Betty Hutton
- Episode aired Apr 27, 2000
- 1h
IMDb RATING
8.3/10
69
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Did you know
- ConnectionsFeatured in Private Screenings: Robert Osborne (2014)
Featured review
Probably the best remembered of the Private Screenings series...
... in which Robert Osborne would interview somebody from the golden days of Hollywood for about one hour. The one with Mickey Rooney may be remembered because Mickey got angry all over again about a dust up on the set of Killer McCoy that occurred back in 1947. The one with Robert Mitchum is remembered because Mitchum decided to be obnoxious and stone wall all of Bob's attempts to make conversation. But this one is remembered for bringing Betty Hutton back into the public spotlight after 40 years.
Betty looked quite frail when she first stepped on the set - you certainly wouldn't recognize her from her heyday in the 1940s and early 50s. But Bob started interviewing her from the moment she sat down so that she would feel comfortable and open up. And she did. Before it was over she was even reprising some of the tunes she had sang fifty plus years before.
Apparently Betty had a very deprived childhood. She never knew her father, her mother was supportive but also an alcoholic, and during the lean Depression years her mom ran a speakeasy out of their home. Betty had four failed marriages, none of which ended on good terms, and she had three children who didn't even attend her funeral.
Among the surprises was just how mean she remembered everybody at MGM while doing "Annie Get Your Gun" in 1950. She claimed that the entire cast and crew gave her the cold shoulder because they had wanted Judy Garland, who lost her place at the studio after getting fired from the job.
Some of the odd things I noticed? Betty never once mentioned her older sister, Marion, who had a minor movie career but was better known as a big band singer. Betty admits that Buddy DaSilva really mentored her in her career at Paramount, and the end of her movie career occurred soon after Buddy's death. Betty said that she left film because in the early 1950s there were no good roles because of the Hollywood black lists, but Hollywood material was only seriously inhibited in the years 1952 and 1953. So I have to wonder if Buddy not being around to advise her had something to do with her leaving films.
She apparently had found God in the mid 1970s, and the press didn't find her cooking in a rectory as a last resort but more of a first choice - being somewhere she felt needed. All during the interview Bob was kind and compassionate as he always was. He often mentioned this interview in later years and credited it with maybe being the reason that the New York Times ran an article about Betty when she passed away in 2007.
This Private Screenings episode is pretty easy to find, unlike the one for Walter Mirisch which aired twice on the same night in 2008 and never again!
Betty looked quite frail when she first stepped on the set - you certainly wouldn't recognize her from her heyday in the 1940s and early 50s. But Bob started interviewing her from the moment she sat down so that she would feel comfortable and open up. And she did. Before it was over she was even reprising some of the tunes she had sang fifty plus years before.
Apparently Betty had a very deprived childhood. She never knew her father, her mother was supportive but also an alcoholic, and during the lean Depression years her mom ran a speakeasy out of their home. Betty had four failed marriages, none of which ended on good terms, and she had three children who didn't even attend her funeral.
Among the surprises was just how mean she remembered everybody at MGM while doing "Annie Get Your Gun" in 1950. She claimed that the entire cast and crew gave her the cold shoulder because they had wanted Judy Garland, who lost her place at the studio after getting fired from the job.
Some of the odd things I noticed? Betty never once mentioned her older sister, Marion, who had a minor movie career but was better known as a big band singer. Betty admits that Buddy DaSilva really mentored her in her career at Paramount, and the end of her movie career occurred soon after Buddy's death. Betty said that she left film because in the early 1950s there were no good roles because of the Hollywood black lists, but Hollywood material was only seriously inhibited in the years 1952 and 1953. So I have to wonder if Buddy not being around to advise her had something to do with her leaving films.
She apparently had found God in the mid 1970s, and the press didn't find her cooking in a rectory as a last resort but more of a first choice - being somewhere she felt needed. All during the interview Bob was kind and compassionate as he always was. He often mentioned this interview in later years and credited it with maybe being the reason that the New York Times ran an article about Betty when she passed away in 2007.
This Private Screenings episode is pretty easy to find, unlike the one for Walter Mirisch which aired twice on the same night in 2008 and never again!
helpful•10
- AlsExGal
- Dec 26, 2019
Details
- Runtime1 hour
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
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