The Screaming Woman

The Screaming Woman is a 1972 made-for-television film starring Olivia de Havilland and directed by Jack Smight. It is loosely based on a short story by Ray Bradbury (which in turn was based on his 1948 radio play for the CBS show Suspense) with a script written by Merwin Gerard. The film was produced by Universal Television and originally aired as an ABC Movie of the Week on January 29, 1972. It features John Williams's last score (to date) for a TV movie. ^[1]

Plot

De Havilland plays Laura Wynant, a wealthy former mental patient who has travelled to her country estate to recuperate. While there, she discovers that a woman has been buried alive on her property. Wynant tries to inform others of what she has found but nobody believes her, and her family begins to suspect a relapse in her mental condition. Because her hands are nearly crippled by arthritis, she is not able to dig the woman up herself. She tries to trick a local boy into assisting her by telling him she is digging for a lost bracelet but is forced to tell him the truth, resulting in a confrontation with his angry father. While going door-to-door to seek help, she encounters the buried woman's husband, who had in fact buried her after striking her on the head with a shovel and thinking her dead. Wynant is confined to home under doctor's orders and, in a fit of anger, experiences a spontaneous recovery from the arthritis in her hands. She begins to dig up the buried woman, who is still alive, but the murderous husband finds her. The authorities arrive in time and Wynant and the buried woman are rescued.

Cast

• Olivia De Havilland as Laura Wynant
• Ed Nelson as Carl Nesbitt
• Laraine Stephens as Caroline Wynant
• Joseph Cotten as George Tresvant
• Walter Pidgeon as Dr. Amos Larkin
• Charles Knox Robinson as Howard Wynant
• Alexandra Hay as Evie Carson
• Lonny Chapman as Police Sergeant
• Charles Drake as Ken Bronson
• Russell Wiggins as Harry Sands
• Gene Andrusco as David, the Deputy
• Joyce Cunningham as Bernice Wilson
• Jan Arvan as Martin, the Servant
• Jay Montgomery as Ted Wilson
• John Alderman as Slater

Television debuts

The film was first shown in the United States on January 29, 1972, in Sweden on June 23, 1973, and in Great Britain in July 1985.

Other notes

A television version of The Screaming Woman, much more faithful to the source material - the protagonist here, as in the original play and short story, is a little girl (played by Drew Barrymore) - was shown under that title as episode 5 in season 1 of The Ray Bradbury Theater on February 22, 1986.^[2]

References