Twitch Upon a Star (63 page)
Read Twitch Upon a Star Online
Authors: Herbie J. Pilato
Morita laughed off the same-age reference, claiming it must have been the water in Japan that helped him retain his youth. Lizzie blushed and made every attempt to downplay the somewhat awkward assumption. “She'd get real embarrassed about the age comparison,” McCartney explains, claiming that makeup had contributed to her youthful appearance and Morita's older look. “But no one was buying it. She had a naturally young, blithe spirit,” he says.
She also had a way with numbers. Upon further early influence from her beloved grandmother Becca, Lizzie frequented the race track and loved to gamble, which is really what her life became. And although
Dark Victory
and
Between the Darkness and the Dawn
had comparatively uneven endings, both films foreshadowed what would later become Lizzie's darkest hours.
In the final analysis, it was never Lizzie's performance as
Samantha
or any of her characterizations or unique talents that were in question. It was her
choices
for certain roles, before and particularly beyond
Bewitched
that proved to be intriguing, if not downright mind-boggling. But her friend and TV-movie co-star Ronny Cox wouldn't have had it any other way. She was “an actress, and the fun is in playing the roles that stretch you,” he says. In the decades since Cox was the affable dad on TV's
Apple's Way
, (CBS, 1974â1975), he's mostly played “bad guys,” similar to Lizzie's choices in films like
The Legend of Lizzie Borden
and
The Black Widow Murders
. And although not evil in nature, her character in
A Case of Rape
was eons away from
Samantha
on
Bewitched
. “Hell!” Cox proclaims, such roles are “
twenty
times
more fun to play,” because films like
Rape
, he says, give actors a chance to showcase and expand their talents.
Case
in point: When former
Charlie's Angels
star Farrah Fawcett appeared in NBC's shocking TV-movie,
The Burning Bed,
directed by Robert Greenwald, this film was based on the book by Faith McNulty, with a teleplay by Rose Leiman Goldemberg:
Francine Hughes
(Fawcett) is the loving mother of three children. But she is also the battered wife of
Mickey Hughes
(Paul Le Mat), who is both verbally and physically abusive. However, whenever
Francine
reaches out for help, she's turned away, and ultimately becomes incapable of bringing
Mickey
to justice. So, one terrifying night, after he rapes her, she sets their bed on fire with him still in it, asleep. As a result,
Francine
goes on trial for her life.
Just as in Lizzie's
Case
, Fawcett (who worked with Cox on
Apple's Way
) played an abused woman who is forced to defend herself within a closed-minded judicial system. Both actresses were allowed the opportunity to utilize what Cox calls their theatrical “muscles” for what became physically demanding and emotionally draining performances.
For some
Bewitched
fans, watching Lizzieâtheir once-cheerful witch-with-a-twitchâget raped in
Case
may have been a traumatic experience. But Cox believes that was the “essence of why she desperately needed” to do such rolesâso fans would “realize that this person on the screen” is only a character played by an actor. Often times, actors are mostly identified with one particular character, as it was and remains with Lizzie and
Samantha.
But according to Cox, too many fans of actors mistake “brilliant acting for the person.”
In further defense of Lizzie's post-comedic
Bewitched
performances, Cox poses:
You can't play
Lizzie Borden
? You can't play an ax murderer? You can't play
King Lear
who goes crazy? I mean, that's what acting is! Lizzie didn't want to walk around for the rest of her life being
Samantha
! It's asking way too much to say, “No, no, no ⦠don't be anything else! Just be
Samantha
for the rest of your life! I can't stand it if you do anything but being
Samantha
!”
“God, that's prison!” Cox bellows, figuratively, adding, “Slit your wrists!”
How would Cox compare Lizzie's childhood “play-acting” performance as
Snow White
(for her grandmother Becca) to her portrayal of the
Wolf
in her Westlake School's French language production of
Little Red Riding Hood
?
“In playing
Snow White
,” Cox deduces, “you still have all these people that love you and care for you and you're dealing with morality and things like that. At the end of the day you're still dealing with dwarfs and the wicked [queen], so you're dealing in fantasy.”
Yet, he loves “the lightweight stuff, too,” especially his friend's much later and more professional fanciful role as
Samantha
:
Lizzie was brilliant on
Bewitched
, but that tapped like this much (gestures small space between index finger and thumb) of her talent. And I talked with her about this, too. She could play that character and phone it in. One of the things that Lizzie knew about acting [were] the tricks of the craft. She had that special spark ⦠her personality sort of shone through in roles like
Samantha
. And in lots of ways she could just get by on that persona ⦠that personality. But that wasn't all of her talent, only a measure of it.
Post-
Bewitched
, Elizabeth certainly leaned toward those edgier roles, more times than not, playing people with malevolent traits. Her manager Barry Krost explained in 2001 on MSNBC's
Headliners & Legends
: “If there was a wicked gene in a character, odds are, Lizzie would do it.”
On A&E's
Biography
in 1999, Robert Foxworth said Lizzie was “thrilled” with the idea that she surprised her fans and detractors with Emmy-nominated performances as in
The Legend of Lizzie Borden
. To have viewers accept her in such a non-
Samantha
role and subsequently respect the theatrical diversity that she would bring to such a role as an accomplished actress was “probably one of her great victories in life.”
The Legend of Lizzie Borden
was helmed by Paul Wendkos, a favorite director of Lizzie's, who also guided her in the 1958 “Bitter Heritage” episode of
Playhouse 90
, and the 1979 TV-movie,
Act of Violence
.
Director Boris Sagal was another of her favorite directors, guiding her and Ronny Cox through
A Case of Rape
in 1974. Before that, he directed her in the 1960 TV
Kraft Theatre
production of
The Spiral Staircase
, in 1978's
The Awakening Land
, and in 1981's
When the Circus Came to Town
, the last which stood out from the rest, if only due to lighter content.
The actual driving force behind
Circus
was legendary producer Robert Halmi, who conceived of the story idea and was responsible for casting not only Lizzie, but acting legend Christopher Plummer, best known for his performance in the 1965 classic feature,
The Sound of Music
. By then, Halmi had produced more than 140 feature and TV films (and went on to produce countless more), and was considered one of the industry's busiest and most respected producers. As he revealed to
The Toronto Star
in 1981, Halmi viewed working with the former-
Bewitched
star as “a wonderful opportunity for Liz to do what she does best. She's fantastic. She makes you laugh, she makes you cry. She's physical. She's sexy.”
While Halmi's words could have just as easily described what Lizzie brought to playing
Samantha
on a weekly basis, her
Circus
co-star Christopher Plummer would never as willingly embrace a regular TV role. “It's bad news, I think, for someone like me,” he told
The Toronto Star
. “You get so terribly identified with one role you can't be taken serious as an actor.”
For years, Plummer was identified with the role of
Captain von Trapp
in
The Sound of Music
, just as Lizzie had been identified for so long with
Bewitched
. In 2011, he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for
Beginners
, in which he portrayed
Hal Fields
, a dying gay senior who comes out of the closet.
Four decades ago, both actors should have been pleased with the critical praise showered upon
When the Circus Came to Town
, which proved to be a nice addition to their already impressive resumes. In his 1981 review in
The Toronto Star
, critic Bill Kaufman said the film “convincingly manages to develop
Mary's
character and how she becomes involved with the raggletaggle touring circus. Plummer plays
Duke Royal
, owner and ringmaster of the shabby big top, a flamboyant man who ultimately changes
Mary's
life with boy love and a guiding hand. The progression of
Mary's
involvement with circus life is skillfully fleshed out under the guidance of veteran director Boris Sagal.”
In 1989, Lizzie said her performance in
Circus
was “tough work, physically, but so much fun to do.” For many scenes, she was outfitted in a heavy headdress, and she wore fishnet stockings with runs and holes, in order to better authenticate the slight seediness of that particular circus portrayed in the movie. Prior to filming, she spent several weeks training with legendary stuntman Bob Yerkes and his son, Mark, who had trained actors, singers, etc. to participate in TV shows like
Circus of the Stars
(the era's answer to today's
Dancing with the Stars
). He's also worked on feature films like
Back to the Future, Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
, and
Hook
(and he currently hosts stunt training, on invitation only, at his Los Angeles home).
She always knew that certain productions would prove challenging. Actors are never sure of what lies ahead until the day of the shoot. Certainly, timing is imperative and performers must trust their colleagues on the set, behind and in front of the camera. In Lizzie's case, she was pleased that she would be allowed to do some of the stunts they had planned for her stand-in.
For example, she had donned a clown's garb for a few
Circus
scenes, but according to Thomas McCartney, she confessed at the time: “I have never been a clown person. Maybe I was scared badly by a clown when I was a child.”
The “fear-factor” in that last sentence may have been some subconscious allusion to the intimating presence her father pervaded over her young life. It was a character flaw that Robert Montgomery may have developed by way of the tragic loss of his daughter, Martha Bryan, Lizzie's infant sister. Into this mix there were the other tragic losses in the early Montgomery lineage, namely with regard to Henry Montgomery, Lizzie's grandfather.
Author and genealogist James Pylant concludes:
[Henry's] suicide clearly had an impact on Robert Montgomery's life, and it would have extended into the relationship with his own children. Perhaps what is seen as his jealousy of Elizabeth's success as an actress was his resenting of her achieving fame too easily because she was Robert Montgomery's daughter. His father's early demise led Robert to toil as a railroad mechanic and an oil tanker deckhand before his big break in Hollywood, and maybe he felt Elizabeth hadn't earned her dues. And the death of his first child, Martha, may have made him more emotionally distant to Elizabeth.
Consequently, she may have attempted to earn those dues and her father's approval, while also igniting his fury by later fanning a bigger star than his via
Bewitched
, the lighter fare of which she then replaced with roles like
Lizzie Borden
.
Classic TV author, curator, and radio show host Ed Robertson offers these thoughts:
Once
Bewitched
ended she was looking for projects that would allow her to grow as an actress, and further develop her dramatic skills, which she was not always able to do as
Samantha
, particularly in the last couple years of the show. I don't think she was necessarily trying to “shed” her image as
Samantha
, but I do believe she wanted to show audiences (and for that matter, casting directors and the like) that she could do much more than
Samantha
. That's why I think she did
A Case of Rape
, which had aired in the year 1974, and I think that's what may have attracted her to doing
The Legend of Lizzie Borden
. That, plus the project itself had a strong pedigree. Paul Wendkos had already established himself as an excellent director, plus Fritz Weaver (who played Borden's father), through his work on such shows as
The Twilight Zone
, was an accomplished, respected stage actor. I don't know whether Fritz worked with her father, but I imagine Elizabeth would have relished the opportunity to work with someone like him ⦠The Lizzie Borden trial was, for its time, considered the
trial of the century
, as was the O. J. Simpson case more than a century later. Like Lizzie Borden, O. J. Simpson became a pariah, even though he was acquitted. And of course, a few years after doing Lizzie Borden, and about fifteen years before the Simpson murder trial, Elizabeth did a TV-movie with O. J. for CBS [
A Killing Affair
, 1977].
