Quintus Arrius (Ben-Hur) Ray Winstone. In the 2016 film Arrius was played by James Cosmo. Arrius has a much smaller role in this adaptation. He shows little regard for Judah in the galley, and is killed in the naval battle. Quintus Arrius (Ben-Hur) Quintus Arrius is a fictional character from Lew Wallace's 1880 novel "". He is a Roman warship commander whom Judah Ben-Hur saves from drowning. After they are rescued, Arrius is informed that his fleet won the battle, and is lauded for his victory. Arrius subsequently adopts Judah as his son, making him a freedman, a Roman citizen, and Arrius’s heir.
Production of Ben-Hur (1959 film) character touches to the script, such as Ben-Hur's purchase of a brooch for Tirzah and a horse for Messala. Vidal claimed that he worked on the first half of the script (everything up to the chariot race), and scripted 10 versions of the scene where Ben-Hur confronts Messala and begs for his family's freedom. Vidal's claim about a homoerotic subtext is hotly debated. Vidal first made the claim in an interview in the 1995 documentary film "The Celluloid Closet", and asserted that he persuaded Wyler to direct Stephen Boyd to play the role as if he were a spurned homosexual