up to that time. For many years it ranked second only to Gone with the Wind (1939) as the most successful film in Hollywood history and stands as one of the great epics.