Following the huge financial failure of the film, Roger Moore was released from his seven year contract with MGM after only two years.
This was Christopher Isherwood's only solo credit as a screenwriter. He claimed it was a screenplay he was proud of, but also that it had been ruined as a movie by miscasting and by a general lack of faith in the project on the part of MGM. He had hoped for Ingrid Bergman and Julie Harris to play the roles taken by Lana Turner and Marisa Pavan.
The celebrated French prophet and court astrologer Nostradamus is conspicuous by his absence in this Hollywood version of history which omits his name, although not his character, attributed to "Ruggieri", a part played by Sir Cedric Hardwicke.