Kathleen Widdoes is now very fat and plays "Emma," Holden's mother on "As the World Turns." And what happened to the divine Joanna Pettet, so fab as "Kay" in "The Group." She was once married to the very hunky 1960s male icon Alex Cord.

Posted by: Tiffany Arreagus at February 13, 2008 3:02 PM

Savvy as was Walter's statement comparing The Group to Sex and the City, The Group is a masterpiece, as opposed to Sex and the City, which is a shopgirl's fantasy...The Group is also noteworthy for the dazzling performance of Carrie Nye, one of the most rarefied (and rareley seen) actresses ever...actress Leora Dana is also of note in this film; both she and Nye paying delightfully innate homage to Tallullah Bankhead...how curious that Lumet, who I personally have found to be a homophobe,could make one of the gayest (in the positive sense) films of all time... Pokey Houston-Liberace

Posted by: Neely Houston-O'Hara at February 13, 2008 3:47 PM

Love it, did they talk about Joanna Pettet? She had lunch with Sharon Tate the day she was murdered. We used "Lakey" as an adjective, as in "she's a little lakey today!"

Posted by: barkley dog at February 13, 2008 3:54 PM

Since this movie plays so seldomly, I just HAD to add - why can't I find it on DVD? And while I'm on a roll, what was with that horrible moderator asking the brilliant Walter and Knight stupid questions?! This idiot (whose name mercifully escapes me) wasted everyone's time with trite musings about how the sets didn't look period enough...in fact, Gene Callahan's incredible art direction was one of the finest examples of proper period decor to that date, and pre-saged 80's Post-Modernism by 20 years...this guy made walk-in closet case / moderator Tim Gunn look profound! Neely Houston-O'Hara Prothero

Posted by: Neely Houston-O'Hara at February 13, 2008 4:04 PM

I agree with Neely. The moderator wasted all of our time. After having the nerve to call Lakey a small part, he asks questions like "so, did all of you become your parts in real life off the set" and asking to applaud people who weren't even there! I love Jessica Walter, (she taught me how to put on fake eyelashes properly in that movie) but I'm not a star struck 14 yr old, and neither was anyone else there, and I'm sure we all had legit comments and questions to ask. He should have opened the floor.

Posted by: Rob/Georgiegirl at February 13, 2008 7:06 PM

They didn't say much about Joanna Pettet, alas. Pauline Kael wrote at the time that Shirley Knight should have played the Pettet role, which would have been interesting. By the way, the interviewer mentioned something weird about how the cast supposedly treated Carrie Nye disdainfully, but Knight seemed to pooh pooh that.

Posted by: musto at February 14, 2008 1:09 AM

I don't know if the cast of "The Group" treated Carrie "I'm Really Straight, I'm Married to Dick Cavett" Nye "disdainfully, but if you've read Mary McCarthy's novel, the girls in "The Group" had no use for the character that Nye played, Noreen Schmedlapp. Lakey called her a "bovine sentimentalist," which is the term I now use to describe Rosie O'Donnell, Starr Jones and Perez Hilton.

Posted by: Tiffany Arreagus at February 14, 2008 4:50 PM

I think the interviewer was either referring to the character or confusing it with the real person. Either way, I love the idea of lithe, sophisticated Carrie Nye being called "bovine."

Posted by: musto at February 14, 2008 7:03 PM

Neely, are you sure Sidney Lumet is a homophobe. Didn't he direct the gay classic "Dog Day Afternoon" as well?

"The Group" is definitely a classic. I read that Candace Bergen got bad reviews but I thought she was flawless.

Posted by: Chrissie Chang at February 15, 2008 9:21 AM

That's her problem, she's flawless, almost impossible to pick apart. And cold, very lakey.

Posted by: trini alvarado's nanny at February 15, 2008 10:30 AM

Quite sure Missy Chrissy - he once screamed "FAGGOT!" at me in the Hamptons. A decade prior to that, outside Toots Shor's, Otto Preminger screamed at me to shave my legs, but he didn't add faggot. Both appeared intoxicated (and not with my legendary allure) at the time...the humorless androgyne Candace Bergen had her greatest role in The Group, marred only by the anachronistic (and nontheless exquisite, if decidedly MOD) frosted lipstick she persisted in wearing throughout the film. This was a gay landmark performance; a decided turn-around from Shirley MacLaine's don't ask/don't tell, self-loathing suicide in 1961's The Children's Hour. 1965's Inside Daisy Clover was the first aknowledgement of homosexuality in an American film that I was aware of, with the (incredibly ironic) throw away line from Katharine Bard to Natalie Wood, "You're husband never could resist a charming boy." This was followed by Larry Hagman's "lesbo" line in 1966's The Group, which led to Sharon Tate's immortal "You know how bitchy fags can be..." in 1967's Valley of the Dolls.1968's The Killing of Sister George and The Legend of Lylah Clare, both directed by Robert Aldrich, took unbelievably queer strides ahead, only to come to a dead stop with usually ingenious Stanley Donen's deadening, 1969 mid-life crisis/drear jerker Staircase. That limited-release clunker aside, Judy Garland's 1969 death inspired Stonewall, and in 1970 we got The Boys In The Band, another masterpiece that is, unfortunately, incredibly contemporary. Neely Parker-Tyler-Kael O'Hara

Posted by: Neely Houston-O'Hara at February 15, 2008 11:16 PM

Larry Hagman's "sappho/lesbo" line is particularly ironic, given who his mother was.

Posted by: ithacaguy at February 16, 2008 12:28 AM

I have to correct the Larry Hagman line. He said "sapphic," not "sappho." He followed that up by telling Lakey (Candice Bergen) that in sleeping with Kay (Joanna Pettet), she had acted out a "filthy lesbian trick Spreading your slime on that dead girl!" Relax. The character's supposed to be a creep.

Posted by: musto at February 16, 2008 11:46 AM