The Stepford Wives (1975 film)
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| The Stepford Wives | |
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 The Stepford Wives film poster |
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| Directed by | Bryan Forbes |
| Produced by | Edgar J. Scherick |
| Written by | Ira Levin (novel) William Goldman |
| Starring | Katharine Ross Paula Prentiss Tina Louise |
| Distributed by | Columbia Pictures Paramount Pictures (2004 DVD) |
| Release date(s) | 12 February 1975 (USA) |
| Running time | 115 min. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
The Stepford Wives is a 1975 sci-fi/horror film based on the Ira Levin novel The Stepford Wives. It was directed by Bryan Forbes with a screenplay by William Goldman. Katharine Ross, Paula Prentiss, Peter Masterson and Tina Louise all starred in the film, which also marked the screen debut of brat pack actress Mary Stuart Masterson. It was remade in 2004.
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[edit] Plot
Joanna Eberhart (Ross) is a young wife who moves with her husband (Masterson) and two children from New York City to the small Connecticut suburb of Stepford. She makes friends with another newcomer to town, Bobbie Markowe (Prentiss), and they start investigating, with ever-increasing concern, the oddly submissive and bland behavior of the other wives in town. The freewheeling Bobbie abruptly changes into another housewife, and then "breaks down" instead of dying when a desperate Joanna stabs her with a kitchen knife. Joanna sneaks into the mansion which is the headquarters of the town's "Men's Association" where she finds graphic confirmation that the women have all been replaced with robot duplicates. She is killed by her own duplicate, who is then seen placidly purchasing groceries at the local supermarket, along with the rest of the Wives.
[edit] Production
[edit] Casting
In his 1983 book Adventures in the Screen Trade, screenwriter William Goldman laments that he may have significantly dimmed the movie's box office prospects with nine words: "She's a good actress; I think she'd be fine."
He said them when the film's director, Bryan Forbes, asked him about casting Nanette Newman as Carol Van Sant. Newman just happened to be Forbes' wife, and the film had gone through enough difficulty finding a director at that point that Goldman was afraid Forbes might change his mind about the project and delay it even further, possibly killing it, if he raised what he thought were valid objections.
In Goldman's view, the husbands would have their robot wives be ideals of beauty, more like models. Newman did not have those looks, and since none of the other wives had been cast at that point, all the other actresses cast looked more like stereotypical New England (or, in Newman's case English) housewives, thus, in his opinion, hurting the film's credibility.
Joanna Cassidy was originally cast as Bobbie Markowe and actually shot a few scenes, only to be replaced by Prentiss.
Mary Stuart Masterson makes her film debut here as one of Joanna's children.
[edit] External links
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