ON LOCATION : Golf on a Pyramid? Sounds Rough to Us

Like many doctors, the character played by Liam Neeson in the upcoming film “Ruby Cairo” enjoys a game of golf. But few get to play atop the majestic Cheops Pyramid, trying to drive a golf ball into the pool of a nearby hotel.

“We got every major permission, but it took a very long time,” explains Oscar-winning production designer Richard Sylbert. “We got five still cameras to the top of that pyramid. Nobody’s been allowed to climb that pyramid in 20 years.”

“It’s a very difficult part of the world to film in,” says Lloyd Philips, producer of the $25-million feature that will be released domestically next fall by 20th Century Fox. “In Los Angeles, they’ll close the streets for a film company. That doesn’t happen in this part of the world and I think that you’ve got to be a little crazy, and a little brave, to come here.”

In the thriller, Andie MacDowell travels around the globe to pick apart the mystery surrounding her husband’s death. Along the way, she befriends Neeson’s character.

MacDowell and Neeson will shoot live-action footage here in L.A., where Sylbert has constructed his own pyramid that will double for the real thing.

Eventually, the film crew got access to ancient mosques, and lighting crews rearranged interiors of Al Mugam’s, Cairo’s City Hall. But these freedoms weren’t provided without a string attached.

“They put a censor on the set,” says Sylbert. “The censor has a script. The censor is very serious about things that they do not want seen in Egypt.”

For example, “you can’t show that there’s garbage in the shot,” Sylbert continues. “There’s garbage in every corner of Cairo. They have no place to dispose of it so they throw it on the rooftops, and they refused to let us shoot anything like that.”