Netflix’s Mary—a new biblical film about the mother of Jesus Christ that began streaming today—will transform viewers back to the year 20 BCE. That’s thanks to the film’s on-location shoot in ancient, abandoned villages in Morocco, and also, apparently, thanks to an old Ridley Scott set that Mary borrowed for King Herod’s palace in Jerusalem.
Directed by D.J. Caruso, with a screenplay written by Timothy Michael Hayes, Mary is a retelling of the biblical story of a young Jewish girl, Mary (played by Noa Cohen), who is chosen by God to be “the vessel of the Messiah.” But as word spreads of a new, God-chosen leader, the tyrannical King Herod (played by two-time Oscar-winner Anthony Hopkins) does everything in his power to prevent the coming of the Lord’s son.
For director Caruso, it was important to build a set to match King Herod’s ambition, opulence and greed. In an interview for the film’s official press notes, Caruso said, “Herod was a great empire builder, and we wanted to showcase his architectural brilliance, which was heavily influenced by the Romans, whom he sought to impress.”
Caruso went on to explain that, for Herod’s first temple shown in the film, the production “adapted a large set built by Sir Ridley Scott to fit our needs, instantly giving Herod’s world a sense of scale and grandeur.”
While Caruso doesn’t specify which Ridley Scott movie set was used, we can guess that it was one of the Scott films that, like Mary, was shot in Morocco. Those films include the 2000 Gladiator and the recent sequel, 2001’s Black Hawk Down, and 2005’s Kingdom of Heaven.
From there, it feels like a safe assumption to make that the most relevant Scott set to Mary would be the vast set of ancient Jerusalem that Scott constructed for Kingdom of Heaven. Even though Scott’s 2005 film took place over a thousand years after the birth of Jesus—during the Third Crusade, in which England attempted to recapture the Holy Land—the location was the same.
In that same interview, Mary director Caruso went on to explain that King Herod’s second temple was filmed at a museum in Morocco, as well as an exterior set built by the production. “Herod’s Second Temple plays a key role in our story and in the unrest it caused among the Judeans,” Carsuso said. “We used an old museum as the interior base and constructed a practical exterior to anchor our scenes.”
So there you have it! Even when he’s not directly involved with a movie, Ridley Scott is the cinematic gift that keeps on giving.
Mary is now streaming on Netflix worldwide.
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