AFI Salute to Helen Lawson

I have a rare copy of her early women's prison movie where she played to crusading wife of the warden but slowly gets sucked by the hardened criminals into the glamour and excitement of crime. The scene where Hope Emerson and Minerva Urecal have her on the laundry table for a "massage" was quite graphic, even in the pre-Code era.

And, yes, she flashes the fact she is not wearing underwear.

Did the EVER wear underwear?

I mean, is there a moment in Mary, The Blessed Virgin that doesn't qualify?

Hope we don't miss the tree planting.

Do they really have a five-minute feature in the tribute with stars, past and present, saying, "Her pussy stinks"?

I hear Steve Allen and Miriam Hopkins are the funniest.

And the segment ends with the line from her "Mildred Pierce" knock-off:

[quote]I cannot lie. It's all me in my cherry pies!

W.C. Fields responded with "If that's true, I can predict there will not be a even a memory of a cherry in that recipe. And I see a very loose and soggy bottom in the bargain.

There should be an AFI tribute to Gloria Gibson instead.

Sorry. Can't make it.

Many More Mornings is my favorite of hers. Especially the scene where she aborts the triplets.

Fleet's In! should be prominent. I know it was a frothy musical, but nobody's sung subtext like Lawson during "What Was Your Name Again?"

I don't suppose they'll mention it, but one of my guilty pleasures is "Curse of the Cat People VII: Fresh Litter."

She had a 70s-80s slump like no other. She made one appearance playing Gail Fisher's temp replacement on "Mannix." That's when Gail's character was out with amnesia. Helen was supposed to make two other guest shots but that was nixed when, every time the scene (she had three) called for her to sit at the secretary's desk she complained that it smelled funny.

It’s about time. I suppose they had to wait until certain people were dead and buried. Some people hold grudges.

What the fuck am I gonna wear?

Why hasn’t she been a Kennedy Center honoree?

I’m still hoping that someone at CBS breaks into the vault and smuggles out the videotape of her last Christmas Special. The one that never aired.

I'm sure they'll show clips from her pre-Code Paramount musical, Stinky Pinky, where she played tough business woman, Lenore "Pinky" Gardenia, who utters the famous line, "I'm a bitch in the boardroom, a bore in the bedroom and a bear on the toilet, now outta my way, I've got a date with Doctor Deuce, if you know what I mean and I know that you do!"

The forgotten “I Need At Least Two Cars.” Lawson appeared opposite Ernest Brorgnine right after his Oscar winning performance in Marty. 1956? Anyways, Lawson would later declare that Borgnine sweated so much that “the inside of thighs looked like a chicken Parmesan sandwich. The woman had a way with words.

[quote] Why hasn’t she been a Kennedy Center honoree?

The. Sesame. Street. episode.

* “the inside of his thighs tasted like a chicken parm.”

Oh! I’d forgotten. Poor Kermit.

[quote]Push a quarter in the slot and I'll go any speed you want... for a minute.

Her very first line in a talky, "Easy Over," 1928.

Her first line on stage was when she was five and went off script for a church presentation:

[quote]Fucking Sunday matinees.

[quote] The. Sesame. Street. episode.

Well, that.....and also the fact that the EPA still hasn't figured out where to bury the remaining cases of Helenesque.

I hope the tribute doesn't gloss over "late-phase" Helen, when she decamped to Europe to make artier, more demanding fare. "Scenes from a Miscarriage" and "Fellini's Puttana" weren't for everyone, but they feature some of her richest work.

R21, Lest we forget Paolini's misguided sequel, Mama Salo or 90 days in a Dutch Oven...starring Helen and a cast of unknown Sardinian teenage boys. The film was never completed as the entire cast and crew were deported upon threat of significant prison time by Italian authorities and Paolini died not soon afterwards. Footage has been kept under wraps by the director's estate, though, Lawson has been quoted as saying, 'I don't know what the big deal is, so I went doodie on a plate? They call that Tuesday night at Danny Thomas' house!"

The AFI has uncovered some rare footage never seen before, including Helen’s 1932 screen test with George Brent that earned her a contract with 20th Century Fox.

I hope there is a lot of focus on her work as an older, much more mature actress. Her ability to showcase the ups and downs of a woman facing the beauty and the beast of aging is quite remarkable. She is, by far, at the height of her abilities as one of America’s top dramatic actresses. This period of time in her career is well known to both critics and audiences alike……Helen Lawson: The Granny Porn/Scat Years

Cases of Helenesque! Do you have any idea what those are worth on eBay?

The problem is, the footage of Helen's misses and scandals is way longer than the stuff they can show for the AFI tribute.

Like when she screen tested to play Mrs. Chancellor on the Young and the Restless. Her screen test partner is still traumatized and mute, all these years later.

Yelling "Go ahead, hire that Cooper cunt!" probably sealed her fate (and Jeanne's, too).

Do they have her screentest for Tootsie, when she was hoping to play a woman playing a man playing a woman ala Julie in Victor/Victoria? Sydney Pollack said she was too butch to play Michael Dorsey and decided to go with Dustin Hoffman instead...

Well, they should have done something about the mustache. I don’t care how tight the budget was.

[quote]R23 The AFI has uncovered some rare footage never seen before, including Helen’s 1932 screen test with George Brent that earned her a contract with 20th Century Fox.

I’ve seen that test! Was it literally SHOT in a motel, or was that the set??

Anyways, Helen’s visibly drunk.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen her sober. Perhaps when she was released on parole, but she didn’t say much.

R30, What do you expect? She once roomed with Frances Farmer.

“Roomed.” How quaint.

[quote] I’m still hoping that someone at CBS breaks into the vault and smuggles out the videotape of her last Christmas Special. The one that never aired.

I thought Paley had that burned, the ashes dissolved in acid, and the resulting goo dumped at sea.

No, r33. Paley just had the tape sprayed with Helenesque. It burst into flames and then melted.

Fred Silverman tried another Lawson Christmas special when he was at NBC. He thought she'd cleaned up her act.

It was the first time I saw Silverman near tears. He told Helen "You made the NBC Peacock cry, you cold hearted cunt!"

Awful film of a great sleazy and trashy book.

Often overlooked is her reply: Cry? You wanna see where I stuffed the turkey, Freddie boy?

I liked her Scarlett O'Hara screen test where she kept flubbing her lines and shouting, "FUCK!".

Her brief Laugh-In appearance has also been scrubbed. She started a small fire in Ruth Buzzi’s dressing room, then used a soiled tampon to write “guttersnatch” on Jo Anne Worley’s windshield.

When asked about it, George Schlatter would cry uncontrollably and need a Bull Shot to calm down.

Many were surprised when Helen was asked to perform the national anthem at Eisenhower’s second Inauguration in 1957.

It had long been rumored that Helen and Ike had a fling while he was stationed in Europe during WW II and Helen was there entertaining the troops.

Mamie was well aware of Ike’s transgression with Helen, but she reluctantly agreed to have her perform at the Inaugural.

Only because Helen introduced her to Everett Brown, best known as Big Sam in Gone with the Wind.

[R34] Thank you. I was hoping that Helenesque would be mentioned. There was a plan to pass out samples to the stars at AFI, but the Fire Marshall put a stop to that based on combustion concerns

Helen Lawson wasn't a film star, any more than the Merm was.

Neely knew where to find the booze and the dope!

Is it true that, after the Sesame Street scandal, Rita Moreno had Helen's appearance on The Electric Company cancelled?

I guess that set could only hold one bottomless slut.....

What IS the truth about the porno she did sucking on Joan Crawford's nipple? Well, going at it like a sow on a corn cob.

Is it true that Crawford's brother held the originals to blackmail her and split the take with Lawson?

She had to drop out of "A Streetcar Named Desire" due to a nervous breakdown. She was having affairs with Brando, Gadge, Karl Malden and Kim Hunter.

Will they show Helen’s screen test for Carmen Jones where she showed up in black face, ate watermelon, and proclaimed that she was born to play a negro whore? There was also a rumored 5 minutes of film from that same day of the screen test where she is quoted as saying more young negro men had been inside of her than a cotton field in Alabama?

What I do in my brief but crucial scene in Ken Russell's The Devils is the reason Warner Bros refuses to release the film to home video. It's the best I've ever been on film if not in life.

She was originally cast as Mrs. Garrett in Diff'rent Strokes, but concerned about the impact on their romance, Gary talked her out of it.

Has anyone seen Lawsons first try at a Disney kids picture in 1958? It was called Hele-NA Handbasket. It was to be an Easter film where Patty McCormack was a little girl that got an Easter basket and one of the toys was a tiny Helen that came to life and helped young patty navigate being a preteen with parents who were separated and distant. Lawson was insanely jealous that McCormack had recently been nominated for an Oscar at 11 years old and made patty’s life hell. She cut the back up of patty’s dress with a built in panties and poor patty mooned the entire set . Its rumored Lawson took photos and tired to sell them to confidential.

The final straw was when they were shooting the big number “he is risen” where Patrys parents attend church on Easter Sunday and fall back in love and don’t divorce. Jesus was to come off the cross and Helen morphs into a full size person and sings the duet with Jesus and a choir . Unfortunately Lawson thought it would be funny if she snuck a few stag movie actors into the choir and when the words “he is risen” are sung the actors pulled up their robes with full erections and Lawson yelled “HE SURE HAS”

All hell broke loose on the set because there were many kids in the scene including McCormack and a young Haley mills who played patttys bff. The vice squad and CPS were called and Disney had to bribe the LAPD, Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons to keep not out of the papers along with the entire cast and crew.

The film was scrapped and Lawson was blackballed. On the bright side Disney became enamored with Haley Mills and signed her to a long term contract. A few years later a tamer version of dress cutting incident was incorporated into mills monster hit film “the parent trap” during the party scene.

Tom Holland saw a bootleg copy of the film and was inspired to write a script about an murderous, ugly, evil red headed doll named Charles Lee Ray, shortened to “Chucky” and it became the horror franchise “Childs Play”.

How many times was Helen blackballed?

R52 Every time she went to Harlem, honey!

Did she ever win an Oscar?

Yes and she accepted it in prison after she had been arrested for solicitation in front of Grauman's Chinese Theater while it was showing her weepie My Heartless Heart.

Did they show a clip from that bizarre giallo she did in the 60s?

MY HEARTLESS HEART actually has a lovely score: “You Spread My Wings,” “Mood Puce,” and the rousing “Chinaman’s Chance”… all classics.

[quote]R56 Did they show a clip from that bizarre giallo she did in the 60s?

‘Blood on Her Back Door’? Yes.

Some of the shots are censored, tho. You know the ones.

"Minstrel Girl" (1944) was only seen by a few audiences before theatergoers rioted. It was filmed on silver nitrite film stock and eventually exploded. Only movie stills survive.

Although probably too obscure to be included, I wonder if they'll include a clip of that flick she made with Doris Wishman, "I Could Go on Drinking", in which Helen spends four hours valiantly trying to assemble a lasagna while chugging back Stoli and getting raped by her Mexican gardener. It caused a minor scandal and was quickly forgotten until Doris and Helen ten years later sued the makers of "Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelle".

I hope they include her screen test as Mother Abbess in the Sound of Music. Nothing cracks me up like when she lets those midgets out from underneath the habit and yells April Fools'!

"Aprilscherz!" R61.

She did her homework.

[quote]she played to crusading wife of the warden but slowly gets sucked by the hardened criminals

Pics please.

I know this is a minority opinion, but I was sorry they cancelled her production of Anthony and Cleopatra because she insisted on a nude death scene.

The last time she was almost in a Shakespearean production was Luhrmann’ s Romeo + Juliet, but her agent fucked it up. She showed up thinking she was cast as Juliet and was enraged when she learned that she was to play the Nurse . I hear the fire was no accident. That’s when she finally became uninsurable.

Who’s the writer who steals all this wonderful material going to be? This thread is a mini series waiting for the green light!

"Wigs & Bitches" the cinema verite documentary on the ill-advised, ill-fated world tour of Neely O'Hara and Helen Lawson. Producer Allan Carr thought the pairing would be a smash. But it was like cats with their tails tied together, as both were having an affair with opener Peter Allen. Directed by Dennis Hopper (who was fucking all three).

Helen and Neely taught me my favorite word!

So [italic]that's[/italic] why you're hosting!

Who had the better career: Helen Lawson or Belle Poitrine?

What do you mean “had?”

Jackass.

R61 That and the fact she kept reading the line as "What is it, you cunt?" are probably what kept her from getting the part.

I was reading these last night with my headphones on because my loser neighbor Trump's speech through my walls for 3 fucking hours, and I was snarly and doing my "HOW OLD ARE THESE FUCKERS AT DL???" routine.

But this thread has some of the straight up funniest shit that I have ever read. You may be a bunch of cunts, but you are some FUNNY cunts.

Thank you for the laughs all of these years as I ponder my own death and self destruction.

It was generally a blast here :)

Has anyone mentioned Helen's short-lived tv series "Disco Detective" than ran on CBS during the 1978-79 season?

It most certainly was not CBS. You could be fired just for mentioning her name until the day Bill Paley died.

I loved her guest starring role on Little House on the Prairie. Giving Harriet an older sister, who was even meaner, was brilliant. I know they won't put her TV work in the reel but she was really good in that. Plus she was always a hoot on Password Plus.

^ I remember when Angie Dickinson called her out for ripping off Police Woman

I don't have time to tell the whole story of the catastorphe that was Helen's guest starring role on "Alice" but it's insane. She and Linda Lavin almost killed each other.

Helen mistunderstood what Linda meant by "scatting."

I don’t know what possessed the producers to cast Helen as Anne Sullivan in that revival of the Miracle Worker. It took her a decade of Special Olympics ribbon cuttings to make up for her fourth-wall-breaking tirade: “Oh for Christ’s sake, it’s fucking WATER, Helen!”

Helen was set to join the cast of “Dynasty” as yet another long lost Carrington sibling, but one night at a party at the Spelling mansion, Helen got a bit tipsy and was found naked in Candy’s bed with two strapping members of the catering staff and let’s just say things got a bit ugly and Aaron decided not to proceed with Helen’s joining the series.

R14 and R22 need to share a padded cell. Just brilliant and disgusting

Helen was always late to the party. When celebrity sex tapes became a thing in the 90’s Helen tried to put one together with Troy Donahue and called it “Helen ON Troy”. Helen showed it to a group of porn company excs hoping it would get distribution. It was a disaster several of them puked, one had a seizure, a few had to seek psychiatric treatment afterwards and several of them quit the business right then and there and turned to god they were so traumatized.

Joan Rivers had a copy that she used to show at dinner parties. She left it to Jerry Herman in her will.

[quote] Helen got a bit tipsy and was found naked in Candy’s bed with two strapping members of the catering staff

Were they gift wrapped?

Very late in her career, she was up for Widow Coney in a made for TV remake of Oliver! Her screen test with a young Nicholas Hoult and a young Freddie Highmore had to be suppressed to keep from running afoul of child pornography laws.

Helen actually filmed two weeks of The Graduate as Mrs. Robinson, but was fired by Mike Nichols after she continually showed up to set drunk and kept forgetting her lines. She also called Dustin Hoffman a "little shit with no talent."

I heard the bitch had a double mastectomy.

So that just left the six.

I assume her stage surname was taken from combining LAWless and poiSON.

The Christian name makes more sense if used with her middle name, Earth(a).

If she wears that fucking pantsuit yet again I am going to throw my drink at it, touch a cigarette to it and watch that wig go up like Alamogordo.

She taught me everything I know about what matters most.

Her stint on QVC selling her line of wigs really damaged her legacy. I think that's why the salute was such a long time coming.

What the fuck is AFI?

American Fag Institute!

She hated Lulu and once allegedly threw a Klieg light on her (but it was just a rumor). Lawson's rendition of I'll Plant My Own Tree was flawless and should have won her a Grammy. Instead, Capitol Records decided to give Lulu the cover that immediately went to No. 1 completely obscuring Lawson's version. Every time Lawson was asked about Lulu in an interview, they had to bleep her.

Her fist fight with Faye Dunaway is legend.

The video clip of Ed Sullivan having Helen stand up and take a bow from the audience in 1956 has been scrubbed from the Internet.

By 8:00 PM on that Sunday evening, Helen was quite sloshed and didn’t realize her giving Ed the finger on “live” television was forbidden.

Her two week run on The Guiding Light was beneath her. There was nothing Helen wouldn't do to stay in the limelight.

Shut the fuck up. She brought some glamour to the place.

Isn't she the one that shit on the floor in Ethel Merman's dressing room?

No, it was Ethel Kennedy's living room.

When Della Reese had her terrible accident crashing through a glass door, it was Helen who pushed her.

I thought Lawson shit in Streisand's wig over the Funny Girl situation, accidentally inspiring a tradition most of the entertainment world wishes would end.

I wish Helen's 70s variety specials were available somewhere, but all we have are a few clips on Youtube.

I loved her signature opening for all of her specials where we saw her on a stage in silhouette, then a spotlight shone on her and she said her famous line "It's me baby, Helen Lawson."

She was more famous than Calvin Coolidge, put together.

[quote] Her two week run on The Guiding Light was beneath her.

By the end of those two weeks, every man on set had been beneath her.....as well as a few of the dames!

How do you suppose Charita Bauer lost that leg?

Helen must have been the inspiration for Bert's line: "A slut like you? Hang it up, honey."

Lucille Ball was the only one who could make her cry.

[quote] Lucille Ball was the only one who could make her cry.

Because her wigs didn't come off.

[quote]No, it was Ethel Kennedy's living room.

You can see the two family members who caught Helen in the act...

Don't forget, on a four martini night, the kid wouldn't stop crying. So Helen knocked those teeth out.

She had to fight like hell to keep her career going after she was released from Warners for causing so many shooting delays due to her frequent “procedures”.

Besties with Sophia Loren. Hard to imagine. They're so different. She kept Sophia's commissary balance up when she was jailed over her taxes.

paparazi pic after Helen got her third DUI

You’re confusing Helen with Susan Hayward who played her in that movie. Hayward did a good job, but she had to tone it way down

r113 there's also a paparazzi pic of Helen just before she got her third DUI.

That was the night Frank Sinatra threw her out on her ass.

Before me, AFI? Really?

Often ignored is the work Our Helen did for Monogram Pictures, back when her box office hit a slump.

The best of these was "This Madam is No Lady" (aka "My Dark Past") about a Gulf Coast belle (Lawson) who is set to become the blushing bride of a promising young senator (Freddie Stewart). However, her shady past as a sex worker in the Dutch Caribbean comes back to haunt her. This revelation, however, pales next to her true hidden shame: this Louisiana creole has been passing as white!

Although it requires a suspension of disbelief to envision the past-her-prime Helen as a nubile young bride (especially to young heartthrob Freddie!), she acquits herself well in her scenes in the brothel.

[quote] However, her shady past as a sex worker in the Dutch Caribbean comes back to haunt her.

Was that based on “Aruba Hubba Hubba”?

Great novel. Especially if you can read it in the original Dutch. The English translation is too tame.

Is it true that she got her start in the silents? By silent, I mean that she liked to be ball gagged while having the Dallas Cowboys run a train on her in her dressing room between takes?

R120, That's disgusting.

AFI ?

As in Airline Food Industry awards- her award is as phony as her hair is!

"Scorned Mistress" is another one of Helen's forgotten Monogram Pictures titles, with Lawson and Richard Cromwell playing a "happily" married couple whose idyllic life in a college town is shattered when one of Cromwell's students (Belita) begins to terrorize her. Although Helen delivers a stellar, Oscar-worthy performance as the beleaguered wife, the film is marred by a miscast Belita, who is given an overly-long ice skating solo scene that seems jarringly out of place in this film noir suspense drama.

It was around this time that co-star Dickie Cromwell eloped with young, 19-year-old Angela Lansbury. When Helen encountered the new couple dining in the small studio commissary, she gushed, "Congratulations, you two! But which one is the bride?"

Fun fact: a young Jerry Herman wrote the melody to Give Her an Inch in between lovemaking during a Summer of '42 type weekend with Lawson. He was so despondent after she loved him and left him he shelved the tune for twenty years, until he gave it life as Hello, Dolly.

Barbara Stanwyck stole the script for The Colbys when she was visiting Helen at her Hollywood bungalow. The rest is TV history.

A few years before, she was highly sought after to replace Barbara Bel Geddes on Dallas, but talks broke down when she dug in her heels about Ellie buying the Dallas Cowboys, for reasons you can imagine. That Helen.... "You don't have to love what you do but you gotta want to do it!"

Isn't this tribute premature? The buzz on her new movie with Sally Ross, Jenny Stewart, and Catherine Zeta-Jones, "Gold Diggers of 2024", suggests that there's a potentially exciting new chapter to be written on Helen's career.

Anything about when she was kicked off the set of The Muppets?

Yes, she tried to throttle Miss Piggy during a cocaine-induced psychotic episode. She's fine now. Both of them are.

the pig has forgiven her. lets all move on.

[quote] Isn't this tribute premature? The buzz on her new movie with Sally Ross, Jenny Stewart, and Catherine Zeta-Jones, "Gold Diggers of 2024", suggests that there's a potentially exciting new chapter to be written on Helen's career.

She's 107!

[quote] the pig has forgiven her.

Peggy Rea?

Helen and Arlene Francis used to snort a lot of coke together then make prank phone calls to Dorothy Kilgallen.

R132 Today's 107 is yesterday's 25!

She should run for President!

I'M NOT DRIVING I'M TRAVELING!

I love the YouTube video of her claiming to be a sovereign citizen when she was pulled over.

I loved her line where she threatens to break that blind girl's kneecaps.

Thank you all for the belly laughs on this Day of Doom.

I'll plant my own foot....

Right up your ass!!!!

I doubt it was two members of the catering staff. They wouldn't have been in bed if it were Christie Brinkley. It was two of the chauffeurs they found with her.

I wonder if they'll show any footage of her screen test to play Roddy McDowell's mother in Lassie Come Home. She was apparantly quite moving until the dog entered the scene and proceeded to bury his/her face inHelen's undercarriage and could not be pulled back. Helen kept trying to push the dog away but it just growled and wouldn't budge. Attempts by members of the crew to get the dog away from Helen's crotch were futile even when they dangled raw meat right in front of it. Ultimately it took six large stagehands to wrangle the dog from Helen's lap as the dog barked and yowled before being led off set. Helen was overheard turning to to the young McDowell and saying, "that's the last time I don't wear panties when my Aunt Blood's in town for a visit' and then cackled euphorically. This is frequently considered to be the exact moment when Roddy McDowell turned gay...

My favorite movie of hers is Snow. She plays a prostitute who for some reason ends up in the Arctic. There she meets a righteous missionary played by Fred MacMurray who wants to sell Christianity and Disney annual passes to the Eskimos. While denouncing her for her wicked ways he falls madly in love with her and goes crazy by the incessant snowing. It doesn't stop despite his endless appeals to God for mercy. In madness he wanders out into the tundra and is covered by a blanket of snow where his body is not found until climate change is a thing. It's a long movie. The great scene where she reproaches him for his hypocrisy while he loudly recites the lyrics to White Christmas to drown her out still astonishes.

Is it true one of the Sesame Street kids is still catatonic even today?

Seeing Helen like that made the poor lad mute.

The famous photo of Helen when she lost the Tony to Mary Martin. This being DL you all proabably know this already, but when Mary was giving her acceptance speech and thanked her husband Richard Halliday, a drunken Helen stage whispered "husband my ass. Everybody knows that broad is a dyke. Just ask Janet Gaynor."

It made headlines all over the US.

Qui etait cette cunt?

What's that stench?

Oh, it's just Helen.

R142 I love the soundtrack at Christmas time. "Swingin' Smokin' Sleighride" and "When You Open My Box" always get me in the mood.

She made "Do you know who I am?" popular among the stars. Now everyone's a pale imitation of La Lawson.

So they're finally giving Helen her props. I guess all is forgiven after that USO Christmas Show Fiasco of 1966.

Helen had agreed to do Bob Hope's USO Christmas Show in Vietnam to support our troops. She had rehearsed for weeks and got into tiptop shape for the show, but when she arrived at Cư Chi, she was horrified to discover that her legendary star power had been eclipsed by young neophytes Chris Noel and Joey Heatherton, who were getting all the wolf-whistles and media attention. Especially daunting was Helen was to come onstage immediately after Joey's wild, frenetic dancing had whipped the boys into a frenzy. This was enough to drive Helen to drink, which she did backstage.

After Helen's introductory banter with Bob fell flat, and their song and dance number received tepid response, a panicked Helen became unglued. She turned on the audience, letting out an expletive-laced tirade, punctuated with "I hope you die, motherfuckers!" The 25th Infantry Brigade jeered loudly, "Get off the stage, you old c*nt!"

"Oh hiss and boo your own selves!" she responded, "You want a red scare, I'll give you a red scare!" And with that she raised her miniskirt to reveal a fiery red carpet dyed to match the drapes.

Miss Lawson's public meltdown made front page news around the word. She was even denounced as unpatriotic and a national embarrassment on the Senate floor. It would take decades of public apologies, philanthropy, and community service for Helen to rehabilitate her tarnished reputation.

[quote] This was enough to drive Helen to drink, which she did backstage.

Oh, honey. No one had to drive Helen to drink. She always had a flask or two stashed away. As she used to say, “Water’s for hosing down the sidewalk.. Pass the gin!”

[quote] This was enough to drive Helen to drink,

To be fair, a change in wind direction would cause Helen to drink.

R151 '...and fish fuck in it, bitch!"

[quote]I love the soundtrack at Christmas time. "Swingin' Smokin' Sleighride" and "When You Open My Box" always get me in the mood.

Her "sub rosa" version of "I'm Gettin' Nutted for Christmas" was a big it with the "party record" crowd.

Wasn´t it Helen who ended the Loretta Young Show when the hostess put out her "swear box" and asked La Lawson to pay up for using fowl language?

What exactly did Helen put in Lorettas box ?

[quote]Wasn´t it Helen who ended the Loretta Young Show when the hostess put out her "swear box" and asked La Lawson to pay up for using fowl language?

FOWL language? Well, she WAS known for going on and on about cock.

"Hello, Sadness" (1970) was a TV remake of Otto Preminger's uneven, "Bonjour Tristesse"- about a troubled teen girl trying to break up her father's new romance. Only this time it co-starred Pamelyn Ferdin and was directed by Charles Nelson Reilly. The production was fraught from the get-go, as Helen was back on the sauce and quarreled bitterly with CNR ("They ran you outta New York on a rail, so you come slinking back to Hollywood, you closet queen!") and Pamelyn ("Where'd you learn to act, the Mickey Mouse Club?!"). Her bid for an Emmy turned into another stint in rehab

Helen was one of the most hated entertainers ever. She also had a lot of self-induced pain and struggle throughout her life. Despite (or because of) that, she had a very well-used cunt, which is easy to encounter in Hollywood but not to that prolapsed degree. At a time when gay people were oppressed beyond belief, they sought her support, and she rebuffed them and called them “fags” .

[quote]It was around this time that co-star Dickie Cromwell eloped with young, 19-year-old Angela Lansbury. When Helen encountered the new couple dining in the small studio commissary, she gushed, "Congratulations, you two! But which one is the bride?"

And don't think Dame Angela ever forgot that incident. Even though the Cromwell-Lansbury union was a bust, Angie remained loyal to Dickie until his dying days. Decades later, when Helen hit up Angie for a guest stint on "Murder, She Wrote," the usually good-hearted Angela sneered, "Not on your life!"

Loved her cartwheel number in that musical where she taught those mute kids to sing negro spirituals.

r160 I thought it was about Rio de Janeiro and landing strips and airports?

What was the production where she set the ingenue's trailer on fire? They hushed it up and blamed it on an unattended cigarette.

I can't read through all these posts, but did anyone mention the film adaptation of 'Hard Rhoda Ho', where Helen plays a mid-western farm wife married to an Asian during the Depression? The sheer grit of her, raising those four 'special' children practically on her own, and running the farm, while her wastrel husband spends his days drinking and playing checkers down by the Community Center and tornadoes tear up the town. As everyone knows, she won a TONY for the musical.

R162, ironically "I'm All Wet"

[quote] Loved her cartwheel number in that musical where she taught those mute kids to sing negro spirituals

I didn't know she could fit a flute THERE and still manage a cartwheel!

My grandpa told me a story once- He met Helen in a bar once. He was in his prime and very good looking and strapping italian man of 27-28.

She asked him if he was a fag!

"He whipped out his braciole and said "Does this look like a fag's dick, bitch?"

She had already passed out.

Helen was up for the role of Dawn Davenport in Female Trouble, but on the first day of filming, she scared John Waters so much that he had police on set to remove her.

[quote] She had to drop out of "A Streetcar Named Desire" due to a nervous breakdown. She was having affairs with Brando, Gadge, Karl Malden and Kim Hunter.

We were just surprised she wasn't having one with the streetcar.

R162, You're probably thinking of "Sister Sister" (working title) with Connie Stevens in a dual role as twins Amy and Allison, one good, the other wicked. Helen was to play their mother. But Stevens proved to be too bubbly for Lawson's tastes. One day, Connie greeted Helen with an exuberant "Good morning, Mother Helen!"

"And what's so good about it, hussy?!" Helen snapped.

Helen was just sore because young Connie was dating the much older Glenn Ford, the "man who got away" from Helen two decades prior. To add insult to injury, Ford kept coming to the set and making Connie's trailer rock.

When that trailer mysteriously burst into flames, Helen pointed the finger at Connie, suggesting that perhaps Connie got carried away with her Method acting. But Jack Warner had suspected Helen all along and not only fired her but banned her from future Warner Bros productions. The project was shelved after Warner realized Connie couldn't carry a film.

Did anyone watch the tribute last night? I was surprised by the scarcity of big names present. I mean, Morgan Brittany and Sheilah Wells are barely even remembered.

When Helen guest starred on Alice, she suggested to Polly Holliday that Flo's trademark catchphrase "kiss my grits" should be changed to "lick my clit." Polly explained to Helen that the network censors would never allow the line change.

R170 True it as rather low on star power. But I did enjoy the musical tribute by Joey Heatherton, and the appearance of that gorilla she co-starred with in "Hey Kids, Meet Your New Dad!" was touching.

Madonna was so late they scrapped her number in favour of Helen's one and only Graham Norton appearance.

Is that the episode where a drunken Helen got into the red chair, Graham pulled the lever flipping it on its back, and Helen croaked "Come and get it boys, I'm on my back and open for business, if you catch my meaning!!"?

Miyoshi Umeki wouldn't talk about rehearsals for their Broadway musical "Chop Susie," which never even actually opened, but she said she would never work with Lawson again after that.

[quote]The AFI has uncovered some rare footage never seen before, including Helen’s 1932 screen test with George Brent that earned her a contract with 20th Century Fox.

20th Century Fox didn't come into existence until 1935.

R174, the one and only. There was some talk of deportation before anyone realized she went directly from the studio to the airport. Helen seldom knew when she was crossing the line but she had highly attuned sense of oh, shit.

Poor Graham Norton, thought he was getting a little old Hollywood glamour with a touch of Dame Edna naughtiness.

I don't think he was prepared for a five minute rant on Marlene Dietrich's tongue technique (rather lacking, apparently) and how much Josephine Baker knew her way around a snatch!

Well, when "Heidi" cut into the football game might be the most shocking TV moment.....but in second place was Helen's take on Turkey Lurky Time. Clearly she WASN'T doing the Bennett choreography. I mean, some segments of that clip are on Pornhub today......

At least two CBS affiliates renounced their network affiliation on the spot.

Did Umeki use any expletives when she said that, R175?

あの古い女!

At the 1974 Academy Awards she offered Moses to show him her burning bush which elicited uncomfortable laughter from the audience.

Her Auschwitz joke however had them visibly shocked !

[quote]R23 The AFI has uncovered some rare footage never seen before, including Helen’s 1932 screen test with George Brent that earned her a contract with 20th Century Fox.

[quote]R176 20th Century Fox didn't come into existence until 1935.

That “screen test” [italic](Can You See My Cancans?)[/italic] circulated at bachelor parties and smokers for years. Zanuck was so enamored by Helen’s athletic antics in it he later signed her, even if the footage was originally shot in a French brothel for Gaumont, I think it was.

R183 She could blow smoke ring with her vagina and a cigar, then fire a ping pong ball right through it. That star power.

Helen was well paid by Zanuck - not because her movies made that much early on, but because she was always so willing to show visiting big shots a night on the town.

Whatever the studio pharmacy had to spend on penicillin rolled back in a thousandfold!

Zanuck called Lawson "Mingie" because he adored Helen's carefully landscaped bush. That is, until his wife Virginia got photos of the duo doing number 17 the Spread Eagle in their Malibu love nest. That's when Lawson was sent packing to Universal.

[quote] Her Auschwitz joke however had them visibly shocked !

That's when I fell in love with that lady!

Tragically, they also had to scrap the whole proposed Mingie series: [italic]

A Melody for Mingie

Mingie’s First Kiss

I Married Mingie,[/italic] etc.

Helen defended her Auschwitz joke by saying "I guess you really had to be there."

Oh r189 you are awful! But I like you.

I loved how she made Jane Curtain cry when she guest hosted Saturday Night Live.

Zsa Zsa Gabor was a class act. When Helen was down on her luck ZZ(what Helen called her) let Helen stay with her for almost a year. When Helen left she left with some of ZZ's jewels. ZZ never said a word. She knew that her jewels would help Helen start a new life; or buy some fantastic toot. ZZ didn't judge.

I would love to see the "lost" episode of Wonder Woman where Helen guest starred as Wonder Woman nemesis, The Cheetah. CBS never aired it and Lynda Carter has always refused to talk about it.

She told Lynda to stop dressing like a Mexican whore. The filming of the episode was never completed. Lynda refused to continue working with her.

"Airport 1984" was the last of the popular series. Helen played a Mother Superior who had served as a WAC in WW2 and knew how to fly a plane. Which she did, after the pilots are hypnotized by a diabolical Chinaman (Orson Welles) working for wannabe Dictator Ghengis Bang (Rod Steiger) who wants to turn the world into a slave colony. Stewardesses: Judy Landers, Teri Copley and Carol Wayne (her last role).

R175 Helen was fucking Mickey Rooney at the time who acted as her accent coach for the production. When the production was canceled because of her behavior, she walked out onto 44th street in her dragon lady costume from the finale, squatted and took a dump in front of the ticket booth.

R196 She then continued to stay in character and parade around Times Square shouting "me so horny, me so horny, me love you long time." Fortunately for her, she wasn't recognized, but apparently a young Woody Allen just happened to be passing by and thought this was as good a time as any to pop his cherry.

R195 Warren Oates and James Patterson (played pilot and co-pilot) both said that the seat cushions had to be replaced after her cameo.

R195Her attempted crossover tie-in pop hit "I Keep My Cockpit Warm" failed miserably

R191 You made Jane CURTIN cry when you couldn't spell her name correctly.

It was after the groping incident at Elizabeth Arden that every beauty saloon in town insisted on safty measures when La Lawson showed up for her monthly moustache waxing starting with the avovado-mask blindfold.

This turned out to be helpful later when Helen- at the urging of Larry Olivier - tricked Vivien Leigh into electro-shock treatment for her manic depression. This was revealed in Lili Palmers autobiography,where she told the story of overhearing a conversation between Lawson and Larry. It started with Helen barking "All right, faggot! Start explaining!" and ended with a tearful Larry whimpering "You've got your new deal, and I've got my sanity back".

My favorite Helen Lawson epic was Genghis Khan and the Señorita with James Stewart as the Mongolian ruler. Unfortunately, international audiences didn't agree with me and the picture ended up being recycled and renamed in the rest of the world as Agent XOX Mission Kiss Kiss. It was huge in the Philippines where it was adapted into a musical, The Happy Stewardess.

R202 Few people know that the pimpslap right after her 'Oh Genghis, you impetuous fool' line was improvised. Jimmy Stewart never saw it coming. He threw an large incense burner at her but she ducked.

Sheen thah panshoo shumplaish.

....

Lea Salonga has been trying to get a revival of The Happy Stewardess to Broadway for years.

Wasn’t Lawson pretty much responsible for the delicate, some say the flower-like, Miyoshi Umeki quitting The Biz?

I don’t remember all the details…

The AFI Salute to Helen is long overdue, but I guess they were waiting for the controversy over the blackface material she did early in her career to die down. Amazing she wasn't cancelled over that.

Helen in blackface singing the novelty song "Mammy's Makin' Pancackes" while whe danced the Charleston used to be on Youtube but it was taken down.

It certainly didn't help when Helen was doing her hand prints at Grauman's Chinese Theatre she passed out, drunk, face first into the wet cement. After that awards and honors were few and far between.

God, they didn't know what they had there r209. Now, "Look at me, I'm face-plant Helen" has become the most popular selfie on the Walk of Fame.

ABC threw her a bone in late 79 and gave her a cameo in the Donna Summer special as one of the bad girls with twiggy and debralee Scott. Lawson kept calling twiggy “Twinkie” and kept saying “I smell cunt” when she walked by Debra Lee. The last straw came when Lawson stole Donna’s purple disco pants and tube top costume and the an over to chasens and ate a pint of chili along with the cabbage roll special.

All hell broke loose when Lawson started letting out stinker after stinker and the seams of the costume started to blow out and Lawsons ass started spraying diarrhea like a broken dam. Production had to be shut down and the studio deep cleaned and fumigated but they still couldn’t get the smell out and they did a controlled demolition.

Luckily Alan Carr heard about while trying on caftans with Pat Ast and she ended up saving the day.

I remember when she said tits instead of boobs on Match Game. The audience was in hysterics but Gene was all NEVER AGAIN.

[quote] Lawson started letting out stinker after stinker

We're not talking about her movies.

Wasn't she Judy's dealer?

I heard it came down to Helen and Audrey Hepburn to play Eliza Doolittle in MFL.

I heard she tried to flush Lupe Velez’s head down a toilet.

Oh, THAT's why they called her Poopy Lupe!

Excerpted from a longer interview, Edith Head acknowledged that Lawson also served as her muse whilst portraying a marooned woman's descent into madness and cannibalism in 'Tough Tahiti.' "Grass skirts were a given, but I took two looks at Helen's bosom and got busy with a seam ripper on some Woolworth's oven mitts."

Thank you all. I never thought it would get this far when I started this thread. It reminds me of the golden age of Datalounge.

Guy Madison at 67 yrs old was still fuckable.

^^ Oops.

Didn't Guy and Helen have a brief affair that ended at Perino's when Guy stopped to talk to Joan Crawford, r220? She slapped Joan so hard that Joan got up and poured her Limestone Salad over Helen. Helen then quipped, "No wonder Philip Terry left you, if your pussy smells anything like that damn salad!"

She was originally cast as Jessica Tate, in SOAP. Helen (and her management team) were really hoping it marked a comeback. The part was passed to the less spontaneous hands of Katherine Helmond when Helen insisted on filming sex scenes with a frightened Robert Urich.

Her never seen stint on Soap also inspired the infamous Sharon Stone shot in Basic Instinct when word got around she'd sit on set in her dressing gown asking who wanted to see her Benson Burner?

I remember overhearing a fight between Helen and Angie Dickinson at Leader Drug. I was trying to eavesdrop but the only thing I heard clearly was when Ang raised her voice near the pharmacy window and bellowed "Lawson, there isn't enough penicillin in the world to clear up a case of you!"

[quote]Helen (and her management team) were really hoping it marked a comeback.

I hate that term!!! It's RETURN, RETURN!

Yes, Helen, but in your case it's when they Re-Turned you out the damn door, once again.

She was all set to play Edith Bunker. Unfortunately she stole Sally Struther's lunch out of the break room fridge. You don't touch Sally's food

She got arrested for using child labor in her landscaping business.

Ah, yes. F. Lee Bailey got her off and she fled to Nevada to open the first of her two moderately successful brothels.

Hey r228, I was looking forward to that bag of chips all morning. I was staying thin, dammit, and it wasn't friggin easy! And I needed something to look forward to!

And I didn't appreciate the little note saying "I'm just trying to keep you from turning into the fat cunt you're destined to be."

[quote] Sally Struther's

Oh, dear.

I trust the tribute will include clips from her performances in the "Flying Fuchs" series.

"Helen Lawson" is such a glamorous name.

R233 Monique Fuchs oh, such a great character. Insane German psychopath frau cunt, fucked every man in the franchise in that thin blond wig.

I hope it includes a clip from her Love Boat storyline with Cornel Wilde.

She lost the lead in Leave Her to Heaven when she really tried to drown the kid.

The lead in Leave Her to Heaven does drown the kid.

ummm OK R238. Um OK.

Oh you mean tried to drown the actor who played the kid? Never mind...

The biggest problem with The Flying Fuchs was the really bad blue screen work for all of the trapeze sequences. I mean set a TV show among a group of aerialists with a traveling circus and then cast William Conrad as the patriarch? La Lawson looked great in her sequin and spandex ensembles but they had to frame the shots carefully because of the things she would do to the trapeze bar.

R241, are you thinking of the short-lived 60s tv version where Joan Collins played the Helen Lawson role? I was talking about the 1942 film and its sequels about a troupe of trapeze artists fighting the Nazis.

Helen kept pestering her agent to get her an audition for Eight Is Enough, but when she discovered the premise of the show was something completely different than what she assumed it was (going by the title of the show) she told her agent to forget it.

In 1987 the sitcom "Helen Of Troy, NY" became a mid-season replacement on CBS. HL played Helen Glenellen, a widowed Avon lady who decides to run for Mayor in protest... and wins! She's naive and overwhelmed, but determined to make a difference- while raising her daughter (Quinn Cummings) without a dad. But she immediately crosses wires with the City Director (Pearl Bailey) and the Chief of Police (John Amos). With Jm J. Bullock as the kooky gay neighbor.

It was not renewed.

She was about to sign to play Endora on Bewitched when she made the ill-fated Tonight Show visit to promote her guest star turn on Batman. She might have gotten away with the bat cave joke, but you can't come back from three references to Fagman and Rubbin'.

I liked the musical where she played a hooker who somehow ended up working as a deckhand on a commercial fishing boat. I think it was called Tuna Surprise.

Did anyone catch Helen in FOLLIES with The Kenley Players? I’ve heard mixed reports.

FOLLIES!

FOLLIESCH!

Only Lassie was a bigger bitch in heat than Helen Lawson when she was at Metro. Matter of fact, I recall seeing a film Mr. Mayer had of Helen and Lassie that…..well I probably should just let the old dog have her dignity and Lassie too.

Helen spent three weeks filling in for Ann Miller during the Broadway run of Sugar Babies while Ann was out for vaginal rejuvination surgery, and the backstage battles between Helen and Mickey Rooney were vicious.

Bob Fosse thought Lawson would be a good fit as Dorothy Stratten’s mother in STAR 80. Helen tried to convince Fosse she should be playing Dorothy Statten and was horrified at the thought of playing the mother of a young adult. To convince Fosse, she bought the Playboys Dorothy was in and recreated the layouts. The photographer could’ve used all the Vaseline in the Castro district on his lens and it couldn’t soften the horror of Helen’s body. Fosse saw the photos and had a mild heart attack and some of the production staff had to be replaced after seeing the pics and coming down with an illness that made even the worst case of food poisoning seem like a mild case of indigestion.

Gwen Verdon found the unretouched negatives and had them printed. She called them A Rotten Raisin In The Sun and would superimpose people she hated heads on them and anonymously send them out to their friends and family and sometimes High Society magazine . Ann Reinking got copies of them and did the same thing to Catherine Zeta Jones when she got Velma in the Chicago movie.

Meanwhile, amidst the mayhem, Carroll Baker slid quietly on set and delivered a surprisingly tasteful performance as Dorothy’s mother.

Helen never forgave her, calling her “that bleached blonde Harlow harlot whore.”

Some of these are funny but the scatological stuff is just lame and gross.

^ Eat shit and die trash

Before the Twilight Zone Tragedy there was The Flying Fuchs incident. Helen, horned up and feeling her oats WAS using those trapeze bars for ways not intended by the manufacturer or Jesus himself... Needless to say, her "lady juices" made the bars slippery as a whales back.

3 different stunt doubles plunged to their deaths.

Helen's rumored reponse behind the scenes?

"Honey, I was always told that my pussy was a deadly weapon. Fuck em!"

Just this line had me howling because I knew what would follow would be FUCKED UP. And it was!

Bob Fosse thought Lawson would be a good fit as Dorothy Stratten’s mother in STAR 80

Yeah, but then he sobered up in the little motel room she’d lured him to , and saw her in the cold light of day. The woman was in her 70s for god’s sake!

Every time he saw Helen at a party, Irwin Allen shrugged and muttered: "The glowering inferno" after preferring Jennifer Jones for the Towering Inferno. Helen wasn't one for philosophy when it came to losing a part.

I happen to know that r252 is A COMPLETE FABRICATION. Unfortunately, I cannot say more as it would reveal my source.

R260 is a liar AND a whore.

I am NOT a liar!

R246

She won Best Actress for her performance at the North Korean Pyongyang Film Festival. The first and only artist honored from a "non-aligned countrie".

That she accidently entertained korean soldiers during the war because she stumbled a bit tippsy on the wrong side of the frontline migth have helped. Due to an overdone eyelift she was was first mistaken as korean thespian Mun Ye-bong but soon endeared herself to the generals by exposing military secrets after a couple of Soju shots.

That Helen was spared consequences for high treason is attributed to her knowledge of Bess Trumans hushed up early days in Missouri vaudeville,but that´s another story.

It's true r263, as I know so well. Now I very rarely got involved in such matters, but this time I just had to get the dirt. I heard the rumors and I had a lovely little brunch at the White House, with Miss Lawson and, well, some fellows like you all. I fear we put rather a dent into the White House liquor budget that day, but my goodness, she had so many stories!

Later Ike and I decided it might be best if we all just let the Matter of Helen Lawson be quietly forgotten.

And for years, whenever the subject of dear little Margaret Truman's singing came up, I would say she'd inherited so many talents from her mother with a little wink at my favorite colored footman, Othello, who served us that day.

During Helen's stay at the Austen Riggs Foundation in Stockbridge, MA, during her "extended vacation," Judy Garland visited her and played her own record of I'll Plant My Own Tree, which supposedly drove Helen to assault her.

Jessica Savitch should never had gone out partying with Helen.

I know that's why she lost the role in The Miracle Worker. First day, first scene, first shot and she slapped Patti Duke back with such force production was suspended for a week.

Well, Patti got her revenge, didn’t she? Starring in “that movie.” I bet she gave Susan Hayward all sorts of “notes.”

Patti Duke had tinnitus until the day she died because of that slap.

I'm surprised Morgan Britanny showed up for the tribute after what Helen put her through on the set of "For Three Drachmas You Get Souvlaki," shot in and around Athens back when Morgan was still sweet Suzie Cupito.

Morgan/Suzie played Helen's intellectually disabled daughter Lori, and "to help her get into character," Helen took to calling her politically incorrect names like "the Little Retard" and "Miss Suzie Dumbfuck."

This went on for days until co-star Constance Ford put a stop to it: "You call her that one more time, Helen, and by golly, I'll kick you in the cunt and use you as a snowshoe!" Connie was the one gal that Helen didn't dare mess with.

Henceforth, Helen made nice-nice with Suzie, sometimes even acting motherly towards her. But this détente went sideways after Suzie had her first period. A very tipsy Helen gave a demonstration on how to insert a Pursettes... in her cooch, then tried to "assist" Suzie in putting one in her! A horrified Suzie went running to Connie, who marched up to Helen's suite, gave her a beatdown, then called the Greek authorities to have her arrested.

A bruised and terrified Helen enlisted her former lover, Ari Onassis, to have her spirited away from Athens.

After negotiations and delays, Helen shot her remaining scenes with stand-ins and a second-unit director on a backlot in Burbank.

R267 R268 R269 PATTY, not Patti.

She's dead. What the fuck does it matter what you call the little cunt?

[quote] Helen took to calling her politically incorrect names like "the Little Retard" and "Miss Suzie Dumbfuck."

They weren’t considered politically incorrect at the time.

[quote] Morgan/Suzie played Helen's intellectually disabled daughter Lori

AKA Light in the Pie-Ass-Uh.

R250 R271

Listen LeSueur and LuPone! You better get the hell out of my thread NOW! The only star that comes out of a Helen Lawson thread is HELEN LAWSON, and that´s me baby,remember?

This fucking thread is blocked untill the moderator has a can tied to those ancient broads tail Somebody tell her to get off her butt and earn her oats.

And that's ^ exactly why she didn't get to play Dorothy on The Golden Girls.

Speaking of “that movie,” I’m trying to think of another example where one famous actor played another in a movie and became so closely identified with the part that you sometimes can’t tell one from the other. Downey played Chaplin, but I’d argue Downey wasn’t famous when he did. Cate Blanchett played Hepburn, but she wasn’t really a star either. Same with Franco as James Dean. Then there’s Jessica Lange as Frances Farmer, I suppose. But was Francis Farmer famous for acting or for going nuts?

OMG—I’m so ashamed. How could I forget? Apologies to Miss Dunaway.

Gloria Swanson was unforgettable as Norma Desmond.

Miss Helen Lawson played Miss Lillian Roth in "I'll Cry Tomorrow." (OK--singer, not actress.)

[quote]Downey played Chaplin, but I’d argue Downey wasn’t famous when he did.

He'd been a pretty well known A-list actor for a few years by that time: Less Than Zero, Air America, Soapdish (on top of Weird Science and the Pick Up Artist).

[quote]Cate Blanchett played Hepburn, but she wasn’t really a star either.

She'd already been in her breakout role (Elizabeth), then three Lord of the Rings movies and The Talented Mr. Ripley!

Lawson's response to the Mother Theresa script: "If the only man on offer was God Almighty it's no wonder she looked like Sam Goldwyn's shmeckel."

Irascible, secretly tender hearted Uncle Charlie was originally irascible, secretly tender hearted Aunt Charlotte, but you can imagine Helen Lawson off-camera on My Three Sons.

Yeah, those sons woulda learned a thing or three from Auntie Helen!

Another blackface number that Helen did early in her career was singing a song called "Bojangles Blues" in a movie called "Pickanniny Parade."

Again, it's a miracle she hasn't been cancelled over that.

Oh honey, if Helen could be cancelled, well, you know how there are these people that just rise above? Bitch rises below, and there ain't nothing any bitch can do about it!

She may not have been cancelled, but there isn’t a trace of most of the films mentioned in this thread anywhere on the internet. Whoever took care of the scrubbing knew what they were doing.

We've all got a Mamacita somewhere.

I wish she had decided yes when she was mulling over a Senate run in California.

[quote] I wish she had decided yes when she was mulling over a Senate run in California.

Behind her back she was also called "Pink Lady", like Helen Gahagan Douglas, but the reason for her being "pink right down to her underwear" was not supposed Communist sympathies but rather the fact that she shunned use of feminine hygiene products "down there".

R12

Same reason as Liza.

The K9 and Canine Community is pretty influental in Washington and those stories from The Mocambo and Studio 54 days are hard to white noise.

In Helens case there is evidence to be found on the dark net allegedly. Me being a delicate flower could not bring myself to search for this unfortunate footage but there are several epics in Rin Tin Tins filmography listed as "lost"-so draw your own conclusions.

Do you think they'd run her appearance on What's My Line? "Right before I die I'm going to swallow a bag of popcorn kernels to make the cremation a bit more interesting."

Did the blackface clip of her doing 'Mammy's Fixin' Pancakes' from the Ed Sullivan show ever surface?

r293 it gets taken down from Youtube five minutes after somebody uploads it.

Apparently Smith College was developing a Women's Studies course called The Sexuality of Helen Lawson: Pathfinder or Pushover?

But it started triggering before anybody got beyond the name, so the funding was diverted to Hamas: The Social Justice Warriors and their Feminist Organizing Manifesto.

YouTube must have an entire staff dedicated to the Helen Lawson scrub.

Even “free speech” Elon won’t tolerate any clips.

I’m surprised Helen doesn’t try to make an issue out of it. Perhaps the rumors about her being on the payroll of the Sultan of Brunei in exchange for her silence are true. I wonder what’s she’s got on him. And what he has on her.

She beat the hell out of Harvey when he tried that shit on her.

I heard there’s a secret code word you can use to pull clips out of the abyss. Surely one of you cunts must have it. Spill!

Don't forget, in Helen's day, she frequently bearded for J. Edgar Hoover, and some say she would even join in on J. Edgar and Clyde Tolson's sexcapades. Helen knew their secrets and she used this to get them to scrub clean her salacious history. Hoover and Tolson are long gone, but there must be some deep state shit still going on to explain why Lawson's controversial Youtube clips keep getting taken down.

She was the one in Grassy Knoll. Helen don't miss.

Well, the whispers never stop that she was at Monroe's house that night..

r299 Was she the one who got Hoover to dress up as Vivian Vance?

No. It was Una Merkel that Hoover dressed as.

Goddamn bitch was unstoppable. The bitch that fucked Khrushchev on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and called Hedda Hopper to laugh about it!

I thought I knew shit. THAT cunt knew some damn shit!

I saw a clip from one of Helen's 70s variety specials where she sang "A Good Man Is Hard To FInd" with Liberace and Rock Hudson.

I heard the number she sang to the Shah of Iran helped get his government overthrown!

Helen spent a week on Hollywood Squares in 1977. Helen, Paul Lynde and Wayland Flowers (with Madame), all drunk on their asses, answered every question Peter Marshall gave them with the filthiest answers they could think of. The shows were never broadcast.

R307, did the contestants still get their prizes?

Overheard at a party in The Stork Club...

J. Edgar Hoover: "Helen, what a lovely frock! May I borrow it?"

Helen Lawson: "But, J. Edgar, chiffon doesn't become you!"

Every knows Helen didn’t call Hoover “J. Edgar.” She called him “Mary.”

Bette Davis and Helen Lawson in Love Has Gone Up the Duff! from 1964. Unfortunately, the studio saw it and recut it and released it as Where Love Has Gone. Helen hated this film calling it When Love Pulled Out. The physical fight with Bette Davis was captured on film, but was burned by Joseph E. Levine.

Helen tried to take Tim Walz' virginity but he was too smart to chance those bacteria and too gracious to say anything but "I loved you in The Great Train Robbery."

Did Helen ever co-star with Vera Charles?

I don’t think the laws of physics would permit it, r313.

Something about a rip in the space-time continuum, whatever that means.

No dear r313. That was Helen Hayes.

Are you sure it wasn’t Helen of Troy?

Remember her Pearl Drops toothpaste commercial? A gal's gotta eat.

Will she be taking this opportunity to introduce her new fragrance (after Helenesque was appropriated for the exclusive use of NASA). I hear it's to be called "Smellin' of Helen."

[quote] Pearl Drops

Is that a euphemism?

Well, it wasn't supposed to be r319! We TOLD them not to use her.

Lawson Lovelocks* was a big moneymaker for her in the 60s - 70s, and is still popular with drag queens.

You should've seen the fight between Helen and Eva Gabor, r321. It got so violent they were tearing out each other's public hair! Eddie Albert tried to break it up, but Helen kneed him in the balls and tire off his toupee.

Helen vs Jayne

Helen Lawson was scheduled to host "The Hollywood Palace," with special guests Jayne Mansfield, Shelley Berman, and the Flying Walendas. But during rehearsals an increasingly inebriated Helen grew tired of Jayne's cooing and squealing, turned to her and said pointedly, "Miss Mansfield, I don't like you. And I don't like how your tits have a habit of falling out of your dress!"

Jayne replied, "Well, Miss Lawson, I don't like you either nor your habit of falling down drunk, but I haven't said a word."

With that they began jostling and slapping and pulling each other's hair until Miss Mansfield's ample bosom knocked Helen off the stage and into the orchestra pit, causing Helen to fracture a vertebrae and pull out of the show.

Years later, when Jayne's career was reduced to touring the nightclub circuit with her tacky burlesque shows, Helen felt sorry for the poor dear and her raggedy hairpieces, and magnanimously donated wigs, falls, and wiglets from her exclusive Helen Lawson Wig Collection. A grateful Jayne made sure to promote Helen's wigs at every opportunity.

When Mansfield met her end at the back of a semi, Helen observed dryly, "What a waste of a good wig."

R323, I heard that Helen, after Jayne's death, said that "She gave good head."

I thought it was Jayne Meadows singing in Mandarin.

She was once photographed at the Tropicana nightclub in New York City watching Ricky Ricardo perform. Hollywood stars Margaret Elliott, Georgia Lorrison, and Eve Harrington were also in attendance.

Helen got on the television bandwagon in the 50s when it looked like the studios were collapsing and TV was the last stand. In 1953 she co-produced the western sitcom, "Skye's The Limit!" wherein a city gal inherits a Montana ranch- and a wagon load of problems! Having just been widowed and in desperate circumstances, she moves her two adolescent children (Lana Wood and Sal Mineo) to the isolated outpost and tries to tame the wild west. Granny: Beulah Bondi. Postmistress: Bea Benaderet. Sheriff: Rory Calhoun.

I’d binge that.

R321, she diversified her wig empire in the 1970s when the big bush fad was in full swing and began selling a line of coarse and curly merkins and vaginal hair extensions for women who could not cultivate an ample lady garden. I believe the ad line was, "now every gal can look like the Commodores are eating her out"

In the '60s and '70s, my grandfather worked high up in the DOJ during the investigation into her failed adoption franchise boondoggle.

I still say that was a good idea. The devil is in the details.

I'm not sure Lawson would agree. She always blamed those three years in Belize for thwarting her comeback. Then again, no extradition treaties can't be choosers.

Past a certain point in the evening, they used to play her interview tapes at DOJ Christmas parties. From about 1972, my grandmother left the room when a Helen Lawson movie came on TV.

Hey—a least Belize has beaches and people who speak English.

Helen taught ESL while there, after a fashion.

R335, what does ESL stand for when it comes to Helen?

[quote] Past a certain point in the evening, they used to play her interview tapes at DOJ Christmas parties.

Even F. Lee Bailey couldn’t get her to stop her self-incriminating rants. And the language would have horrified a jury. The stenographers refused to provide transcripts. There was no way she could let that case go to trial.

Fortunately, for our girl, she had the goods on J. Edgar Hoover.

I heard the Fed's codename for her was "Venus Flytrap."

R336, sufficient vocabulary to get a gig with a landscaper and a map to the safe tunnels underneath the fence between Mexico and San Diego.

It should be said, sometimes she thought it was funny to draw her own map to the extent she single handedly created the Belizian expat community in Tijuana. There's a statue, though it's usually covered in half flowers, half bodily fluids.

That Helen!

R336

Eczema ,Scabies and Lice

R336, Early Servitude Labor. She was training young Central American orphans to be good workers before shipping them off to their new families.

She beat the shit out of Cher's mom in a road rage incident.

"this one if for the tramp, this one is for the thief, and this one is for the gypsy!" That was Helen when she held Mrs. Cher's head by the hair and upper cut her.

A young Melanija Knavs was her protogée in Tijuana.

Well, Helen has caused at least three international incidents in Paris this week. The French Government called Biden to send for her. He asked who it was and when they told him who it was, he hung up after saying "Fuck her."

Even Joe can't forget Helen.

Helen represented Australia this week as the country’s first entry in Olympic breakdancing under the stage name “Raygun”.

Rue McClanahan and Conrad Bain told stories of Helen’s failed audition for “Maude.” Helen thought it was a variety show like Laugh-In called Mod and showed up in a bikini with words painted all over her. She had “oyster” written on one bun and “cracker” written on the other. The word “damp” was painted on her stomach, with an arrow pointing toward her mound.

Norman Lear saw her getup and decided he did not like it one bit. She refused to read from the actual script and instead sang “Waiting For the Robert E. Lee.”

Esther Rolle was watching all this and punched Helen in the mouth while they were both leaving. It smeared the word “dumpster” that was written on Helen’s cheek.

Helen appeared in one episode of Little House on the Prairie as Pa's Aunt Lenore a former Civil War Nurse and saloon gal. Her demands, her arguments with the kids caused Melissa Sue Gilbert to strike her, in shocking incident. How do you think [bold]The Shit Bra[/bold] was created?

She was in the very special episode of Family, where she played Nancy's gym teacher? Or am I confusing her with Agnes Moorehead?

She kept asking Sada: "Don't you just want to beat the shit out of the little cunt Nancy?".

[ R 345 ] I thought it was common knowledge that Joe Biden tried to "fuck her" but Jill caught wind of it and put the kabosh on any hanky panky. That didn't stop enormously endowed brother Frank Biden, who was only too happy to fill in for Brother Joe. I guess you can say that Frank "planted his own tree" inside that famous Lawson snatch and "made it grow". It caused some bad blood between the brothers since Frank took pics of Helen, wide open for business which he passed on to Joe to rub it in. Helen couldn't walk for days but she sure had a smile on her face for a week after and was overheard saying that "drunken, fag loving has-been Neely O'Hara should only know that Helen Lawson is the broad with the real luck of the Irish"

Love this thread

For reasons known to her Helen has been banned for life from Southwest Airlines.

Did Lawson really shit in Bonnie Franklins sparkly pantyhose when they were filming “Those Ravishing Redheads” in 1985 and hung them on the bathroom door of Bonnie’s dressing room. When Bonnie opened the door she fainted from the smell and co stars Rula Lenska and Rhonda Fleming stared violently throwing up.

R355, I believe it. Helen pulled the same stunt backstage at Night of 100 Stars the year before, only this time her target was Vera Ralston, whom she had despised ever since Vera stole Herbert Yates from her and ruined her chance of being crowned Queen of the Republic Pictures Lot. When Vera reached into her pocketbook to grab a Chesterfield Red, she let out a blood curling scream. She had dipped her hand into Helen's hot wet turd.

Onlookers Olivia de Havilland, Nanette Fabray, and Morgan Fairchild nearly passed out from the horrific odor. "Maybe I shouldn't have eaten the beef and broccoli today," quipped Helen.

According to legend, she stared them all down, walked past each of them slowly, then stopped in front of poor little Andrea McArdle. She pimp lapped her hard and whispered, "Eat my puff you fucking cunt". Then she went and gave a great performance.

Offstage I hate her; but, onstage, I'm madly in love with her.

I tried to get this AFI tribute trending on TikTok and they cancelled my account.

The little shits have no respect for the greats.

Keram Malicki-Sanchez knows that TMZ is sitting on a sex tape of Helen taken at a Diddy freak off party.

Harvey Levin should have his breaks checked.

Helen showered once every two or three weeks. Why did she hate it so much? Was it something from childhood?

Helen was mentored by Charles Laughton who also showered infrequently. She also said she like to provide a challenge for her paramours when they visited her undercarriage, as after a couple of weeks without showering her downtown lips were usually 'sealed' with a buildup of dried pus, crust, and the remnants of her previous visitor's fluids...

She was supposed to play Mrs. Oleson on LHOTP. Then there was this incident when she beat up one of the Carries for crying during her audition.

[quote]Helen showered once every two or three weeks. Why did she hate it so much? Was it something from childhood?

It started after her brief affair with Janet Leigh.

We don’t talk about this much but just yesterday, Loretta Swit told me Helen bragged she could put her whole fist in her mouth. Loretta told her that was no trick, she could do it too. Then Helen stuck her fist up Loretta’s ass and said, “Try this for a trick, you cross-eyed cooze.”

She almost never returned her clothes to the wardrobe department and when she did, they were just thrown away. The studio could repair them and get the stains out but the smell made them too difficult to work with.

Baby I may have been a barracuda but I sure as hell wasn't a scat kween like ya freaks.

Barracuda? Hah! Child’s play.

I’ll tell you what, toots. Back when I was a studio player at Warners, I was scarfing down more tuna than any barracuda you’ve ever seen in your life.

“Garbo Speaks”? Honey I made Garbo scream like an orangutan long before the talkies ever came about.

She holds the world's record for both legal and illegal abortions.

I know she’s a fictional character, but Ethel Mertz definitely gave our gal Helen a run for her money with respect to the world record for the number of “procedures”.

Are the reports on TMZ true? Helen is dead??

R369 Neither Helen nor Ethel are fictional characters

In 1981!Lawsons agents launched “operation soften the barracuda” in order to get her career back on track. Since Sally field had so much success with Sybil a few years back, they thought a tv movie about a woman with multiple personalities would be the ticket.

Helen, Helena & Helean was about Mrs. Helen Fairchild a woman devoted to her family, faith and community living in fictional double oaks river illinois. However, she led a “triple” life due to her undiagnosed mental health condition. Charles Nelson Riley played her husband, Mildred Dunnock played her mother and her kids were played by Johnny Whitaker and Emily Schulman.

Helena was a mentally retarded teenager who went to special school by day but by night was a street hooker who was abused and protected by her pimp played by William Conrad.

Helean was a saucy fashion magazine editor who was single but played the field and had her choice of men. Don Knotts, Shecky Greene, Dolph Sweet, Fred Rerun Berry and Herve Villachaize played her handsome suitors and an unknown Mr. T played her bitchy gay assistant.

All of these identities come crashing down when Helen is honored with the “planting her own tree award” service award given out by Helean’s magazine at a banquet hosted by Helean. Helena’s special school teacher is also honored with a “teaching tards with tenderness” award and Helena is one of the students invited to the banquet, but she’s also hired to be the arm candy of an elderly gentleman who is also one of the biggest supporters and donors of the organization. Karl Malden was cast as the old man.

Helen saw this adorable child actress named Jenny Lewis and she was hired to play young Helen in flashback scenes. Shecky Greene was playing at the Sands and Lucille Ball and Gary Morton caught his show. Afterwards they played a game of backgammon and Shecky told Lucy about the movie. Lucy hated Lawson ever since she “accidentally” set Lucy’s dress on fire when she was filming stage door.

Lucy cooked up a revenge plot like no other. First she bribed the director to have the young Helen scenes reshot with Mason Reese as younger Helen. Lewis was brokenhearted but Lucy made it up to her by pulling stings and getting her cast in tv shows and movies throughout the 80s including the ill fated life with Lucy sitcom. Lucy heard about what bob guccione did with Caligula by splicing in hardcore sex scenes into a non porn film. Lucy gathered up Helen’s old stag films and had an old editor from Desilu edit the footage in and replaced the master copy of the film with Lucy’s new and improved version.

Lawson invited every studio big wig in town to screen the movie along with a lot of new and old Hollywood. She really thought this film would put her on the map as an award winning actress. The screening started out fine but then all the sudden a giant hairy pussy appeared in the screen and footage of Helen rimming fatty arbuckle, eating out Louise Dresser, trying to fuck zippy the pinhead and finally getting fisted by Harold Russell’s metal hooks at an Oscar’s after party in 1947.

Fred Astaire had a stoke, Ginger Rogers vomited and shit at the same time, Steven Spielberg had a seizure and rock Hudson was asking for Harold Russell’s number.

Poor Helen.

I wished she had replaced Liza in The Sterile Cuckoo like campaigned for.

Love these wonderful Helen tales. Almost as much as a bottle of "Helenesque". It's great for killing cockroaches.

Helen could occasionally be put in her corner. Norma Desmond especially intimidated her. And evidently Baby Jane Hudson (of all people) nearly took her eye out during a food fight at the MGM cafeteria.

But it was the mysterious and beautiful Broadway starlet Ann-Veronica Moore whom Helen really avoided. She evidently said of Miss Moore "Only one person has really terrified me..."

R375, I'd add Linda Arden to that list. Arden had a lot of shit to deal with in her personal life and she had no time for Helen's histrionics. On the set of "Everybody Saw the Sun Shine" she evidently gave Lawson such a dressing down that the latter quipped "I think she could actually pull off a multiple revenge murder on a fucking train."

Helen never got credit for her unseen cameo in Alien. The scene where John Hurt suffers the chest-burster attack was impossible to convey in real time due to the complexity of the puppetry, so Hurt wore a spring-loaded picture of Helen's pussy that popped out of his shirt.

Sigourney vomited, Harry Dean Stanton fainted, Veronica Cartwright went into hysterics, Yaphet Kotto had a heart attack and movie history was made.

You may laugh, but Helen was auditioned for Murder on the Orient Express, the bio of Linda Arden. She was to play the invented role of Mother Fukker, a German nun.

Sidney Lumet told the cast to have dinner together as he realized the London stage stars were intimidated by the classic Hollywood stars and vice versa.

Joh Gielgud broke the ice with some very dirty stories, but Lawson shut him down with some even more explicit anecdotes.

After 3 hours, everyone ate in silence as Lawson went into graphic details about a traditional Mexican fertility festival involving a goat race.

She was fired after drunkenly screaming at Wendy Hiller "Bitch, did you fall asleep on a waffle iron?"

Is it true she got into a hair-pulling incident with Eve Harrington in a Saks Fifth Avenue elevator?

R7, see I always confuse that with her ping-pong-ball trick in "Taint Misbehavin'".

I don't have the time or inclination to scroll through 380 replies, but can someone confirm that this is the Dr. Deuce that R14 is referring to?