Sally Field fans rejoice! (1 Viewer)

[JohnMor]

Well, it appears from what I've read over the last several years that the back-up psychiatrist who treated Sybil in Dr. Wilbur's absenses found early on that he felt certain the personalities were generated by the therapy, sort of created at Dr. Wilbur's urging. He said that as Sybil would discuss certain childhood abuses, she would say things like, "This is where Dr. Wilbur says I need to become Marsha to talk about this." But he found Sybil could always talk freely to him about everything without being coached into taking on another personality.

Later, after the deaths of the major particiapnts, some tapes of the sessions were released to at least one psychiatric association, who verified that it appeared to be a therapy-created situation. The tapes supposedly had all three of the major players on them: Sybil, Dr. Cornelia Wilber, and Flora Schreiber, the author of the book. However, the listeners stated that it definitely did NOT appear to be a malicious hoax, but rather a case of self-deception. It was believed that the participants truly wanted to believe in this, even when some facts seemed to contradict them.

Of course, I can't find a lot of info on this to verify any of it, but as David VP put it, who cares? It's still a great story and film, even if it is more fiction than fact. Sally rocked in that role.

 

[Johnny Angell]

Thanks, John. As you say, just watch it as fiction and not fact. When I first watched Sybil I remember thinking, "This is the actress who did the flying nun?"

Makes one wonder how many talents are wasted because they don't get the chance to show what they can do.

 

[Daryl L]

I'm confused. Is the Sally Fields tv show Gidget coming out on DVD? If so, is there any timeframe?

 

[Mikah Cerucco]

Tons.

Every movie has the sometimes conflicting goals of being the best movie it can be, and earning the most money it can earn.

I love a movie where the actor is a non-issue except for his ability to channel the character. I almost actively dislike $20MM actors, though I don't begrudge them their salaries based on business economics. It's just that often I know a $20MM actor is hired for his/her ability to put people in the chairs, not necessarily his/her ability to best channel the character.

As I said, I don't begrudge it as if it were my money, I'd do the same thing. It's about making money.

I look at J.Lo in Maid in Manhattan, and I look at the Paz Vega in Spanglish. I'd rather see 5 more Paz Vega movies before I see another J.Lo movie. But I understand why that won't happen. People know J.Lo's name, and will give her movies some attention based on that alone. Nobody knows Paz Vega's name, and won't go see a movie because she's in it -- no matter how good she actually is in the movie.

In my imaginary perfect world, there'd be more $5-$10MM movies showcasing some of the excellent talent out there.

 

[Lucia Duran]

OMGoodness! This makes me so happy to hear that Gidget is going to be out on March 21st.

This was one of my most favorite shows when I was younger.

 

[Mary_P]

Yep, I'll definitely be buying "Gidget" as well. Big Pete Duel fan -- must own! Some fun guest appearances too by folks who later became well-known in way different roles like Daniel Travanti and Richard Drefuss.

I'd love it if whoever owns Field's series "The Court" would fork over the goods. Another "too smart for television" series that didn't get a chance to find an audience.

 

[Ethan Riley]

What was that movie she was on the other night; something to do with she became a maid? I didn't catch the title.

 

[Elena S]

I'd buy "Occasional Wife" in a heartbeat. "Love on a Rooftop," too (Pete Duel was in it, too).

 

[Michael Alden]

Unfortunately I don't think we'll see those 2 fine shows. Gidget, for whatever reason, was at least put into syndication by Columbia and then got re-syndicated in the 80s as part of the Colex package. OW only showed up one other time, on HA in the early 90s. Rooftop reran on ABC in the summer of 1971 and has not been seen since. Except for us collectors, the general public hasn't seen either show in 40 years, virtually assuring that they won't come out.

 

[Mary_P]

How often has "Good Morning World" been seen in syndication since its original run? Has "Mr. Peepers" been shown anywhere since its time in syndication in the 60s? (I'm asking -- I really don't know!) I just don't think that's necessarily the major determining factor of whether something gets released or not. I can't speak to "Occasional Wife," but I know there are a ton of "Alias Smith & Jones" fans who'd snap up "Love on a Rooftop" in a heartbeat. It's a way for studios to make money on product that, up until now, has just been sitting in the vaults gathering dust, costing them to store, and not generating any revenue at all.

The bigger issue, I would think, is how much cost would be involved in mastering -- what kind of shape the negatives or existing prints are in and how much it would cost to clean them up for release. If the only available materials are in terrible shape, then I agree that studios probably wouldn't sink the money into restoring them unless they could be guaranteed of massive sales. But if it costs them next to nothing to put it out -- and most older shows wouldn't have music licensing issues -- I can't imagine why some of these shows wouldn't be candidates for release at some point.

 

[Michael Alden]

Those are very good points that you bring up and I would like to address them. When it comes to lesser known shows, like Good Morning World, Mr. Peepers, Occasional Wife and Love on a Rooftop, what matters most is not the quality of the shows (all of these are very good shows) or even their relative profile in the public eye. It comes down to ownership of the properties. World is owned by Sam Denoff, who produced it. Peepers is controlled by UCLA Television archives, who were bequethed the property by David Swift, the producer. The are both being put out by Smore Entertainment, a niche label run by one of the former bigwigs at Rhino, before it was bought by Warner and became just another part of a corporate giant. They can work off a small sales and profit margin and know that shows like these will likely sell only a few thousand copies. OW and Rooftop are Sony properties and at this point in time, none of the majors have shown an indication that they are willing to go through the time and effort to market lesser known shows that will have such a small profit margin for them. They are still working on getting the big boys out there. Just off the top of my head, Sony owns One Day at a Time, Maude, Police Story and I'm sure many other shows that were far more successful that they haven't touched yet. It would be a great thing if the DVD industry did what the music industry did and create divisions (like Sony special products) to market smaller, niche properties. So far that has not been the case.

As for condition, OW was remastered in the early 90s for it's run on HA, so nothing would need to be done with it. Rooftop, on the other hand, has languished in the vaults for decades so it would have to be remastered. But yes, it would be great if Sony brought them out (along with Nancy, Second Hundred Years, Temperatures Rising, The Paul Lynde Show, The Good Life w/Donna Mills and Larry Hagman, and Farmer's Daughter)

 

[Michael Rogers]

The Doris Day show has been out of circualation for a long time too.

A different way to think of this is that DVD is a way of making a little money off a long dormant TV show. The type of show that would be pulling in a little money before from syndication before the rise of the infomercial.

I can't tell you how stoked I am for Gidget to come out. I like Flying Nun too but Gidget was more fun (and Sally Field was less covered).

One of the joys of watching Screen Gems shows is looking for all the reused sets, backlot housefronts and musical cues from show to show.

You can pick out the Bewitched house in Partridge Family, I Dream Of Jeannie (it becomes Dr. Bellows house) and Gidget for instance.

 

[Michael Alden]

And luckily it is owned by Doris Day herself, rather than a major studio. Believe me, if a studio controlled it you would have never seen it. Certainly not all 5 seasons. Maybe, a one and done but even that would have been unlikely.

 

[Michael Alden]

I just got my Gidget set in the mail today. I watched the pilot version, which runs 31 minutes and has different closing credits as well as a different artist singing the theme song. Besides that, they include a nice retrospective on the series that they talk with Sally about. Amazing that Sony actually did this for this show when all of their other, higher profile shows get zippo in the extras department. You would think a show like All in the Family, which was the number one show for like 4 or 5 years would get treated a little better. After all, AITF had two unaired pilots they could dig out.

 

[Ethan Riley]

Do you mean that the theme music for Gidget is different in the whole set? Or just the pilot?

 

[Michael Alden]

Just the unaired version of the pilot.

 

[Jon Baker]

Got both "Flying Nun" and "Gidget". So far watched the 1 hour pilot of "Flying Nun" and a couple episodes. I hadn't seen this show since I was a kid and it was such a flashback seeing Sister Bertrille flying over the hills during the opening theme. The colors look awesome - so clear. It's also funny noticing how badly dubbed the singing numbers are. I know this series takes place in Puerto Rico, but does anyone know where this show was actually filmed?

 

[Michael Alden]

I'm sure on Columbia's back lot. Now if we could just get someone to release her album on CD, that would be nice.

 

[Daryl L]

Got Gidget in the mail yesterday. Watched episode 1 and gotta say the picture quality is really good. Looks better than it did when TV Land aired it 1 to 2 years ago (digital TV Land). Really good transfer job. Sony did good. I love Gidget. Watched it as a young child (pre-teen) and again in reruns in my early teens after school let out. Been wanting this for years, I'm happy now.

 

[Ethan Riley]

The Flying None?? Where the hell do you buy this? I went to

Suncoast video: oh uh we don't have it. Um we're not carrying it. We only carry Jack Black movies.

Target: The flying what?? Never heard of it.

Wal-Mart: Eh? En Espanol, por favor.

I did find some copies at BestBuy but I guess it wasn't on sale. They had it at the full retail price. However, their website lists it at a substantial discount. Is the website price the same as the in-store price? If so, they should out a damn sale sign so we'll buy their dvds. Sheesh!