The Man in the Iron Mask (1977 film) The Man in the Iron Mask (1977 film) The Man in the Iron Mask is a 1977 television film loosely adapted from "The Vicomte de Bragelonne" by Alexandre Dumas and presenting several plot similarities with the 1939 film version. It was produced by Norman Rosemont for ITC Entertainment, and starred Richard Chamberlain as King Louis XIV and his twin Philippe, Patrick McGoohan as Nicolas Fouquet, Ralph Richardson as Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis Jourdan as D'Artagnan, and Ian Holm as the Chevalier Duval. Jenny Agutter plays Louis XIV's mistress, Louise de la Vallière and Vivien Merchant appears as Queen Marie-Therese. It was
Man in the Iron Mask suggests that the King's minister, Cardinal Richelieu, had arranged for a substitute, probably an illegitimate son or grandson of Henry IV, to become intimate with the queen and father an heir in the king's stead. At the time, the heir presumptive was Louis XIII's brother Gaston, Duke of Orléans, who was Richelieu's enemy. If Gaston became King, Richelieu would quite likely have lost both his job as minister and his life, and so it was in his best interests to thwart Gaston's ambitions. Louis XIII also hated Gaston and might thus have agreed to the scheme; the queen would have