If DC Had Directed Valley of the Dolls (was "Joan Crawford as...")

[markyboo]

    I wish Dan Curtis could have directed the film version of VALLEY OF THE DOLLS (one of my favorite "guilty pleasure" movies). He could have cast the film with DS actors. Grayson Hall would have been cast as the bitchy Helen Lawson - "Broadway doesn't go for booze & dope!". And she would get to sing that hysterical "I'll Plant My Own Tree"! It seems like Susan Hayward (who played Helen Lawson) was puffing away all throughout the movie, so Grayson could smoke in the movie just like she did on DS.  Alexandra Moltke ,cast as the "good girl", Ann Welles - naturally. Barbara Parkins, who played Ann in the film , would have made a wonderful Victoria Winters by the way. I think Lara Parker would have had the sex appeal then to be Jennifer North, the role played by sweet, ill-fated Sharon Tate. And Nancy Barrett as Patty Duke's character - the great Neely O'Hara. Nancy would have just been dynamite in all the crying, screaming scenes plus it would have been a hoot to hear her say: "Boobies, boobies, boobies!".

Also, David Selby as Lyon Burke, Joel Crothers as Mel Anderson, Donald Briscoe as Tony Polar...any suggestions on who should play Neeley's bisexual husband, Ted Casablanca?

[David]

John Karlen played a bisexual dude in the film Daughters of Darkness (anyone who wants to see
Karlen's tush & wee wee need to check this film out!)
And just imagine: Nancy Barrett's Neely calling
Karlen a "fag"
OMG!

And I'd pick Marie Wallace to do the VO:
"you've got to climb Mount Everest to reach the Valley of the Dolls....."

David

[Janet the Wicked]

John Karlen played a bisexual dude in the film Daughters of Darkness (anyone who wants to see
Karlen's tush & wee wee need to check this film out!)
And just imagine: Nancy Barrett's Neely calling
Karlen a "fag"
OMG!

Is that what was going on it that film??? I can't for the life of me see JK as a homosexual/bisexual/or anything but a manly man. I imagine John feels the same way. It was an acting job. That is all.

[joe integlia]

john karlen played a gay school teacher in a tv movie called"welcome home bobby"

[MagnusTrask]

I've never seen VotD, but I have DOD.    I don't even remember the bi part.    I recall a posterior or two, vaguely.

[David]

Early in Daughters of Darkness, it was established that Karlen's character, Stefan, married his wife on the rebound from a gay relationship with a domineering older man, who's seen talking to him on the phone.

David

[Gothick]

Well.

Trying really really hard to be tactful here.... I think it is just as well that Dan Curtis never directed ANY version of VotD (it's interesting to note that Jean Simmons played Susan Hayward's role in the early 1980s telefilm remake--I commented to someone that Jean seemed to be stuck doing "remakes on behalf of other dead divas" when she got Joan Bennett's role on the Shadows remake).  I don't think Curtis' skill set (again, trying to be tactful) was in any way suited to the material of Jackie Susann's novel.  Mark Robson was considered a wretched director by those who worked with him on VotD, by the way.  According to Patty Duke's memoirs, Robson was brutal with the actors and had poor Sharon Tate constantly in tears because he treated her as  little more than a talking mannequin throughout the shoot.

I would cast Briscoe as Mel and Crothers as Tony.  I think Grayson would have been better as Tony's sister--the Lee Grant role.  I think it would have been more fun and shocking to have Joan Bennett as Helen Lawson, although Joan might not have wished to violate her gracious public image with a role that had such a "hard inner core."  (I keep my tape of Suspiria just for the dialogue where Joan rants "I want you to kill that American bitch, NOW!")  I think based on Karlen's performance as writer Will Loomis, he would have been great as Ted Casablanca although I would have wanted the role to get more screen time than was the case in the final cut of VotD.  Karlen could work a flamboyant edge.  And to Janet the Wicked, it doesn't impugn an actor's masculinity to say that he can play gay convincingly. Quite the reverse, I would say.  There's a reason why we call it acting, dear.  But I'll stay off my soapbox ... for now.

I've referred to the characters at Collinwood reading VotD the novel more than once in my own fan fiction.  I think it would have been a hoot to have shown the book on Liz's night table in one of her boudoir scenes.  In one of those scenes where Carolyn tries reading to her mother to calm her nerves when Cassandra has been giving her nightmares, it would have been great if she had picked up some thick tome and recited, "You'd have to climb Mount Everest to reach the Valley of the dolls."  I think Nancy would have been SPECTACULAR as Neely.

G.

[MagnusTrask]

I haven't seen VotD, and I'm thinking of renting the porn film "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls" (written by Roger Ebert).     Will I spoil anything by watching this one first?!

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I don't think Curtis' skill set (again, trying to be tactful) was in any way suited to the material of Jackie Susann's novel.

Well, really no need to be tactful. It's not like it's any sort of secret that if not for the assistance of DS director Lela Swift, DC wouldn't have had the first idea how to get hoDS made - much less any film as early as '67 - and much more less a non-horror film (especially one that necessitated actual scenes of character development). 

Mark Robson was considered a wretched director by those who worked with him on VotD, by the way.  According to Patty Duke's memoirs, Robson was brutal with the actors and had poor Sharon Tate constantly in tears because he treated her as  little more than a talking mannequin throughout the shoot.

Hmmm - Mark Robson directed Kate Jackson in Limbo in '72. I wonder if she has horror stories about him...

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I'm thinking of renting the porn film "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls"

If you're simply renting for the supposed "porn" element, don't waste your time. The film would rate a PG-13 by today's standards.  :-   And honestly I wouldn't recommend renting it for any reason. I saw BTVOTD when it was reissued in '77 in a double bill with Myra Breckenridge, and the time spent in the theater with those two films was excruciating and four hours of my life that I'll never be able to reclaim...

[MagnusTrask]

I was just kidding.  But if I see any of the films mentioned, in some VHS $1 clearance bin, I'll snap them up.     That's the era I concentrate on, and I'm only now seeing the movies that were talked about (sometimes in hushed tones?) when I was just a little young to be going to them.    I don't need them all to be good.   I'm filling in the gaps in my cultural history, from my own lifetime.

[David]

MB:
I think Beyond & Myra are hilarious!

What's not to like about two vulgar porn wannabes, one featuring Mae West & Raquel Welch!
and Farrah Fawcett!
and John Carradne!
and Rex Reed!

what a hoot!

David

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I think Beyond & Myra are hilarious!

Ah, but they're not supposed to be - at least not in the ways they turned out to be.    But unfortunately, getting deeper into that here in any way would be way too far OT and much better suited for a completely different forum.    Perhaps we can continue the discussion on The Unintentionally Funny And/Or A Complete Failure Forum. And if it doesn't exist, someone really needs to start it up! 

On the bright side, one thing hoDS does have going for it is that it's better than either of those two films...

[David]

 

But imagine HODS with Mae West as Dr. Julia Hoffman lusting after Barnabas (Rex Reed)
John Huston as Roger, Raquel Welch as
Carolyn.

OMG!

But yes, DS & HODS are better!

David

[Gothick]

There are beautiful new DVD issues of both VotD and Beyond the VotD.  I enjoyed the latter for the songs and the completely way-out situations and characters.  It was fascinating to learn from the DVD that Roger Ebert is actually PROUD of having written Beyond the VotD--I'd always assumed that he had devoutly hoped that his connection to that movie would be buried in obscurity.  Beyond the VotD also features an appearance by the Strawberry Alarm Clock, whose anthemic song "Incense and Peppermints" was very much a part of the vaguely occult late Sixties groove in which DS became so widely celebrated back in the day.  (Although Beyond ... dates to the early 1970s, the band are seen performing "Incense," a top ten hint in 1967, at a party sequence.)

I guess we now have definitive documentation that the MB does NOT like camp, since he has gone on record dissing both Beyond... AND Myra Breckinridge--two of the campiest movies ever produced!

cheers, G.