Denzel Washington has revealed that his same-sex kiss was cut from Gladiator II.
Speaking in a new interview, Washington, who plays the ruthless businessman Macrinus in the Ridley Scott film, was asked, “How gay is the Roman empire?”
He replied: “I actually kissed a man in the film but they took it out, they cut it, I think they got chicken.”
“I kissed a guy full on the lips and I guess they weren’t ready for that yet. I killed him about five minutes later. It’s Gladiator. It’s the kiss of death,” he told Gayety.
It’s not the only kiss that was cut – Paul Mescal has revealed that an improvised kiss between him and Pedro Pascal was also removed from the movie.
“There was a moment when we were rehearsing my fight scene with Pedro, and I had an idea towards the end of the scene to kiss Pedro on the forehead,” Mescal told Entertainment Weekly.
“I did it in one of the takes, and then we’re getting the radio messages back to Ridley [in video village], and I was like, ‘Ridley: Kiss on the forehead, did you like it? Yay or nay?’”
“There was radio silence for a second. His radio crackles back, and [Ridley] goes, ‘I’m afraid I did.’”
The sequel to the Oscar-winning 2000 film starring Russell Crowe as Maximus, picks up years after Crowe’s character captivated the Colosseum in the original.
The sequel sees the nephew of Maximus, Lucius (Paul Mescal), forced into the brutal life as a gladiator, who tries to enter the Colosseum to take back the Roman empire, to which he is the rightful heir. Meanwhile, Denzel Washington’s Macrinus is a former slave who’s amassed great wealth and has an interest in capturing and enslaving other gladiators.
Early reviews of the film have been overwhelmingly positive, with The Independent’s Clarisse Loughrey calling the film “pure camp” and stating that it “shows us how to make cinema with a capital ‘C’”.
In The Telegraph’s four-star review, Robbie Collin said that Washington’s “juicy role translates into pure pleasure for the audience,” but added that he outshines the rest of the cast.
In another four-star review, The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw called the movie “gobsmacking” and “weirdly almost a next-gen remake” of the original.
“Gladiator is a hard act to follow but Sir Ridley Scott proves still to be a master working up a Roman orgy of excitement that proves a worthy successor in every way,” wrote Pete Hammond for Deadline.
However, more negative rules have suggested that Gladiator II is Scott’s most disappointing legacy sequel.
Kevin Maher of The Times called it “Scott’s most disappointing ‘legacy sequel’ since Prometheus and stated “Are you not entertained? No, not really.”
Gladiator II is in cinemas from 15 November
