Did You Know?

Jane Fonda turned down the role of Bonnie Parker. Living in France at the time, she did not want to relocate to the U.S. for the part.

Michael J. Pollard's character, C.W. Moss, is a fictional conglomeration of all of Bonnie and Clyde's minor sidekicks including: Ralph Fults (their first sidekick), William Daniel Jones (nicknamed "W.D." and "Deacon", and was an attendant at the gas station owned by Clyde's father), Ray Hamilton, and Henry Methvin (who's father made the deal with Frank Hamer to set Bonnie and Clyde up).

After François Truffaut's departure from the project, the producers approached Jean-Luc Godard. Some sources claim Godard didn't trust Hollywood and refused; other allege he planned to change Bonnie and Clyde to teenagers and relocate the story to Japan, prompting the film's investors to force him off the project.

Thousand of berets were sold worldwide after Faye Dunaway wore them in this film.

The poem that Bonnie is reading as the police open fire on the rented flat is "The Story of Suicide Sal" written by Bonnie Parker in 1932.

The movie that Bonnie and Clyde go to see after their botched bank robbery when C.W. Moss parallel parked their get away car was Gold Diggers of 1933.

Gene Hackman was on the set one day when he noticed a guy standing behind him and staring. The man said, "Hell, Buck would've never wore a hat like that." Hackman turned around and looked at him and said, "Maybe not." He looked like an old Texas farmer. The man introduced himself and said, "Nice to meet you - I'm one of the Barrows."

In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked this as the #42 Greatest Movie of All Time.

Cher auditioned for the role of Bonnie Parker, but when her husband/manager at the time, Sonny Bono, heard about the audition, he was furious at Warren Beatty for letting his wife audition for such a "controversial film".

During one of the bank robberies, Buck Barrow (Gene Hackman) does a leap over the tellers' cage. This was a stunt routinely pulled by John Dillinger, who in turn learned it from watching Douglas Fairbanks in the "Zorro" movies.

When Warren Beatty was on board as producer only, his sister Shirley MacLaine was a strong possibility to play Bonnie. But when Beatty decided to play Clyde himself, for obvious reasons he decided not to use MacLaine.

Warner Brothers had so little faith in the film that, in an unprecedented move, it offered its first-time producer Warren Beatty 40% of the gross instead of a minimal fee. The movie then went on to gross over $50 million.

The story of Bonnie Parker smoking a cigar in a picture is accurate. She did it as a joke. But after the shootout at the bungalow in Joplin, MO, police found the photos the gang had taken and published the photo of Bonnie, thereby leading to her unearned rep as a "Cigar Smokin' Gun Moll".

In one scene, while holding up a bank, Clyde Barrow tells a farmer he can keep his own money. ("Is that your money or the bank's?" "It's mine." "You keep it then.") In real life, it was bank robber Pretty Boy Floyd who allowed a farmer to keep his own money during a holdup.

In a TV interview director Arthur Penn pointed out that this film shows for the first time the firing of a gun and the consequences in one single frame. Before that you would see a gun being fired, then cut and the next scene shows the bleeding body. In Bonnie and Clyde you see a gun being fired into the face of a person without inter cut. This was incredible at the time and would have been censored in the past. (Such a shot had, however, had already been used in all three of the films Sergio Leone's "Dollars" trilogy.)

In the Special Edition DVD Documentary, Estelle Parsons says she was the only member of the cast who actually researched the history of the Barrow Gang. She also says that early in the filming, she wanted to meet the real Blanche Barrow but Warren Beatty, in his capacity as the producer, was against the idea. Finally, after a week, Warren relented and set up a meeting with Blanche, but at that point Parsons lost interest and never met Blanche. In fact, Warren Beatty brought the script to Blanche for her to read for her approval before she would give permission to use her name. She agreed the script was factual and approved it. While there he played her piano and sang for her. She was very fond of Warren even though the director completely changed the script to make her look as in her own words, "A screaming horse's Ass." She took her third husband Eddie to see the movie with her for the first time and nearly died of embarrassment.

Screen writer Robert Towne did uncredited work as a story consultant on the movie. He is featured in interviews for the Special Edition DVD Documentary.

In real life Blanche Barrow did not run from the Joplin apartment screaming with a spatula. In fact she helped Clyde push one of the police cars out of the driveway which was down hill. The car started rolling faster and rolled across the street into a large tree. They both were dragged by the momentum and that is what witnesses saw. Clyde was shot at that time and Blanche let out one yelp and kept moving to get out of the line of fire. That was about the last shot since the officer shooting ran out of ammo so Buck called her back and she returned to get into the escape car in front of the apartment rather than being picked up down the street as the movie portrayed.

Half a dozen of the cars used in the movie, including the one stolen from Gene Wilder's character were loaned to the studio by a private owner who specialized in the restoration of Model A's, Roadsters, and Model T's, Mr. Seng of Castro Valley, California. His only requirement in loaning the studio his cars was that they were not to be shot up.

Warren Beatty wanted to produce this movie in black and white. This was rejected by Warner Brothers.

According to the film's editor Dede Allen, the climactic massacre was meant to evoke Abraham Zapruder's footage of John F. Kennedy's assassination. As Clyde Barrow (Warren Beatty) goes to the ground in slow-motion, a fragment of his skull is dislodged by a bullet hit, a similar head shot captured by Zapruder's footage of the JFK assassination.

Leading Newsweek film critic Joseph Morgenstern hated the film when he first saw it, but then later took the unprecedented step of admitting that his original review was completely wrong. His revised version raved about the film.

Heavily influenced by the French New Wave directors, mainly through its rapid shifts of tone and its choppy editing.

One of the first films to feature an extensive use of squibs.

Arthur Penn originally turned the script down but after various other directors did likewise - including William Wyler - Warren Beatty was compelled to take it back to Penn. The director agreed only on condition that he could make some important changes, the main one being making Clyde impotent as opposed to bisexual.

Michael J. Pollard admitted in later interviews that he borrowed his accent from Bob Dylan on the "Blonde on Blonde" album.

At the time, this was Warner Brothers' second highest grossing film, after My Fair Lady.

Costume designer Theadora Van Runkle had to deal with Warren Beatty's worries (6'4") that he would be upstaged by Faye Dunaway(who stood 5'7"). This is why Van Runkle kept Dunaway in flat shoes throughout the film.

Once Warren Beatty came on board, one of the first things deleted from Robert Benton and David Newman's script was a homosexual affair between Clyde and Moss.

Faye Dunaway nearly lost the part of Bonnie Parker as she had put on some weight for Hurry Sundown.

When scouting for locations, production designer Dean Tavoularis was delighted to see that a lot of the smaller Texas towns hadn't changed much from the 1930s.

Michael J. Pollard didn't realize in eating scenes that you don't actually eat all the food because of the possibility of repeated takes. Sure enough, he soon regretted it in the scene in which the outlaws kidnap a couple and eat their lunch in the car. By the 12th take, Pollard was feeling decidedly ill, having had to eat 12 whole hamburgers.

Many consider one of the reasons why the film was so successful was because of its anti-establishment stance. At the time, disillusionment with America's involvement in Vietnam was gaining ground.

Producer Warren Beatty requested that the sound of gunshots in the movie should be much louder than the rest of the soundtrack. He was greatly influenced by Shane in this regard. However, at a screening in London he noticed that the gunfire sounds were much softer than intended. He went to the projection booth, where the projectionist told he that he had "helped" the film by adjusting the gunfire sounds. The projectionist said that he had not come across a film as poorly mixed since "Shane".

Billed as 'America's Most Wanted Broadway Musical, 'Bonnie & Clyde' is set to open on Broadway at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre in November, 2011 starring Laura Osnes Laura and Jeremy Jordan.

This was the final movie from Warner Bros. Pictures to use the classic WB shield logo until spring 1972; the following month after "Bonnie and Clyde's" release, movies from Warner Bros. Pictures had a stylized "W-7" shield to represent the then-recent merge of Warner Bros. and Seven Arts, which lasted until 1970. (The movie is copyright to Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, however.)

The car that the real Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow met their fate in is on display (along with Barrow's bullet-riddled shirt) in Primm Valley Hotel and Casino in Primm, NV, 20 miles outside of Las Vegas near the California border. The prop car used in the film was displayed as part of a "Bonnie and Clyde" diorama at Planet Hollywood Dallas, in Dallas, TX. The Planet Hollywood in Dallas closed in 2001 and the car is now owned by a private collector.

The final moment of the field shoot out in which the posse surrounds a dying Buck and a hysterical Blanche is based on the rare "action" photo taken of that moment. In actuality, Blanche was screaming at an officer who had his foot on Buck's wounded head and a gun to his face threatening to shoot him again. She was begging him not to shoot him again because he was already dying.

The infamous climactic shoot-out was filmed with four different cameras, all running at different speeds. The scene itself lasts 54 seconds.

In real life, Clyde Barrow was a highly dangerous marksman who had mastered most firearms including the Browning Automatic Rifle and the Thompson Sub Machine Gun. The lawmen chasing him were well aware of his ability with a gun which partly explains the ruthlessness behind the way he was gunned down.