Death Chain

FILMED October 1970

APRIL FOOL — even though as I write this, it’s the middle of August. Why April Fool? I never directed a film titled ONCE IS NEVER ENOUGH. I didn’t direct that opening teaser sequence (although if I had, I would be proud to admit it; Virgil Vogel directed it and stunningly) and yes, this post is definitely going to be about a film titled DEATH CHAIN. To solve this discrepancy we must fast forward to spring 1971, the end of the 1970-71 season, when because of less than through-the-roof ratings, ABC cancelled DAN AUGUST. Fast forward again to July 30, 1972, when Warner Bros. released the feature film, DELIVERANCE starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds. The film was an immediate smash hit. Burt’s much lauded performance coupled with several dynamic appearances with Johnny Carson on THE TONIGHT SHOW put the Quinn Martin production company in a quandary. They only had twenty-six one-hour episodes of DAN AUGUST, which was far from enough to send the show into syndication. But DAN AUGUST starred Burt Reynolds, who had become the hottest star in the country. Those twenty-six reels of film were too valuable to be buried in the vaults. Television in addition to airing series programming also had a voracious appetite for movies. Why not turn the DAN AUGUST episodes into a group of DAN AUGUST movies. For instance take the episode PROGNOSIS: HOMICIDE, hook DEATH CHAIN onto its rear end, replace the early billboard with a new movie-style opening credit announcing its new title, ONCE IS NEVER ENOUGH and include the casts for both shows, both directors and in this case only one writer’s credit, because the writer had written both episodes, and then do the same thing at the end of the show, redoing the end credits. And that’s what they did, I’m not sure how many times, but I do know that they turned out at least seven movies. And Burt’s credit changed. The opening billboard for the series had announced DAN AUGUST starring Burt Reynolds. In the reconstructed movies it was Burt Reynolds in DAN AUGUST. He had ascended to that desired pinnacle for actors: his name was above the title.

To make the transition, to give continuity to the segue from the first crime story to the second, the teaser for DEATH CHAIN, (a scene where the young girl was picked up by four unidentifiable boys) was eliminated and replaced by a newly written scene of George Untermeyer (Richard Anderson) phoning Dan August. Untermeyer referred to the Serling case (of the first crime story) as he gave August a new assignment. Richard Anderson was then brought back to the studio to film it, and since I was long gone, I did not direct the new scene.

I would like to show you how the original episode opened and how it compared to the reconstituted version, but I do not have a copy of DEATH CHAIN; I only have the reconstruction.

This is was the fourth (and last) time I would work with Gerald O’Loughlin. I am still in awe of his talent, of the way he brought such energy, such sensitivity, such intelligent insight into his creations of men who were basically crude, working-class Joes.

In the DEATH CHAIN episode, Lawrence Prescott, the bookstore manager, appeared in the opening teaser scenes that were cut for the movie.

For fans of THE WALTONS, the role of Lawrence Prescott was played by James McCallion, the husband of Nora Marlowe, who played Mrs. Brimmer on THE WALTONS.

Santa Luisa was a fictitious town created to be the base for DAN AUGUST. Oxnard, a coastal town thirty-five miles west of Los Angeles, was chosen to be our Santa Luisa. The town was small enough, there was less traffic to contend with, permits to film were easier to obtain, and it was more expedient to stage some of our action sequences there than in Los Angeles, plus the people of the town were more positively responsive to a film company invading their community. I remember going to a house I had selected as a possible choice to film, and  I explained to the lady who answered the door what I needed to do: we would be filming the exterior of the house, and there would be a scene at the front door so an actor would be inside the doorway. She agreed. I further told her what we would be paying her, and her response was, “You mean I get paid for this?” I swear I think she would have been willing to pay us. The population of Oxnard at the time was about 72,000. Today that population has grown to almost 200,000. And Oxnard had a fine courthouse that we used as our exterior for police headquarters.

Just one day of filming was scheduled for Oxnard. Three other days of location filming were done in the Los Angeles area. For the large church we needed, we picked one in Burbank near the Warner Bros. studio.

Usually when there was night filming, it was scheduled for Friday, so the weekend could provide the cushion for the actors’ turnaround. But since we had 8 1/8 pages of night filming for this production, three nights were scheduled. Starting Wednesday, our second day, we started around noon and worked into the night until we finished. That first night’s filming was the sequence discovering the girl’s body that opened this part of the movie. Thursday started ten hours after we completed Wednesday night’s work. We had two sequences totaling 5 3/8 pages to film at night at a swimming pool. Since that would have taken an all-night session to complete in one visit, we filmed the first sequence Thursday night and the second sequence Friday night.

We filmed the pool sequence at a lovely home in Coldwater Canyon, and the kids were just great. The pool was heated, but October nights in Los Angeles can be bitterly cold, and that one was. I remember that I was wearing a heavy coat and gloves, but the kids were in bathing suits. When they came out of the water between shots, we had towels and blankets for them to wrap themselves in, and big cans of fire to warm them. Fortunately Friday night was easier.

I made a slight misstatement in my post for THE LAW. I said that every episode had a sequence in a cemetery. In DEATH CHAIN the sequence was in the funeral home, not the cemetery.

Thinking back, the number of actors I have directed from behind the camera is mind-boggling. I remember believing in 1961 when I directed my first film (DR KILDARE) that if I ever worked with an actor, I would never forget him or her. Fast forward to 1974; I was in preparation for an episode of THE WALTONS, and I was down on the set observing the production currently filming. An interesting actor, Victor French, whose work and name I was familiar with, was in the scene. After the take he came out of the set, saw me and enthusiastically came over and gave me a great greeting.  I had forgotten I had directed him in a SUSPENSE THEATRE in 1963. In 1979 my family came to visit. I picked them up at the airport and my two young nieces were all excited. One of the stars of ALICE had been on the plane with them. He had played Mel, the owner of the diner. They didn’t know his name and asked me who he was. I wasn’t much help. As we were leaving, Vic Tayback, the actor in question passed us, saw us and came over and gave me a great hug in greeting. We had worked together on THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY in 1971.Last year my friend Marlyn Mason wrote, produced and starred in an independent short film which has won many awards at film festivals. Starring with her in the film was Peggy Stewart. I saw her film many times, but it wasn’t until I worked on this post that I realized I had worked with Peggy Stewart. Forty-two years ago she played the mother of Ronnie, the boy who was shot when swinging.

I had an incredibly lucky break early in my training. For years Gilmor Brown, the founder and artistic director of the Pasadena Playhouse, had taught the course in directing in their School of the Theatre. A change was made as I was entering my second year at the Playhouse. When it came time for me to take the directing course, it was to be taught by Dick O’Connell. O’Connell, a young writer-director, already noted for his translations from Spanish of the plays of Garcia Lorca, was a graduate of Yale. Like my wonderfully talented Myrtle Oulman, he had taken the same directing course at Yale instructed by Alexander Dean and was a disciple of Alexander Dean’s magnificent textbook, FUNDAMENTALS OF PLAY DIRECTING. That textbook was the basis for the course O’Connell guided us through that year. It was a very disciplined and analytical approach to directing. I was taught to prepare EVERYTHING before beginning rehearsals, and I assiduously through the years followed those guidelines. But from the beginning as I worked as a director in theatre, I was aware that I had instinctual feelings toward my script and in rehearsal found myself following those feelings and deviating from the blueprints I had planned on paper. The strictures imposed by filming under television’s restrictive time certainly limited my flexibility in making changes on the set. But there were times that I did. The scene with Burt, Jan-Michael, and Norman at the car was one of those times. My original planned staging had them at the side of the car for the entire scene with coverage being the master three shot and then coverage on each of the three. But as we worked on the scene, I realized I needed a break, time in the scene for a major emotional transition, so I gave Burt the line, “Get into the car.” Once the three were in the car I cancelled the individual close-up coverage of the three. I wanted the balance of the scene to play in the master angle. In some companies the lack of those close-ups would have caused some consternation, but I had no negative feedback.

Location filming, especially at those times of the year when there was the possibility of inclement weather, was always scheduled at the beginning, and distant locations (like Oxnard) were usually at the very beginning. We went to Oxnard on our first day of filming. The very first thing we filmed there that day was the final rooftop shootout.

The Journey Continues