A Bridge Too Far on Arte: Sean Connery Strikes This Movie, But Why?

Scottish actor Sean Connery has gone on strike over pay inequality before filming the war film A Bridge Too Far. He felt he was underpaid compared to other stars of the film.

“Fresco” with the fashion of war films such as The Longest Day, The Guns of Navarone or The Bridge on the River Kwai, A Bridge Too Far has a pharaonic budget, hundreds of extras, the film is a blockbuster of the era. Directed by Richard Attenborough, it boasts an impressive star cast.

Thus we see Dirk Bogarde, James Caan, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Edward Fox, Elliott Gould, Gene Hackman, Anthony Hopkins, Hardy Kruger, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O’Neill, Robert Redford, Maximilian Schell and Liv Ullman.

The first of these stars to sign on for the film was Sean Connery as General Robert Urquhart for $250,000, or $1.2 million today. But three weeks before the shooting, he discovered a salary discrepancy in the newspapers:

At first I thought it was a mistake, but I found out it wasn’t. In proportion to the size of my role in the film, the salary we agreed upon seemed fair. But when I learned how much others were getting – for the same job and on a level playing field – it became unfair.

Among these “other” better paid, we find Robert Redford, who has less presence in the film than Connery and earns much more (rumored to be $2 million, today almost $10 million).

It must be said that Redford was at the height of his fame back then (he had just done The Con, Gatsby, 3 Days of the Condor and The Fate of the President’s Men), where Connery’s recent films haven’t really had much success since. He hung up the role of Bond in 1971 after Diamonds are Forever.

Conner’s desire for more touch is no joke, says comedian Ian Bannen, who filmed The Hill of the Lost Men with him:

It was not greed or self-centered arrogance. I know Sean, one of his sayings after Bond was “pay me what I’m worth”. Of course, he realized that since Redford was being paid so highly, he deserved more.

Even before shooting the slightest picture of the film, Sean Connery expressed his displeasure with producer Joseph Levin. Going on strike and refusing to go back to work without a raise, the actor finally got what he wanted.

Levine gave him 50% of his pay and filming started on time in Deventer, the Netherlands.

Barely 4 years later, Sean Connery would return to the stage in the early 80’s successively with Murders Live, Highlander, The Name of the Rose and The Incorruptibles, renewing his career with the general public.