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Cleopatra’s speech is cloaked in the fiery idealistic language of early
1960s political activism, made famous in the “I Have a Dream” speech
given by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in August 1963. While Caesar is
skeptical, Cleopatra is adamant about making the Greek Alexander’s dream
manifest through Rome and Egypt. She temptingly promises their son will
be a symbol of this union, using Caesar’s personal desire for an heir to
sway him. The canny Caesar notes the skillful way she makes her pitch:
“You have a way of mixing politics and passion . . . where does one begin
and the other leave off ?” But Caesar’s death cuts short her dream of a
united world empire, and the sight of Pompey’s statue at his dying moment
highlights the theme of civil war that will erupt between Antony and
Octavian in the second half of the film. The feeling of unspeakable loss
and despair would recur grimly a few months after the film’s release with
the assassination of President Kennedy on November 22, 1963. Cleopatra
the visionary returns briefly in the final scene of her suicide, when she
speaks of her dream: “How strangely awake I feel, as if living had been just
a long dream . . . someone else’s dream, now finished at last. But then
now will begin a dream of my own, which will never end. Antony . . .
Antony, wait . . .” As she dies calling his name, the visionary queen dreaming
of world unity yields to the more romanticized figure of Antony’s
tragic beloved.
Like earlier epic films, Cleopatra offers a provocative view of gender
issues within a changing American society. In the early 1960s, the American
public was enchanted by its style-setting new First Lady, the young
and glamorous Jaqueline Kennedy, who carefully constructed a sophisticated
and vivacious atmosphere around the White House, and later
associated her husband’s brief administration with the legendary realm
of Camelot. The handsome President was seductively serenaded on his
birthday in May 1962 by actress Marilyn Monroe, the epitome of female
Hollywood sexuality, who was rumored to be the President’s mistress. As
studio publicity and the press persisted in assimilating the actress Taylor
to the character of Cleopatra, questions were raised about the shifting
roles of women in the early 1960s, in particular about their sexual freedoms.
With her extravagant and scandalous celebrity lifestyle, meticulously detailed
in the media, Taylor was wrapped in all the reckless luxury and
erotic glamour attributed to the ancient queen (Wyke, 102–5). Blurring
the boundaries between the historical figure and the movie star was made
easier by their respective sexual relationships with their lovers. Taylor’s
illicit affair with Burton became a reincarnation of Cleopatra’s seduction
of Antony, a delicious connection between real Roman history and a
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