TV Guide Vol. 33 No. 3, Jan19-25 1985
Page A-2
Insider Grapevine - Squirming Out of a Scene
The bride wore silver scales, the priestess was a lizard, and the guests dined on roaches and hamsters. That’s how things (gulp) went down recently on the set of NBC’s V, where the wedding of Charles (Duncan Regehr) to the evil Diana (Jane Badler) was filmed for this week’s episode (Jan. 25) Before the ceremony, the script called for Diana to luxuriate in a nuptial bath filled with live eels. But weeks earlier, Badler had balked. “Now way.” She told the producers. As she explains to us: “I’ve picked up live rodents, snakes and tarantulas. This is it. No baths with eels. They got a double to pose with those things.”
Pg A-5
This week’s movies by Judith Crist
The disappointment of the week is My Wicked, Wicked ways; the legend of Errol Flynn, a three-hour TV-movie based on the actor’s posthumously published 1959 autobiography. Once again we learn that too many scripters (sic) spoil the froth: Doris Keating, Jill Trump, James Lee and Don Taylor are credited with the teleplay, with Taylor directing. And once again we learn that getting an uncharismatic actor- in this case Duncan Regehr- to portray a glamour star of the past results in nothing more than pedantic impersonation, no mater how many ululating schoolgirls are herein made to pursue this ersatz Errol Flynn.
Further, those “wicked, wicked ways” – the barroom brawls, hedonism, nacho adventures and amorous exploits that eventually made in like Flynn, a part of the language- pale in the light of current mores and, certainly in this blandly episodic, though lavishly produced, retelling. The movie covers Flynn’s arrival in Hollywood in 1935, his marriage to Lili Damita and instant stardom within a year, in captain blood; his friendship with the stuntman Billy Welch and the actor John Barrymore; his brief stint as a correspondent in the Spanish Civil war and the Mexican escapade that led to his trial in 1942 for statutory rape of the girl aboard his yacht. (in reality two girls were involved) His last 17 years are related in voice-over, CBS could have done itself and us a favor by simply rerunning Captain Blood. Gentleman Jim the ad natures of Robin Hood or other films that are posterity’s interest in Errol Flynn.
Close Up page A-65
Ad page A-66
