Lolita (1962 Film) - Cast

Cast

• James Mason as Humbert "Hum" Humbert, a professor of French Poetry. He is smooth, charming, self-assured, but condescending and insensitive. He becomes immediately infatuated with Lolita upon meeting her. Secretly, this motivates him to stay with Charlotte Haze, although he regards her as superficial.
• Shelley Winters as Charlotte Haze-Humbert, a loud, overbearing, status-seeking widow who is both landlady to Humbert, and mother to Lolita with whom she has a strained relationship. She aspires to be cultured and sophisticated, but never manages to be more than a middle-class householder. When she develops a romantic interest in Humbert, she makes pushy advances parried by his barely concealed sarcasm and indifference.
• Sue Lyon as Dolores "Lolita" Haze. She is at first flirtatious with Humbert and competes with her mother for his affections. However, after their relationship has commenced, she is increasingly unresponsive to his pressing demands, resists his attempts to educate her into high culture, and eventually finds him a suffocating and overbearing presence.
• Peter Sellers as Clare Quilty. The character's role was greatly expanded from that in the novel and Kubrick allowed Sellers to adopt a variety of disguises throughout the film. Early on in the film, Quilty appears as himself: a conceited, avant-garde playwright with a superior manner. Later, he disguises himself as various personae. First, he is an inquisitive policeman on the porch of the hotel where Humbert and Lolita are staying. Next he is the intrusive Beardsley High School psychologist, Doctor Zempf, who lurks in Humbert's front room for the purpose of persuading him to give Lolita more freedom in her after-school activities. Later in the film he is an anonymous phone caller conducting a survey.
• Gary Cockrell as Richard "Dick" Schiller
• Jerry Stovin as John Farlow (Ramsdale lawyer)
• Diana Decker as Jean Farlow
• Lois Maxwell as Nurse Mary Lore (at the hospital)
• Cec Linder as Dr. Keegee (at hospital)
• Bill Greene as George Swine, the hotel night manager in Bryceton
• Shirley Douglas as Mrs. Starch, the piano teacher in Ramsdale
• Marianne Stone as Vivian Darkbloom, Quilty's frequent companion and co-conspirator
• Marion Mathie as Miss Lebone
• James Dyrenforth as Frederick Beale, Sr.
• Maxine Holden as Miss Fromkiss, the hospital receptionist
• John Harrison as Tom
• C. Denier Warren as Potts

Errol Flynn and Beverly Aadland met with Stanley Kubrick to discuss appearing together in Lolita, although it was James Mason who was cast in the lead, in part due to previous allegations of statutory rape that had been filed against Flynn.

James Mason was the first choice of director Kubrick and producer Harris for the role of Humbert Humbert, but he initially declined due to a Broadway engagement. Laurence Olivier then refused the part, apparently on the advice of his agents. Kubrick considered Peter Ustinov, but decided against him. Harris then suggested David Niven; Niven accepted the part, but then withdrew for fear the sponsors of his TV show, Four Star Playhouse (1952), would object. Mason then withdrew from his play and got the part. Harris denies claims that Noël Coward also rejected the role.

Tuesday Weld was considered for the role of Lolita. Hayley Mills also turned down the role. At the time, her father, John Mills was credited with the decision; later, Walt Disney. Stanley Kubrick originally wanted Joey Heatherton for the title role of Lolita, but her father, Ray Heatherton, said no for fear his daughter would be typecast as a "promiscuous sex kitten." Jill Haworth was asked to take the role, but she was under contract to Otto Preminger and he said 'no.'

Ed Bishop had his first film role in Lolita, an uncredited appearance as the ambulance attendant who tells Humbert that Charlotte is dead. Bishop was one of a handful of actors who appeared in two Kubrick films, also appearing as the shuttle pilot in 2001: A Space Odyssey.