Behind the scenes: Dr Strangelove

Features

Rare on-set images give a glimpse of great minds at work as Stanley Kubrick and Peter Sellers film their 50-year-old classic Dr Strangelove.

Cast and crew share a joke behind the scenes of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Peter Sellers (centre) shares a joke with cast and crew in Ken Adam’s famous war room set.

Stanley Kubrick originally intended a straight adaptation of Peter George’s novel Red Alert, a chilling thriller about a paranoid American general initiating a nuclear bombing mission over the USSR. But he saw the absurdity behind the retaliatory strategy of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) and decided to film it as a comedy.

In an acting tour de force, Peter Sellers plays the British officer attempting to apprehend the psychotic general (Sterling Hayden), the US President trying to smooth things over with his Soviet opposite opposite number, and the eccentric Dr Strangelove, a German émigré scientist with an autonomous Nazi arm and wild ideas about the post-apocalyptic world.

Much of the action of Kubrick’s jet-black satirical masterpiece occurs within the cavernous War Room at the Pentagon, a space indelibly imagined by production designer Ken Adam.

Stanley Kubrick guides the cast of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Stanley Kubrick directs gunmen during the scene in which US forces lay siege to their own airforce base.

Stanley Kubrick behind the scenes of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Kubrick on set.

Peter Sellers behind the scenes of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

A pensive moment with Peter Sellers out of character. Sellers plays three roles: Royal Air Force captain Lionel Mandrake, US president Merkin Muffley and the eccentric German scientist Dr Strangelove.

Stanley Kubrick, Kelvin Pike and Christiane Kubrick on the set of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1963)

Kubrick shares his vision with camera operator Kelvin Pike and the director’s wife Christiane Kubrick. Kubrick married Christiane after casting her as the German singer in the moving finale of Paths of Glory (1957).

Stanley Kubrick filming Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1963)

Kubrick behind the camera for the scene in which US general Buck Turgidson (George C. Scott) cavorts with his lover, Miss Scott (Tracy Reed).

Stanley Kubrick on the set of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Framing a high-angle shot of Tracy Reed (playing Miss Scott) in Turgidson’s bed.

Stanley Kubrick and crew during production of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
Stanley Kubrick behind the scenes of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Kubrick watches through the viewfinder.

Stanley Kubrick and Peter Sellers on the set of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

A leisurely moment between takes with Kubrick chatting to Peter Sellers (in the guise of President Muffley).

Slim Pickens on the set of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Actor Slim Pickens gets into position on the atomic bomb. Clutching his cowboy hat, Major T. J. ‘King’ Kong (Pickens) will ride the bomb as it is dropped onto its Soviet target – truly a horseman of the apocalypse.”

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