Over Exaggerated by Pop Culture

The Mozart/Salieri rivalry mentioned Tuesday and the false rumors that Salieri poisoned Mozart inspired many creative works in years to come, thus causing more people to believe the over-exaggerated story. One example includes Alexander Pushkin’s 1830 play, Mozart and Salieri. Rimsky-Korsakov wrote an opera based on this play in 1897.

The more popular influence from these historical rumors occurred in the 1984 film Amadeus. The film begins with the elderly Salieri housed in an insane asylum, confessing his sins in relation to the deceased Mozart. The story is a tale of jealousy and hatred, again over-exaggerating the rivalry for which historians do not have a strong foundation.

Can you think of other occurrences of the Mozart/Salieri relationship within pop culture?