All EIS’s statues were initially received without pause or controversy, that is, except for Lizzie’s Samantha, due to its placement in the middle of Salem, a town best known for its historic hanging of nineteen citizens accused of witchcraft. It all transpired in 1692 but remained a hot topic centuries later in 2005. As was discussed in the article, “Bewitched Statue Bothers Some in Salem,” by David Segal, and published in The Washington Post (May 10, 2005), capitalizing on that history with a statue of a broom-gliding media witch rubbed a few locals the wrong way. “It’s like TV Land going to Auschwitz and proposing to erect a statue of Colonel Klink,” said John Carr, a former member of the Salem Historic District Commission. “Putting this statue in the park near the church where this all happened, it trivializes the execution of nineteen people.”
But that night on June 15, 2005, the statue’s mold and fate had already been cast, shaped, and determined by a vote of the Salem Redevelopment Authority, which owns Lappin Park, where Lizzie’s likeness was placed. Mayor Usovicz liked Carr’s odds. No disrespect intended, he said. The town takes its dark past seriously and deals with it reverently in museums, but that doesn’t mean it should have declined to showcase a pop culture icon.
“Will this statue redefine Salem? Absolutely not,” he explained. “Will it add to the experience of coming here? Definitely.”
On Bewitched, Samantha and company may have lived in Westport, Connecticut. (In fact, as Screen Gems executive Harry Ackerman explained in The Bewitched Book [and elsewhere], he had drafted an original “eight- or nine-page treatment” for a show he called The Witch of Westport.) But as to those few seventh year episodes shot in Salem for the witches’ convention, it made the city a logical place for TV Land to erect its statue, especially when they visited the town during Halloween and found that thousands of revelers had descended upon the area.
“What we saw was a huge Halloween party,” said Robert Pellizzi, a TV Land senior vice president. “So we thought, it certainly makes sense to ask.” They sought advice about where to place the statue and they made a generous offer. Not only would the town get the bronze for free, but TV Land also offered to renovate Lappin Park and to pay for upkeep of the statue, too. In return, of course, TV Land hoped for public relations points, including some good photo opportunities when the statue was unveiled.
“If I were one of the people who had a house on the beautiful common there, would I hate it?” asked Ivan Schwartz, partaking in a conference from June 15, 2005 that addressed the issue. “Yes, probably. But it seems like [Salem] was going down that path long before this TV Land thing ever surfaced.”
“That path” was the path of cashing in on Salem’s witch backstory, something the town has been doing for a while (that is, police officers have a witch and broom stitched into their uniform emblems; at Halloween, various costume shops and haunted-houses open, etc.). Yet, for residents such as John Carr, the camp was getting a little out of hand. “God bless the mayor, but he thinks that statue is contemporary art,” Carr said at the time. “The whole idea is bad taste beyond belief.” Either way all these years later, the controversy has subsided, and Lizzie’s stilted bronzed presence remains.
“Unfortunately,” Thomas Hill was unable to attend the statue’s dedication, so he has “little recollection of the imbroglio,” but he’s sympathetic with the historians who “didn’t want this dark chapter in Early American history to be treated frivolously. But, naturally, I see America’s pop culture history as a valid inspiration for public art.”
However, Hill does recall TV Land’s President Larry Jones partaking in a TV news discussion program during which he defended the statue against someone representing the historically minded. “But the show had also booked a third guest, representing the modern day Wicca perspective— pro-witch, I suppose?”
Hill concludes, this particular Wiccan’s presence “made the entire debate appear rather absurd.” Consequently, despite even her physical absence, Lizzie’s name—and likeness—remained infused with political conflict and social issues—and she would have loved it.
On January 4, 2008, at yet another ceremony, this time presided over by honorary mayor Johnny Grant in Hollywood, California, Lizzie finally received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In attendance at the rain-drenched ceremony were a multitude of her fans, including radio host and journalist Jone Devlin, who recounts her experience of that day:
It was a cold, blustery, day, very rainy. Yet in spite of the awful weather, there was a good sized crowd there—and most of us arrived literally hours early just to be ensured of a good spot. Everyone in the group was happy and excited, sharing their memories of Bewitched and Elizabeth Montgomery and happily greeting people that they’d only ever met on Bewitched websites. The presentation was wonderful, touching and heartfelt, but what I remember the most is how everyone stayed for the entire thing … even when it was pouring down icy rain, even when people’s umbrellas gave out, drenching them and everyone around them, even when a small brook began to form beneath our feet as the drainage system lost its race with the driving downpour. To me that, above everything else was a testimony to how much Elizabeth Montgomery meant to her fans and friends; and it is a moment I’ll never forget.
Devlin and her fellow Bewitched fans then heard special memories shared from Lizzie’s children Rebecca and Billy Asher, friend Liz Sheridan and Robert Foxworth. Each of those who spoke mentioned how delighted Lizzie would have been with the ceremony. The downpour of rain, which all speakers believed she would have found amusing, could not compete with the outpour[ing] of respect from the loved ones and fans who attended the event despite the cloudburst. “It is so awesome that it is raining,” Rebecca said at the ceremony. “I can’t even really express it. She [Lizzie] is so happy right now.”
According to Devlin, Rebecca went on to explain how there are not many things more gratifying than seeing “someone you care about” being recognized for their work, especially if that individual happens to be a parent. Rebecca then described her mother as “an incredible human being … full of grace and wit and beauty and brilliance.” How every day, Lizzie brought a sense of wonder to everything she did, and gave a unique perspective to everything she rested her eyes upon. In short, Rebecca enthused, “She was incredible!”
Rebecca then expressed how she and her brothers Billy, Jr. and Robert appreciated how they directly experienced their mother’s influence on the lives of others. They saw it that day at the ceremony, and continue to see it every day in the eyes of those who find out that they’re Lizzie’s children. Rebecca said her mother worked hard and always challenged herself and her audience with the characters she chose to play. Rebecca expressed how much she and her brothers always loved their mom and still do; how proud they remain of her; how honored they were to have been present at the ceremony on their mother’s behalf. Rebecca then thanked the crowd for their loyalty to Lizzie, and left the podium.
At which point, Bob Foxworth approached the podium, and delivered an equally heart-felt and revealing sentiment. He began by defining Lizzie as shy, a quality of her character and personality that he said benefitted her life and career. He said her shy demeanor added a special sparkle to every character she portrayed because in the process of discovering who the character was she would “dig into herself and reveal someone that maybe she didn’t even know she was.”
Consequently, to each of her roles Lizzie brought a special quality, whether it’s with what Foxworth called “women of the west,” as in TV films like Belle Star or The Awakening Land, the latter of which he described as a “beautiful and historical film,” or The Legend of Lizzie Borden, which he called “a classic for television.” Each time, he said, she revealed more of herself—“it was like the peeling of an onion.”
Foxworth was certain that the crowd was well aware of her comedic talents by way of Bewitched. But what they might not have known, he said, was that Lizzie was “hysterically funny” in her private life as well. He explaine
d how she was not “terribly enamored with the glitz and glitter of Hollywood,” how she would much rather dirty her fingers in the garden than get “all gussied up” and attend some “fancy function,” and even though she loved doing that, too, it wasn’t her favorite thing in the world.
Foxworth then concluded his speech as he had started it, saying, “She was a very private person and that sense of privacy came from her shyness.”
But when it came to advocating for young minds or human rights, the ill or disadvantaged, Lizzie’s personal objectives took a backseat to compassion and concern for others … for better or for worse. More times than not, “she had a lot of problems with her self-confidence,” Bill Asher said in 2001 on Headliners & Legends. So, she stayed home a great deal. She could at times be considered a Hollywood recluse. Other times, not so much, because she enjoyed parties, especially if they were charity events.
In keeping with her indeterminate style, she kept everyone guessing, while one thing was certain: Elizabeth had little desire to age.
Ginger Blymer is a retired movie hairdresser whose famous clientele included the likes of Natalie Wood, Sean Connery, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, and more. She worked with Lizzie on The Awakening Land and Belle Starr, both of which Foxworth had defined as classic films about “women of the west.”
In 2002, Blymer authored Hairdresser to the Stars: A Hollywood Memoir (Infinity Publishing), in which she remembers how much Lizzie loved horses, the racetrack, games, and any sort of mental competition; how Elizabeth’s home was filled with “wonderful things,” like a merry-go-round-horse in the bar, and a hundred pillows on her bed. At Christmas, Blymer wrote, there were amazing decorations throughout Lizzie’s home. “The staircase with pine wound up the bannister. It smelled great.”
Blymer also recalled how Lizzie once called Foxworth “the love of her life”; how Blymer talked with him shortly after Elizabeth passed away; how he told her that Lizzie never wanted to get old.
“So, she didn’t.”
Award-winning actress, comedienne, talk show host, writer, political blogger, social advocate, and comedienne Lydia Cornell is a loyal fan of both Elizabeth’s and Bewitched.
Best known as Sara Rush, the “virginal blonde bombshell” on the classic sitcom, Too Close for Comfort, Cornell became one of the most popular blonde female sex symbols of the 1980s, as was Elizabeth in the 1960s. On Comfort, Cornell was the happy-go-lucky TV daughter of the Emmy-winning Ted Knight, who had found fame playing the egotistical anchor-man Ted Baxter on The Mary Tyler Moore Show in the 1970s. Off Comfort, Cornell was struggling with an addiction to alcohol and drugs.
Beginning with the discovery of her young brother’s body after he died of a drug overdose, Cornell has endured one shattering personal tragedy after the other. At one point, she says, “I had three boys and two dogs, including my husband, and they were all going through puberty at the same time.” Her stepson, whom she raised since the age of four, suffers from brittle bone disease. “He’s amazing,” she adds.
Cornell’s pretty amazing, too. In 1994, she halted her substance abuse during a “catastrophic spiritual awakening.” Today, she is a grateful recovering alcoholic, who mentors teens and is a motivational speaker for recovery groups across the country. “Every bad thing I’ve ever been through has turned out to be something good or something hilarious. I have turned it all into comedy, somehow. I am grateful for every ‘wrong turn.’”
Lydia’s poignant stories of transformation are laced with an innate sense of humor and comic timing, some of which was inspired by Lizzie. She explains:
Bewitched was my favorite show growing up. What a beautiful, wonderful soul Elizabeth Montgomery was! I looked up to her as a role model. She had this mysterious secret intelligence behind the eyes, which gave me hope as a woman in a man’s world in Hollywood. There was nothing vacuous, shallow or bimbo about her.
As to any personal struggles that Elizabeth may or may not have had with substance abuse, Cornell says:
My heart goes out to her. As an artist who struggled with alcoholism, I know full-well the darkness that clouds the joys. At seventeen years sober, I have found that nothing in the material world, no drink, drug, marriage, lover or career success can fill that hole in our heart with a permanent peace until we seek a spiritual solution. I only wish she could have found the peace she was seeking while she was alive. Like Steve Jobs, I believe our secret lives and the resentments or bad thoughts we harbor about ourselves and others often fuel our diseases which show up as a reflection of our deeply engrained mindset.
A mindset Ed Asner (who co-starred with Cornell’s TV dad Ted Knight on The Mary Tyler Moore Show) believes may have been instilled into Elizabeth by her father Robert Montgomery. “Maybe that’s where the cancer came from?” Asner suggests. Or maybe it stemmed from a combination of a number of sources?
Whether an actor, singer, dancer, writer, or director, be it for the big screen, TV, or the stage, there are many prevalent and destructive patterns that develop for those within every section of the entertainment industry. The fame, the money, the perks: it all becomes intoxicating and self-destructive, in more ways than one.
For one, Whitney Houston’s tragic death from a toxic mix of drugs, drowning, and alcohol on the eve of the Grammy Awards in 2012 shocked the world. Consequently, on March 8, 2012, The Los Angeles Times published an informative article about the rampant substance abuse issue pervading the music industry in particular. The Day the Music Died was written by Randy Lewis, who wondered, “If celebrities who have access to every resource available can’t get help, what hope is there for the majority of people who haven’t even experienced the smallest fraction of their success?”
Or as Harold Owens, senior vice president of MusiCares/Musicians Assistance Program (MAP) Fund told the Los Angeles Times, “You can’t reach an addict when he’s not ready.” Owens should know. He’s been counseling others in substance abuse since he became sober approximately twenty-five years ago. “I’ve been through the struggle,” he said. “To an alcoholic, I like to think it’s a self-diagnosed disease: Nobody can tell you you’re an alcoholic until you tell yourself.”
Suffice it to say, Lizzie may have joked about drinking in interviews with John Tesh and Ronald Haver, and may have even joked about wanting pina coladas poured into her IV on her deathbed (as was explained in People Magazine, June 5, 1995). She may have inherited a drinking problem from her mother and her paternal grandfather Henry Montgomery, Sr. Her father Robert Montgomery may have driven her to drink. Her relationship with the father-figure alcoholic Gig Young may have increased that drinking. The social drinking era of the 1960s may have camouflaged her drinking issues. Her drinking issues may even have compromised her relationships with her peers, thus cutting her chances for any Emmy victories, and on and on.
Either way, if she had any real issues with alcohol, Lizzie never acknowledged them, at least not publically. She may have admitted it to herself, or to her family and maybe a few close friends. but not to the world, and no medical documentation or statement was ever made to suggest it.
Maybe that’s all because, as Liz Sheridan had expressed on MSNBC’s Headliners & Legends in 2001, Elizabeth never wanted to face anything that was “bad or ugly.” Upon learning that Lizzie had cancer, or even when she was started to lose weight, Sheridan believed her friend was in that “huge state of denial.”
In essence, Lizzie may have been inadvertently “protected” from the truth, because admitting the truth in such instances of substance abuse or even potential substance abuse, usually hurts. However, nothing hurts more than death.
Studies have shown that alcoholism contributes to and exacerbates colon cancer, which is what killed Lizzie. Her weight also seemed to fluctuate over the years, if ever so subtly. And research has proven that weight fluctuation also contributes to colon cancer.
The bottom line is this: Whatever adversities Lizzie may have failed to conquer, that doesn’t tarnish her memory, or
make her a bad person. Her losses, just as much as her victories, merely make her a human person. She was someone who cared for others, but somehow neglected her own well-being. She may have needed help in certain areas, but didn’t know how to seek it, and then ultimately never received it, for whatever reason. Either way, she’s not any less wondrous a being who brought countless hours of magic to the world. And her death may not have been in vain.
As Harold Owens went on to tell the Los Angeles Times, “There’s a harsh saying, ‘Some must die so that others can live.’ I think the impact that the deaths of Freddie Mercury and Rock Hudson had on the public perception of AIDS are a good analogy to the situation we have now.”
Randy Lewis of the Times also interviewed Recording Academy President Neil Portnow, who has worked in the music industry since the 1970s as a record producer, music supervisor, and record company executive. Portnow said:
We need to have a clear-cut understanding of (substance abuse) as a disease, the things that lie behind it and the things that are necessary to treat it. Given the breadth and scope of who this affects in our culture, a more healthy perspective would be very welcome.
Or as Lewis himself deduced, “If (Whitney) Houston’s death contributes to a broader understanding of addiction and substance abuse, her legacy might include more than the million-selling recordings she left behind.”
In like manner, if Lizzie’s demise contributes to the same, on supposition alone, her legacy might include so much more than Bewitched, her TV-movies, and even her charitable work while she was alive.
AFTERWORD
Twitch Upon a Star Page 44