| re: I wonder why Shelley didn't do the 1982 TV movie of 'Elephant Man' | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 03:05 am EDT 09/03/18 | |
| In reply to: I wonder why Shelley didn't do the 1982 TV movie of 'Elephant Man' - WaymanWong 01:21 pm EDT 09/02/18 | |
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| I don't remember reading here about the dispute mentioned by bobby2. I may have just forgotten. Here is something from Carol Lawson’s Times theatre column of January 30, 1981, after Shelley had returned to The Elephant Man: "She [Shelley] left 'The Elephant Man' to star in a film - 'something that doesn't often come into my life.' Colleen Dewhurst, Carol Kane and Shirley Knight were also signed to star in this picture, the project of a Canadian film producer. 'What happened,' said Miss Shelley, her small face tightening into an angry knot, 'is one of the yuck stories of this business. The night after I left the play, I was introduced to Colleen and she said to me,''I'm so sorry, honey.' I said, 'Sorry about what?' She said, 'Don't you know? The movie was canceled last Tuesday.' There was no way I could go back to 'The Elephant Man' because Patricia Elliott had been hired.' "What did she do? 'I went to work at the Shaw Festival in Ontario at Niagara-on-the Lake,' Miss Shelley replied. She starred in 'The Cherry Orchard' and 'Misalliance' there. 'Every three years I like to go back into repertory for learning.' "But what did she really do after such a blow? Miss Shelley smiled ruefully and muttered, 'I bled internally.'" In addition to playing Ranevskaya and Lina Szczepanowska at the Shaw Festival, she also played a leading role in a Hungarian play called The Grand Hunt by Gyula Hernádi. The Shaw Festival season ran till October 9. The Grand Hunt moved on to a run at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa and then to Seattle Rep during the time when the television Elephant Man was planned and filmed. It's possible that she simply didn't want to renege on what may have been a commitment to stay with The Grand Hunt. Meanwhile, Anglim did the Elephant Man tour with Fuller and Ken Ruta. The television version was shot in Toronto the last week of November 1980 (possibly into the first week of December), with Conway. He had left the Broadway production at the same time Shelley left, but the producers don't seem to have been angry at him for leaving. Of course, he had not won a Tony. Perhaps because of her Tony win the producers were particularly anxious for her to either stay on Broadway or do the tour, although I doubt that business suffered much on Broadway when she left or on the tour because she was not on it. Or perhaps there was no unhappiness between them since she returned to the Broadway production on January 6, 1981. If there was a dispute with the producers that kept her out of the television version, it must have been resolved right after the filming. Or she simply felt a commitment to The Grand Hunt. Anyway, she was a great actress. A particularly fine performance of hers that has not been mentioned is when she replaced Piper Laurie a few weeks into the run of The Destiny of Me and played it through the end of the run. |
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