The Sound of Music (film) of the film; the actor accepted after being assured that he could work with Lehman to improve the character; Plummer later described himself as having become quite arrogant at the time, "spoiled by too many great theater roles". Wise also spent considerable time and effort on casting the secondary characters. For the role of Max Detweiler, Wise initially considered Victor Borge, Noël Coward, and Hal Holbrook among others before deciding on Richard Haydn. For the character of Baroness Elsa Schraeder, Wise looked for a "name" actress—Andrews and Plummer were not yet widely known to film audiences—and decided on Eleanor Parker.
The Sound of Music (film) film's Nazi theme was especially unpopular in Germany, where the Munich branch manager for 20th Century Fox approved the unauthorized cutting of the entire third act of the film following the wedding sequence—the scenes showing Salzburg following the "Anschluss". Robert Wise and the studio intervened, the original film was restored, and the branch manager was fired. "The Sound of Music" is one of the most commercially successful films of all time. Four weeks after its theatrical release, it became the number one box office movie in the United States, from revenue generated by twenty-five theaters, each screening only ten roadshow