Reunited: "Turning" to "Steel!"

Considering how impactful the movie (and its parent play) Steel Magnolias (1989) has been on my life, it's remarkable that I've really referred to it or written about it precious little here in Poseidon's Underworld. But it you come here much, you know I most often dig up buried "treasure" versus focusing on projects that everyone already is more than familiar with. I did dig something up, which I'll share in a bit, though it's debatable how close to treasure it is! First, though, I'll mention my recent trip to the cinema in order to attend the 35th anniversary screening of the movie (a 4K video release has also made its way onto the market.) A close, longtime friend of mine suggested that we take it in and we enjoyed great, comfortable seats for what was an expansive view of the picture. This allowed me to see all sorts of little details in the background (or elsewhere) that I have missed over the years, especially those cropped VHS ones! Steel Magnolias was the very first DVD I purchased and was the reason I made the leap to DVDs from my VCR. It's because it contained deleted scenes and I just HAD to see those asap. Would you believe I'm so blond that after decades now of owning the disc, I only found out the other evening that there was a second "page" of excised scenes that I had heretofore not watched!! How do I make through each day, I ask you... Anyway, the movie was a visual delight from start to finish and still packs an emotional punch, too, amid all the hilarious moments. Trivia tidbit: The photo shown above right (which seemingly every community theatre group in the country has aped ever since when promoting their renditions of the play) has a secret. Olympia Dukakis wasn't there...! She couldn't attend the shoot, so Shirley MacLaine had to cling to a body double and, later, the real star's face was pasted in.

In the film, Shirley MacLaine and Tom Skerritt play warring neighbors. There's a dispute over ownership of a magnolia tree, compounded by Skerritt's endless antagonizing of her hyper-sensitive yet nonetheless rambunctious St. Bernard.

While she's reached an age when she no longer cares to hold her tongue nor filter her thoughts for those around her, she considers him horrendously uncouth in his own right. As he needles her for a piece of groom's cake at his daughter's wedding, the irascible MacLaine hacks off a large portion of the armadillo-shaped cake's tail end!

Taking the grey-iced piece of red velvet cake with tail attached, he lets her know he always did like a nice "piece of ass!" Of course, we all know that even amid their considerable differences, there is buried affection there. I always enjoy a later, brief, moment when, at his daughter's funeral, she walks by him and gives him a knock along his shoulder. It's the closest she was ever going to get to a hug with him, and it's understood.

Somehow out of the blue it occurred to me during this most recent screening that Skerritt and MacLaine were well-acquainted from a prior project. In fact, the same director Herbert Ross, was at the helm for both movies. Seen here, the two played a married couple in The Turning Point (1977), about a dozen years before sparring in Magnolias.

As Skerritt and Sally Field fretted over their daughter with the long, auburn hair in Magnolias, Skerritt and MacLaine had their own child whose future was very much in the forefront of their minds in Point.

I saw The Turning Point in the theater when I was ten (!), so most of its dramatic weight likely sailed right over my head. So revisiting after watching the more familiar Magnolias, it's fun to observe these two as a devoted couple versus portraying feuding cranks.

Drum and Ouiser as an intimate married couple.

The characters both play retired ballet dancers and it was intriguing to watch them discuss the fact that she felt that having his baby would prove to the world that he wasn't gay -- only to have him announce that he also needed to prove this, to himself!

Get a load of the way director Ross blocked this moment in the movie...! Both my pal and I noticed the use of mirrors as we re-watched Magnolias at the screening, but there was nothing on the level of this shot!

Regardless of the animosity they demonstrated in Magnolias, Skerritt and MacLaine were good friends and she was elated to be reunited with him on Donahue during a publicity appearance for the film with all the ladies except Darryl Hannah. (The perennially shy Hannah refused to come and face a live crowd or answer their probing and sometimes inappropriate questions.)

Those familiar with the movie will recall the climactic scene at the grave site in which Field finally suffers an emotional breakdown after having held it together for the longest time.

Her friends are powerless in the face of all this unbridled rage and confusion.

In an effort to release the tension, Dukakis puts forth MacLaine as a potential punching bag for Field to use as a stress reliever! A small scuffle breaks out. Interestingly, this "laughter through tears" moment (from the play) was not unfamiliar to director Ross.

In The Turning Point, the story climaxes with a blistering argument between MacLaine and her longtime frenemy Ann Bancroft, culminating in a wild cat fight. But, finally, after kneeing, clawing and even spanking one another, the two women dissolve into laughter.

Bancroft even borrows MacLaine's comb in order to try to repair some of the damage. ("I don't know how you're doin' on the inside, but your hair's holdin' up beautifully...")

The Turning Point was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, but was left empty-handed at the end of the evening. (Is that about the worst conceivable rendering of MacLaine imaginable?!)

Magnolias landed but ONE nomination (for Julia Roberts, who lost to Brenda Fricker in My Left Foot.) One might have thought at minimum that it's deliberately tacky production design and art direction might have been nominated, not to mention the unforgettable music by Georges Delerue. Regardless of what any of the ladies said to the press or to interviewers, filming was for the most part a horrible nightmare thanks to the taciturn, cruel, demanding behavior of director Ross, who was acting out after the recent death of his wife and lost a lot of his prestige as a result. But the finished product doesn't betray this, with the actresses delivering memorable performances.

I mentioned earlier how so many community theatre groups aped the famous shot of the six actresses embracing in a row. When I directed the show in 1988, I eschewed that concept (because otherwise how else could I get my own fat face into the shots!? Ha ha!) This photo was taken at an early dress rehearsal before the set decor was applied and without all of the makeup and hair details being done. The ladies were DYNAMITE and at the time set a record for the number of local awards won for that small, less-prominent theatre troupe. Three of them won acting certificates and the ensemble won as a whole (which went to me.)

I also told you at the beginning of this post that I'd done a little digging... Who among you remembers this?!?! I had to have either forgotten about it entirely or blocked it out of my mind like some traumatic event. It was a 1990 television pilot for a half-hour series of Steel Magnolias. It aired once on CBS and was rarely seen again. (Are you seriously telling me that this is the headstone that the Eatentons and her lawyer husband installed for Shelby?!?!)

The program hasn't even gotten underway before the horror begins. Having been told that his mother is in the nearby grave, her toddler son Jack Jr exclaims, "Then dig her up...!" This dour, misguided retread was written by the same author as the play and the movie, but it did not sell as a series.

Even realizing that the video quality of the YT upload is substandard and that it surely looked better than this upon airing, it's still a gauzy, dimly-lit fiasco with recycled humor and situations. She might look the part all right, but Kirland is too New York for this role and her deep voice and lack of effervescence lies in start contrast to the inimitable Dolly Parton.

Likewise, Bergen and Stritch seem like solid casting, but I could only roll my eyes when Stritch handed Bergen a magazine about cosmetic surgery and suggesting that maybe she try it when Bergen has clearly already undergone eye work and probably several other things...!

In this version, M'Lynn wasn't a mental health counselor, but instead worked at a brewery called Shotz. (I'm kidding... that's a lame Laverne & Shirley joke. Actually, Ms. Williams was trying, and wasn't bad, but this was mostly a non-starter no matter what.) You can watch it and see what you think right here.

One of the more fascinating trivia tidbits was in the casting of the soon-to-be new Mrs. Jackson Latcherie. (In real life, Susan Harling's - the basis for Shelby - widower remarried within a year of her death.) This new character was played by Dana Morosini. Her own life would play out at or beyond the level of the story behind Magnolias.

Already by that time, she was the girlfriend of handsome Christopher Reeve. They would wed in 1992 after she became pregnant with their son. In 1995, Reeve suffered the accident that would paralyze him until his death in 2004 at 52. Dana Reeve passed away of lung cancer (attributed to secondhand smoke from her singing career in nightclubs) at 44 in 2006. It was a tragedy worthy of a movie in its own right! Their legacy lives on, though, through the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, which seeks cures and treatments for neurological disorders. 

And that brings down the curtain on this post!

Top Ten Anniversary: Favorite Tear-jerkers

We didn't intend to break up the procession of Top Ten lists, but the untimely demise of Miss Carol Lynley called for it. So were back now with list #9. (Can you guess how many there will be in the series?  Ha ha!) Today we're going to wallow in shameless emotion because we're breaking out the tearjerkers. Now... My own most significant tear-jerker is, amazingly enough, The Poseidon Adventure (1972), which reduced me to a mess as a child, but I am not including it in this list for reasons which will become clear later. Another one is also being omitted for reasons which will be made known in the not-too-distant future. However, the others below represent films that are practically guaranteed to set off my waterworks. There are many more (I'm Irish and well up at everything from Hallmark commercials to big game show wins...!), but these are MY favorites, in alphabetical order. Grab a hankie!

AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER (1957) -- The original version of this film (by the same director!), Love Affair (1939), is great, but I like this one a skosh better because of its color and production values and the fact that I really like Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant as a couple. The better part of the movie is a "cutesy" shipboard romance between two people involved with others on shore, but once a story point hits just as the stars are about to reunite at the top of the Empire State Building, things turn melodramatic quickly. Things I love about it: the self-sacrifice that Kerr is willing to make in order to not burden the love of her life, the tragedy of such hopeful anticipation spoiled by a lightning fast event and, most of all, the tete-a-tete between Kerr and Grant at the finale as they toy with one another and delay our gratification. Probably the part that gets me more than any is when Grant starts to dart around Kerr's apartment in search of something and his expression when he finds it. This film's ending is so tear-jerky to me that I started crying during Sleepless in Seattle (1993) when Rita Wilson was merely describing it! I cannot, however, stomach the dreary, passionless later remake Love Affair (1994), which I awaited with bated breath, by Warren Beatty. Bonus points for the gorgeous opening song crooned by velvety Vic Damone. It was Oscar nominated, but lost to "All the Way," another beautiful song, from The Joker Is Wild.

GLORY (1989) -- This is one of the rare movies in this category that I have only seen one time. Sometimes you see a movie and you cannot wait to relive it over and over. Sometimes you see a movie and you absorb it so much that once can be enough. (The Pianist, 2002, springs to mind. I ADORED it and have it on DVD, but have never watched it again...) I can never forget sitting in the theater and watching as Denzel Washington, about to be unfairly punished by whip for breaking the Union army rules, is stripped of his jacket, revealing a litany of scars from countless prior assaults on his person. As the punishment proceeded, he began to release a tear (*the story of which is interesting in itself) and that was it for me. I don't think I stopped weeping until the movie was over... Like many movies in this post, the music means so much and, amazingly, it was not nominated for an Oscar despite being so unusual and wonderful. (The composer James Horner was nominated, however, for Field of Dreams that year.) *Washington was being flogged with a special whip that didn't cut, but did leave a sting. On the take that made it into the final print of the film, the director hesitated in calling "Cut!" and it resulted in a real tear from the actor as he was being struck. Agonizing, yes, but he took home an Oscar for his pains!

MADAME X (1966) -- We keep mentioning this film, but I swear it is just so memorable to me! Cynics and eye-rollers may be immune to it, but those who fall for a good "mother love" yarn and who like being emotionally manipulated in exchange for a good cry will feel differently. At the climactic murder trial, pretty Keir Dullea does all he can to help his downtrodden client Lana Turner without her even lifting a finger to help herself and finally she acquiesces. As she relates her own story, and we begin to see the mournful expressions on a now (finally!) aged Constance Bennett, and hear the pleading closing statement from Dullea, the flood begins. One of my quirky tear-jerking triggers is when someone who has behaved horribly eventually comes around and is remorseful for what they've done. In countless movies and TV shows I've become moved by this for some reason I haven't completely explored in my own psyche. Maybe it's because I sometimes say or do things I wish I wouldn't have and would like to be able to make it right. Not sure. As is so often the case with this list, Frank Skinner's music is delirious throughout. (There's a staircase climb near the start of the film as Miss Lana races to the top in heels and a snug skirt that I especially treasure!)

PENNY SERENADE (1941) -- This is the third film that Irene Dunne and Cary Grant made together (following The Awful Truth, 1937, and My Favorite Wife, 1940) and so by now their already wonderful chemistry was off-the-charts. The first two films were highly comedic and this one has its moments as well, though typically more gentle than the other ones. Here, Dunne plays a series of records on a phonograph as she recounts her life with Grant and is preparing to leave him. Their up and down relationship is revealed in a sequence of episodes that are amusing, touching, always-charming and in some cases heart-wrenching. The affable Grant, star of so many screwball comedies and light romances, has a scene before a judge that is positively gut-wrenching. He received one of his only two Oscar nominations for this tenderly sentimental film (losing to Gary Cooper for Sergeant York.) And Dunne, who could really do just about anything, is his perfect counterpoint with her extraordinary immediacy and realistic reactions as a cinema actress. Expert support, and I do mean expert, is offered up by Beulah Bondi as an adoption agent and Edgar Buchanan as an endearing character called "Applejack" who witnesses most of the couples trials and triumphs. The little girl who plays their daughter Trina is simply precious. Trivia tidbit: Dunne starred in Love Affair (with Charles Boyer) while Grant starred in the aforementioned remake An Affair to Remember.

SOMEWHERE IN TIME (1980) -- Of all the movies I have paid tribute to here, this is the one I keep meaning to write about and yet never do...  Strangely unsuccessful in theaters, perhaps due to its unabashed romanticism and the fact that newly-famous Christopher Reeve wasn't in his red and blue Superman (1978) uniform (along with the fact that an actor's strike prevented promotion for the film from them), this soon developed a cult following. It stands as a Valentine to beautiful Mackinac Island (and, in fact, now to its picture perfect stars.) Reeve is a playwright who becomes obsessed with the enigmatic portrait of an actress from decades ago and eventually finds a way to go back in time to meet her. Stunning Jane Seymour in her most beautiful period plays the graceful, elegant actress. Appearing in support are Christopher Plummer and Teresa Wright. While Rachmaninoff is heavily utilized in the film to punctuate the couple's lush romance, John Barry also provided some incredible music to accent the story, including an airy yet rich love theme. It's especially wonderful leading up to the moment when Reeve and Seymour finally meet up for the first time. That's one point where I nearly always tear up. The music was ignored at Oscar time, though the costumes were nominated (losing to Tess.)

STEEL MAGNOLIAS (1989) -- This is the play-turned-movie that gave us the line "Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion!" and that happens to resonate with me, but let's face it, among a certain crowd this whole damned movie is quotable. It's also got several moments that open up the floodgates. Needless to say, Sally Field's big meltdown in the cemetery is a whopper, and Julia Roberts' line about rather having "thirty minutes of wonderful than a lifetime of nothin' special" is touching, but as I've noted elsewhere there are strange things that tend to set me off. One is when Roberts' brothers come to visit her in the hospital. This is a teensy moment, but since they've been rowdy roughhousers all along, it's touching to see them actually show a little respect. The other one for me is when Dolly Parton and Sam Shepard share a moment that was not in the (all-female) play.  Parton's character has spent her whole life trying to make herself and others as beautiful as she can and her husband has barely taken an interest in any of it. He tugs at some soft wax on a stick and says, "What is this stuff?" and she replies, "It's supposed to make you pretty," with tears in her eyes. All the wax in the world can't help you save a life, though. Roberts was nominated for an Oscar (losing to Brenda Fricker of My Left Foot) and that was the film's sole nomination. Most staggering of all is that the superlative score by Georges Delerue was not nominated. The delicate, yet rich, music is unforgettable.

THE CHAMP (1979) -- I guess I oughtta quit bellyaching all the time about remakes when this is the third remake to appear in this list alone! The famous original was in 1931, starring Wallace Beery and Jackie Cooper. This time out, we have Jon Voight as a down-on-his-luck boxer trying to raise the young son (Ricky Schroder) left behind when mother Faye Dunaway felt the need to seek greener pastures and a more cultivated existence. While the movie was mocked for some of its more unusual elements (Dunaway's ethereal character is often awash in gauzy, enveloping clothing and her interest in Schroder sometimes seems a little icky!) and for it's heart-on-its-sleeve emotionalism, it still works thanks to Voight's devoted performance and the wellspring of tears that pour out of the little towhead. The poor little tyke just has problem after problem and he convincingly takes each one on like a trooper. He and Voight share a clear connection thanks to director Franco Zeffirelli, all underscored tastefully by Oscar-nominated Dave Grusin (who lost to Georges Delerue, winning that time for A Little Romance.)  This tear-jerker even has a tendency to crack tough "he-men" although there have been a few who could withstand the test.

THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1965) -- When a movie means as much to a person as this one means to me, there is going to be emotion. There are scenes meant to bring about tears and some not that still do anyway. One that was intended to hit the mark and does for me is when stern Christopher Plummer (looking devastatingly handsome throughout!) surprises his children by joining in with them as they serenade his lady love Eleanor Parker. The iceberg has begun to thaw. If you're like me and have "daddy issues" this scene is particularly touching. I actually got to live this whole thing out when I played the Captain on stage in 1995. Different parts at different stages of my life "get me." For instance, I was all choked up not even watching the movie one time. Just the Diane Sawyer anniversary special that was on a couple of years ago had me welling up with each new featured piece on the damn thing...! And, yes, the music is everything in practically every scene.

THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939) -- In a similar vein, I get really gooey, really easily when it comes to this film. It's "There's no place like home" message resonates with everyone and it does to me as well, though I really was never happy at home and can't imagine it being better than the freedom I eventually found! What really gets me is a) the fact that Judy Garland is so caring and innocent and giving, which, in light of the way her life wound up makes viewing more poignant, and b) dog lover that I am, anything to do with Toto. In the sepia-toned early section, when Toto joins Dorothy for "Over the Rainbow" and puts out a little paw, I'm just gone... G'night, folks! Later, when Toto makes a brave escape from the Wicked Witch of the West (played by the divine Margaret Hamilton), it's equally touching to me. The whole movie is such a perfect candy box and it's needless to mention how, again, music plays a substantial part in it.

TOMORROW IS FOREVER (1946) -- This lesser-known film has a wealth of talent on hand from the renowned (if, let's be honest, sometimes hammy) Orson Welles to the always rock-solid Claudette Colbert and even veteran leading man George Brent. It also introduced us to young Richard Long, who had a great career going until his untimely death from a heart attack at forty-seven. But the really big draw for me is the debut acting performance of one Natalie Wood. Yes, she'd been an extra once, but this was her first real role at age eight and she's astonishing in it. Uncharacteristically blonde and playing a German, she is nonetheless so naturally adorable, articulate, delicate and utterly charming. Like Judy Garland, the fact that she perished so young (at forty-three) adds a whole new layer of sentiment to what was already a very heartfelt performance. Her character is the adopted daughter of sickly Welles. She cares for him capably and demonstrably in spite of having been in a concentration camp herself and exposed to untold horrors.

I tend to fall for it every time. Thus, movies like Blossoms in the Dust (1941), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) and I Remember Mama (1948), and countless others could have made it onto this list as well. I love to be moved by a motion picture. And, as I say, different things move me at different times. The first time I saw Titanic (1996), I was moved by Leo and Kate's story, but the second time, I found myself reacting more to Gloria Stuart and what she was doing.

BONUS PICS!

She doesn't appear like this for long, but this is the look Deborah Kerr sports as a nightclub singer in An Affair to Remember.

And here is a wardrobe test photo of Cary Grant from the brief shipboard swimming scene in the film. Grant was clearly still in admirable shape, though had recently quit a 2-pack a day smoking habit and began to eat a lot more than usual. Still, he always maintained a decent physique during his acting career.

On the subject of swimming, here is Mr. Ricardo Montalban between takes on the set of Madame X (1966.) He plays Lana Turner's suave lover who doesn't like it when she attempts to break off their affair once her husband returns. Montalban was another man who kept up a good figure throughout his acting career.

Between Captains and the Kings (1976), in which she was paired with Perry King in a look much like this, and Somewhere in Time (1980), I thought that Jane Seymour was the last word in Gibson-style beauty. She and Christopher Reeve made a beautiful couple.

The setting, the costumes, the music and the performances all join together to create a really beautiful viewing experience.

Yours truly as a pup in 1995 during an outdoor production of The Sound of Music. The day we were going to open, it occurred to me that the children had been (mis)directed to sing to me when they meet The Baroness. They'd been coming on with her after my fight with Maria over the clothes and then singing to me. However, I took them all aside and said to them, "You were taught this song to sing to the Baroness... so do that. Do not look at me! When you suddenly hear me singing after all these years of never doing it, then you look at me." Well... cut to the moment in the show that night when I began chiming in, "...I go to the hills..." and all of a sudden seven little shocked, touching moppet faces turned and looked at me in unison and I swear to God I almost lost it! It was a struggle to get through the song (and the brief duet with Maria after that, which is cut from the movie.) Some of these kids have their own kids now and a couple of them still perform, even professionally, which is gratifying.

I do not ask it. I demand that you click on this photo and take in the blue-eyed glory of Mr. Christopher Plummer. My God, no wonder the Baroness didn't want to give up without some sort of college try!

I've seen this picture cropped to just chests many times or in black and white, but not too often in color, so I share it here... the fabulous foursome on the set of the Wizard of Oz.

Garland and Terry (the canine heart-breaker who played Toto) had a wonderful relationship on and off screen. Terry even stayed with Garland prior to filming so that they would be better acquainted during the shoot. Terry later lent Susan Hayward this pose for "I'll Plant My Own Tree" when she took over Judy's role in Valley of the Dolls (1967.) Okay... I made that up...

One of several posters that were developed for the release of The Champ.

But looky here... a piece of photo art that was used in creating the poster. Note how the real poster extends both Voight's and Dunaway's necks unnaturally! That gave me an idea for a party game and since "laughter through tears is my favorite emotion," I will show you how to do it. You print off the above photo with a copy for each person there and then let them fill it in the way they wish. Then everyone votes for the winner... Example below! LOL

Now don't get your titty in a twist. I'm just having some fun at the end of this post. Till next time, I'm yours truly... Poseidon!