Marking Milestones in The Underworld

Hello my loves! We've been scarce for the last couple of weeks, but there was a method to the madness. You see, this is Poseidon's Underworld's 700th post (!) and I wanted to mark the occasion with something a little different and special and it took a bit of time coordination. I think you'll have to agree that this is what has come to pass because we're celebrating the occasion with this site's very first celebrity interview!

Thanks to one of our dear and loyal readers, we found ourselves in touch with one of the 1980s' busiest young actresses, who left her mark on several films with cult followings, was featured in some high-profile TV miniseries and who is still working today (and looking sensational as ever!) So we offer our gratitude to one Barry Langford. And now proceed to today's guest, the lovely Miss Catherine Mary Stewart!

Stewart burst onto cinema screens with the leading role in 1980's The Apple, a staggering futuristic musical that has run the gamut from riotous flop to sought-after collector's item and fan favorite. (Miss Stewart agreed to speak with us even after the lambasting we gave this outre film in the early days of Poseidon's Underworld!) This was followed by a short, but popular, stint on Days of Our Lives. Then came a pair of sci-fi oriented movies that left her with a substantial cult following, The Last Starfighter and Night of the Comet (both 1984.)

She next had featured roles in two of televisions most delicious miniseries, Hollywood Wives (1985) and Sins (1986), before joining in the shenanigans of yet another cult favorite, the whacked-out Weekend at Bernie's (1989.) Marriage and family took precedence for a while after that, though she has continued to work all along.

Kelly Preston, Doug McKeon, Chris Nash and Stewart in 1985's Mischief.

The daughter of two highly-educated Canadian college instructors, she broke a bit from the family's academic mold through her love of performing. She enjoyed singing, acting and particularly dancing and eventually wound up studying performing arts in London, England. This is when her professional career unexpectedly came about and where we begin our Q&A:

You intended to merely dance in the 1980 musical spectacular The Apple, but were instead handed the leading role! Just how heady an experience was that for you? Was it overwhelming at times or were you energetically along for the ride? After the movie's release, did you ever again see or hear from costar George Gilmour?

"I just happened to show up for the dance audition for The Apple with a couple of friends who I met on their way there.  I decided to tag along.  I was completely unprepared but wanted to experience that kind of professional audition as a dancer. The director thought I looked right for the lead role, so he auditioned me right there and then.  It was a crazy experience, like nothing I’d ever experienced before, but it all happened so fast that I didn’t really have time to think about it.  I just went along for the ride and I loved every minute of it!  I did see George once or twice after filming but I haven’t seen or spoken to him in decades.  He is a wonderful, talented man."

In the wake of The Apple, now situated in California, you had the occasion to appear in a teensploitation/party type of flick called The Beach Girls (1982) in which your chief contribution seemed to be kissing a fellow actor for a lengthy take and then gathering around a bonfire. Was that a fun and frolicsome time on set or was it a hot mess?
  

"Yes, I had a tiny role in the movie The Beach Girls.  By uttering a couple of words I was able to apply for my Screen Actors Guild union card.  If you blink you miss me.  I think I said something like… 'Who cares…?'  I was probably on the set maybe half a day so I really had no concept of how the shoot was going.  I always love being on sets. From that perspective I’m sure I had fun."

Stewart is seen at far left.

You soon began appearing on Days of Our Lives as the first Kayla Brady, a young, forthright nurse. Was there a family atmosphere among the long-term actors on the show or was it more about the work and getting it done?

"I think long running soap operas with the same cast definitely becomes like a very close family.  It is tough work so it’s great to have a good support system!  DOOL was probably the hardest job I had in acting.  We shot a 60 minute show in a day.  If you have a big storyline you might need to know 50 pages of dialogue for one episode.  Memorizing that kind of thing is hard!!  I am in awe of soap opera actors!" 
  

Before too long, big screen opportunities came calling again, including The Last Starfighter and Night of the Comet (both 1984.) These are but two of several fondly remembered sci-fi oriented films of yours which have amassed a cult following. Do you attend conventions and, if so, do the fans surprise you with their enthusiasm and knowledge of the movies in question? 
  

"I have attended conventions and the fans are astounding in their knowledge and enthusiasm.  I often joke that they know my characters and movies way better than I do.  I am so grateful to have been a part of these charming, character driven movies that have touched so many people in an often profound way.  I love talking to the fans and hearing their thoughts.  I never expected that these movies would have the impact that they have to so many people.  It’s incredibly gratifying."
  

[Editor's Note: Night of the Comet had the distinction of featuring two young female leads against not only a horde of zombies, but a sinister group of scientists, making it a unique action film of its time - and after!]

 
As pretty as you are, was this really the best date you could find to the Starfighter premiere?
  

Very funny, regarding the 'date!!'  Hey, that thing was cute!"

   

In the mid-1980s, you entered the world of the then-popular TV miniseries. First came Hollywood Wives, a star-studded, highly-glitzy affair in which you were the wide-eyed young girl tossed into a world of money, power and fame (and, if I recall correctly, drugs!) First of all, what were these photo shoots like, in which you were elbow to elbow with a variety of famous and sometimes infamous actors and actresses? Any competition for the center spot, etc...? And what did you think when you first saw Andrew Stevens in his alter-ego role of the deranged, bearded twin? 
   

Predating the Geico caveman, Andrew Stevens as his own evil twin...

"I can’t believe how incredibly lucky I was to work with some true legends.  I worked with Rod Steiger twice!!  TWICE!!  The 80’s were a huge decade for mini-series like these and I was SO fortunate to be up and coming at the time and filled the niche of the young innocent that seemed to appear in many of them.  I was young and innocent but I so appreciated the likes of Candice Bergen, Angie Dickinson (who took me under her wing), Anthony Hopkins, Roddy McDowall, Robert Stack, etc., etc.  It was mind blowing!  The joke was Andrew Stevens as his alter ego looked like Charles Manson.  It was so creepy!!  He went for it, man!  The photo sessions we did for Hollywood Wives, just cemented the wonderful experience of working with these talented actors.  There was literally no competition between the actors.  I was very shy and intimidated and in awe of the cast.  I was so grateful to Angie Dickinson for making me feel comfortable.  She is a saint."

Stewart, alongside Mariette Hartley, in her second project with Rod Steiger, the 1989 TV-movie Passion and Paradise.

This same telefilm had her hurled into the arms of one Armand Assante, at the time riding a wave of successful TV projects such as Rage of Angels (1983), Evergreen (1985) and Napoleon and Josephine: A Love Story (1987.)

Not long after, you were selected to play the teenaged version of Joan Collins' character in her miniseries Sins (1986.) Did working on her sister Jackie's Hollywood Wives play into this in any way? Were you selected by Joan (who was also producing) personally? As young Helene, you had to endure a lot of the torment of the character that later became vengeful once Joan took over. How harrowing was that?
   

"I don’t think being in Jackie Collins' Hollywood Wives had anything to do with getting the role in Sins in terms of Joan and Jackie’s relationship.  I was working a lot at that time and certainly it didn’t hurt that I was in Hollywood Wives.  It showed that I was a popular commodity. I loved playing the role of the Helene Junot in Sins.  It was a complicated, emotional role so quite challenging.  We shot in Paris and the surrounding area.  That was absolutely fantastic!  It was an incredible experience and another legend-filled cast!  I’m still in touch with Joan through a good friend of mine to this day.  She is an icon."

Stewart's Sin-ful selection led to an article in TV Guide wherein she shared recipes and dished about getting to meet La Collins!

Photographer John Findlater and Stewart divorced around this time after two years of marriage. It is her present husband Richard Allerton (who she wed in 1992) with whom she shares two children, Hanna (born in 1993) and Connor (born in 1996.)

You seem to have worked with some really well-regarded actors in your early years, from Robert Preston to Robert Mitchum, Karl Malden to Shirley Knight to Rod Steiger, Also up and comers like James Spader, Holly Hunter, Jon Cryer. Are there any particular things that you learned from any of these people (or from others not mentioned) or that you particularly enjoyed about them?
   

Robert Preston in The Last Starfighter (1984.)

"Working with these actors you see why they are as highly regarded as they are!  Robert Preston was a lovely, kind, giving actor. Lance Guest always speaks of him with such love and respect. I only met him on the set once because I had no scenes with him, but he literally seemed to glow.  He kissed my hand!!  Some of these actors would challenge me, some intimidated me but they were all amazing, professional actors that knew what they were doing.  I tried to learn as much as I could just being around them.  I still carry many lessons to this day!"
    

Little known is the fact that you, joined with Julia Campbell and Ally Walker, filmed a TV pilot for The Witches of Eastwick (in the role originated by Michelle Pfeiffer.) The vast majority of your acting career, however, has been split between features, TV-movies and miniseries with only the very occasional American primetime TV series appearance (for example, no guest roles on one of the big soaps, on the almost obligatory Murder, She Wrote, a girlfriend of Jerry's on Seinfeld, a killer or victim on one of the endless CSI programs.) Is this by design or just the way things worked out?

 

"I have never had a specific plan for my career.  I feel like that could be limiting.  I never want to limit myself as an actor.  I never want to be 'branded,' which seems to be a 'thing' these days.  Of course there are many roles that I didn’t get that I would have loved to have but I could never complain about the path my life and career has taken.  I am so grateful that I’ve been able to pursue something I truly love.  I feel like there is so much possibility out there and I want to take advantage of it all."
   

In 1993 you worked with both Charles Bronson and Christopher Reeve in The Sea Wolf. Do you have any reflections about that experience with these two actors that almost no one would ordinarily associate with one another (or on Reeve, who was paralyzed only two years later)?
     

"The Sea Wolf was another wonderful experience.  I did a lot of research into the time period and the character was something I hadn’t done before.  It was fantastic being able to submerse myself into this very complicated character with a couple of incredible actors!  Christopher Reeve was lovely, intense and talented.  Charles was kind, sweet and not nearly as intimidating as you might think he is. We became great friends.  Working with incredible actors forces you to really step up to the plate. Sadly, both he and Christopher Reeve have passed.  Again, I feel so fortunate and grateful to have known and worked with these people."
   

Apart from a period in the early 2000s when you were focused on caring for your son and daughter, you have never stopped working! You've acted alongside one-time pretty boys who've continued to hone their craft (such as Grant Show, Rob Lowe, Billy Zane and Alec Baldwin) and I believe even two of The Golden Girls, Rue McClanahan and Betty White! Most recently, you joined Eric Roberts (with whom who worked on a TV-movie eight years prior) for the film When We Dance the Music Dies. What can you tell us about this and what sort of things do you look towards in the future?

 

Miss Stewart in the forthcoming When We Dance the Music Dies, in which she plays the wife of William Ragsdale, once the young lead of Fright Night back in 1985!

"I have been able to keep working pretty regularly, with some terrific actors.  I plan to keep that up and get more in to directing.  That is a passion of mine.  On every set I’ve worked on, I spent as much time behind the camera on my days off as I did in front of the camera.  I wanted to know everything about the technical side to putting a show together.  I love being on a set and I hope soon I’ll be behind the camera directing!"
   

You survived the '80s, a time when RIGOROUS punishment was done to hair and you almost always utilized your own luscious locks for all the many and varied characters you played and yet you still have amazing hair that always looks wonderful... Secrets please for our many female readers?!
   

"Fortunately hair keeps growing!  I’ve had every color, every style, every length under the sun, but part of the reason I’m OK with it is that I know hair will always grow out.  …and it’s really fun!!  I loved the ‘bigness’ of the 80’s.  Big hair, big shoulders, bold colors, big makeup, crazy jewelry.  It was a great time and I enjoyed every minute of it!"

Miss Stewart embracing, while also becoming one of the faces of, the unforgettable 1980s.

You have often been described in the Canadian press as a "good girl." I always think of the words "appealing" and "fresh" when your name comes up. Did you ever play a down and dirty bitch role and, if not, do you want to? 
   

"Absolutely!  The darker characters are the MOST fun.  Certainly, earlier in my career, I was cast as the girl next door but it wasn't long before I broke out of that mold with Night of the Comet. Especially as I get older there are more opportunities to play characters with lots of dimension.  I’ve played alcoholics, bitches, you name it."  

 

We know you like Modern Family and once played the mother of Nolan Gould in a telefilm [Ghoul, 2012.] It would be awesome to see you pop up there in a zany guest role! 

"I would LOVE that!!  I’m primarily in New York so that cuts me out of a lot of the series that shoot in LA.  I plan to be more bi-coastal now that my children are grown."
   

Lastly, can you offer an explanation for this photo? Was it your own wedding?!

"The wedding gown photo was from a photo shoot I did for a magazine.  I got to work with the incredible photographer Harry Langdon on this shoot.  I worked with him several times over the years.  Love him!"

We're so thankful that Miss Stewart was willing to take the time to answer these questions. My own first exposure to her was when she played the first Kayla Brady on Days. I was fifteen at the time and developed a bit of a fixation on her! I remember being so excited when she was later featured amid all the stars of Hollywood Wives. She worked on so many things that we never got to touch on, but I didn't want to take advantage of her graciousness in supporting my li'l ol' site. And she is indeed such a gracious, amiable and - as you surely could tell - kind and appreciative person. We look forward to much more from her, including her efforts behind the camera.

The Apple Really Bites!

Proudly taking its place next to Can't Stop the Music, Xanadu, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and other breathtakingly bad musicals of the same basic era is this rapturously awful piece of celluloid punishment. This one tops all of the aforementioned flicks in the heinousness department because the others, at least, contain some modicum of memorable and, even good, music! You might find yourself remembering a song or two from The Apple, but it will likely be for the wrong reason. The “styling” in this film is also in a category all its own (notice I didn’t say class!) The word for it is putrescent.
Released in 1980, this film is set in the far-flung future of 1994. Shoulder pads, face and hair paint and garish, gaudy, shiny clothes are all the rage. (So are ridiculously appointed cars, full of gadgets with no apparent purpose.) Music (and apparently most everything else!) is controlled by a huge conglomerate called BIM, run by a demonic looking, all-powerful executive. During a Worldvision Song Festival, Catherine Mary Stewart and George Gilmour, two young, folksy types from Moose Jaw, Canada, completely at odds with everyone else in sight, pit their sappy love ballad against the over-the-top, synthetic music of Grace Kennedy and Allan Love.

Surprisingly enough, they start to endear themselves to the whacked-out audience and come close to winning the competition, but the evil head of BIM (played by Polish actor Vladek Sheybal) rigs it so that they lose. Realizing their potential, however, he attempts to sign them to a record deal. He invites them to a party at his elaborately designed house where the chains really begin to come off in the hair, wardrobe and makeup stakes! A crazed assortment of music celebs and hangers on populate the party. (Look fast for Finola Hughes - above, middle - as one of the dancers!) Stewart is entranced by everything, but Gilmour is skeptical.

The following day, the duo reports to Sheybal’s headquarters where a plethora of musical acts are waiting for the chance to be signed. Search the world. Try it. I’ll wait. You will never see another production number as zany, ridiculous and as musically unsound as this. It’s bad enough that Sheybal speak-sings the number (and he’s no Rex Harrison!), but the song is so disjointed and bizarre that there was no chance of it being good in the first place. However, like almost everything else in this movie, it entertains nonetheless due to sheer audaciousness and lunacy.

Once inside Sheybal’s office, Stewart foolishly gives in and becomes a performer with BIM while Gilmour stands his ground. His reservations about signing are manifested in a couple of hallucinatory interludes, one involving that disaster movie era staple – an earthquake – and the other a far more elaborate and memorable one.

Suddenly, he and Stewart are shown in pseudo Adam and Eve style getups with Sheybal (natch!) as Satan. They find themselves in a cavernous, hell-like place filled with writhing, deformed inhabitants. Love, in a gold lame thong that seems to have a hoagie bun stuffed into the front of it, prances around singing about the temptations of “the apple” while black henchman/assistant Ray Shell, in full-on, glam, snake suit hisses accordingly. The primary benefit of this senses-shattering debacle is that Gilmour spends the entire number in a very skimpy, leafy loincloth and, whatever his other faults may be, he is a cute, furry little guy.
Once back to reality, he refuses to sign with BIM and is quickly on the skids. He returns to his seedy apartment where Miriam Margolyes plays his fretful landlady with every solitary drop of stereotypical Jew mama cliché that she can muster. He sees what the money, drugs and sexual excesses are doing to Stewart and attempts to break her away from BIM. When that doesn’t work, he is roughed up and left to flounder in the pouring rain (mustering up enough energy, though, to warble a love duet as the blood seeps from the corner of his mouth.)
Gilmour only wears one pair of jeans throughout the bulk of the movie. The chances of them being any tighter are about 150,000 to one. He sports some serious moose knuckle (and, to be honest, sometimes camel toe!) any time he's shown in anything but a close-up! I feel guilty all over for looking, but that, and his hairy chest, which is frequently peeking out of his shirts that are sometimes unbuttoned to below the sternum, seem to steal my attention away from the never-ending parade of tacky, outrageous and deliberately garish costumes that everyone else has on. That said, most of the extras seem to also have been encouraged to "go commando" and put their junk up there on the silver screen whenever possible!

Anyway, thanks to Margolyes and her cure-all chicken soup (which is ladled into the bowl clear, but is cloudy when she feeds it to him!), he makes one more try to get to Stewart. This time, he in intercepted by Kennedy, who takes him on a drug-laced sexual journey that includes visions of pasty pale “dancers” in gold thongs simulating positions probably not even found in The Kama Sutra while she sings, “I’m comin’, comin’ for you” in addition to other even more suggestive lyrics. When Gilmour enters the house, there are gays a’ plenty, in and out of drag. When the erotic couples are shown, naturally it’s all hetero.

Things get really loopy when Gilmour runs into bearded hobo Joss Ackland who introduces him to a 1960s hippie culture. (The largest percentage of this sect is under 40 or even younger though the movie’s timeline of 1994 would have this about three decades after the 60s. Did they all join as children?) Eventually, Stewart and Gilmour are reunited and join the hippie troupe as a God figure (also played by Ackland) confronts the Satan figure (Sheybal.) Somehow, in a year’s time, the young couple have conceived, born and raised what looks to be a three year-old child (or else the planet’s most overgrown three month-old!)
The basic plot line of the film, which, despite all the fanciful trimmings, couldn’t be more hoary (an innocent seduced into sin by shady opportunists?) takes its basic cues from The Bible, but is souped up with Rocky Horror Show-style hair, make-up and costuming topped off with ludicrous production design and some of the most dreadful, ear-assaulting production numbers ever to be captured on film. Every dancer acts as if there's a $1000 prize for the most obnoxious or idiotic expression captured on film that day. In a move that could only have happened in the 80s (or maybe the 60s), the characters have names like Alphie, Bibi, Pandi and Dandi. (They needn’t have gone that far overboard. The movie was only set 14 years in the future and no one was naming their child Pandi or Dandi in the 1970s, which is about when the characters would have been born!)

Bad as it is, it’s all in fun I suppose (and like many of the flicks I remark upon here, it does have a devoted cult following.) There’s a thoroughly zany enforced-exercise sequence with nuns doing choreography and surgeons dancing while a patient is being operated on (and even he is required to give the movements a try, sick or no!) Fans seem to be split on which songs they like or hate more...the disco-esque BIM songs or the love ballads cranked out by Gilmour. None of the songs in the film are particularly memorable though, even if one can't get the imagery that goes with them out of one's head!
It is astonishing that Stewart could actually carve out some type of career after this, but she did. Her fresh face and amiable persona somehow won out. Though she had something of a singing voice, she was so new to the business that the producers grew anxious about her abilities and hired a pro to record her songs, which Stewart then lip-synched to. She actually enjoyed a fairly healthy TV and movie resume in the wake of this film, though she has to have set some sort of record for appearing in the most gaudy, strenuously chintzy looking movies ever during the 80s and 90s, though certainly the time period itself played into that. I remember seeing her in the mid-80s as the upstanding original Kayla Brady on Days of Our Lives and then as another innocent caught up in squalor in the tackilicious 1985 miniseries Hollywood Wives. Another cult favorite came with Weekend at Bernie's. Now, having grown into her looks and lost some of the trappings of the earlier hair and fashion felonies, she looks quite appealing.

Gilmour is another story. He dropped off the face of the earth entirely, apparently. His singing isn't all that bad and he had a compact, sexy body (shown off to good advantage at several stages of the movie) but he could not act at all and occasionally resembles Will Farrell! He actually looks even more handsome in profile than straight on and sported a great head of hair. He was apparently a member of a band, but it’s very difficult to find any sort of concrete information about him. Speculation about him runs rampant on the Internet. In any case, he never made another movie (or even TV) appearance, which suggests that he had his fill during this production.

Kennedy and Love were also virtually obliterated by this turkey. Love was quite awful, but Kennedy actually appeared to have a certain amount of talent and presence and it's a shame she was sunk before she even got started. I believe she had a moderately successful career in music, at least.

Sheybal had a long career as a character actor and he always struck a distinctive note, but his singing here is disastrous. Ackland also can't sing, but he manages to provide a little bit of presence in his dual role. The writers, a married couple named Coby and Iris Recht, have bit parts in the film. They had originally planned this as a Hebrew stage musical (!), but were persuaded by the producer Menahem Golan to do it cinematically in order to ride the wave started by Saturday Night Fever and Grease. Sadly, there were really no similarities in the slightest to those previous, far more successful films. None other than George Clinton was enlisted to make the song’s lyrics more understandable to an English-speaking audience and he cannot be commended as having succeeded very well! He is also given a part in the movie. His wife at the time, the daughter of comedic actor Tom Poston, was also given a part. It’s a miracle that the meter readers and hairdressers of the staff weren’t given parts as well and maybe they were!

And who choreographed the delightful musical numbers? The ones in which people thrash and stretch and flail around? British TV presenter and dance aficionado Nigel Lythgoe is to blame! Lythgoe is the force behind So You Think You Can Dance and the non-stop musical juggernaut American Idol! Methinks he learned a thing or two from this film! The movie may seem preposterous, but one thing that isn’t as off as one might think is the makers’ insight into the way the music business will have evolved. It isn't all that far off the mark!
Useful as a party-enhancing laugh machine and as an example of balls-out excess (regardless of a low budget), look high and low, far and wide, but it is unlikely that a more splendiferously hideous film will be found. Just remember that if you're showing it to someone for the first time, you may see damage to your TV or your home. Viewers at the premiere in Hollywood were given free souvenir soundtrack albums, but as the film progressed, they found what they were seeing and hearing so vomitous that they began throwing their records at the performers, causing damage to the screen!