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Stella Stevens, whose turn
as an A-list actress

in 1960s Hollywood, placed her
alongside six symbols

like Brigitte Bardot,
Ann-Margret, and Raquel Welch.

She was groomed as a contract
player by various studios

and was often compared
to Marilyn Monroe

for her smoldering blonde looks,
grace, and glamor.

However, she came to resent the
male-dominated industry

that she felt frustrated
her ambitions

to become more than
a pretty face.

Stella Stevens died on Friday

at a hospice facility
in Los Angeles.

She was 84 years old.

♪ Stella means celestial star ♪

♪ Chebella ♪

♪ The loveliest by far ♪

♪ The moon and the stars give
Their heavenly light ♪

♪ But none in the firmament
Shine ♪

♪ As bright as Stella ♪

♪ Stella her star with its
Glow burning white ♪

♪ None in the heavens are
Shining as bright tonight ♪

Entries in film encyclopedias
chronicle Stella Stevens

as a film star and working
actress for more than 50 years.

But what is not recorded is
the pain she endured

stemming from her struggles
as a single mother

from a small town in
Mississippi

who made her way alone
to Hollywood

and carved out a niche
for herself

during the misogynistic,
sexist, and racist 1960s.

I started to realize that even
though life with my mother

was never warm and fuzzy,

my truth wasn't necessarily
the whole truth

and that her truth was worthy
of having a look at.

And as I started to research
her life and her story,

I was able to look at things
with a softer lens

and view her journey
from multiple sides.

This house was originally built
in the early 1800s

by my great, great grandfather,
Edmund Trent Eggleston.

Some say it was renovated
again around 1870

and obviously it's had updates
since then.

My maternal grandfather,
Tom Eggleston,

he grew up in this house
with his siblings.

He had two brothers
and two sisters.

Tom met and married Dovie
Estelle Caro from Marks,
Mississippi.

The two of them, they had one
child, Estelle Caro Eggleston,

who later became Stella Stevens.

Stella Stevens was born Estelle
Caro Eggleston

on October 1st, 1938 in Yazoo
City, Mississippi.

The Eggleston family was one of
the oldest in Yazoo City.

As a child, she had
two nicknames.

They called her Bootsy and they
also called her Little Estelle

because my grandmother
was Big Estelle.

The Egglestons moved
to Memphis, Tennessee

with four-year-old
Little Estelle

and purchased a small brick
house on Carrington Road

with the Park Theater just
across the back fence.

I uncovered decades of
interviews with my mother,

but in the early days
of her stardom,

they were all in print

and I was trying to find a way

that we could bring
her words to life.

We lived behind the Park
Theater in Memphis

and growing up, I practically
lived inside it.

I saw every film that played
there over and over.

My mother thought I went
to too many movies,

but I learned that if I
bugged her enough,

she would pay me to
get rid of me.

I remember my mother didn't
want me seeing The Outlaw

A 1943 Western film
with Jane Russell

because it had been condemned
by the Catholic Legion

of Decency for its provocative
content.

She tracked me down and pulled
me out of the theater

by my ear.

The Catholic Church had it
out for the picture.

They thought it was too risque.

With two working parents, I
learned responsibility

and independence at a young age.

I learned to cook and take
care of myself,

but movies became my passion

and I watched them at
every opportunity.

My life has never been
what I wanted.

My mother was a devout Catholic
and I was raised Catholic

and I went to Sacred
Heart High School.

After Sacred Heart,
little Estelle enrolled

in Elizabeth Messick
High School.

It is there that she met noble
Herman Stevens.

When Herman met Stella, she was
a high school sophomore

and he was a senior.

The attraction was instant.

Estelle dropped out of
high school at 16

and married journeyman
electrician and amateur boxer

Herman Stevens on December
3rd, 1954

in Holly Springs, Mississippi.

My parents told me that
I was conceived

in the backseat of a Mercury
at the Skyview Drive-in

in Memphis, Tennessee.

My mother, who said
my name Andrew

and Andy for short, was named
after the Aldo Rey character

in the movie Battle Cry,

which apparently was
playing that night.

So I was conceived to the
soundtrack of a war film.

When I was 15 years
old, I got pregnant.

When I was 16, I had a baby.

I've been a mother
since that time.

I actually quit high school
to get married

and have the baby, then went
back to school at night

to finish high school.

I went to college at Memphis
State University.

I was an English major and
joined the drama group.

I knew then that I
would like to act.

Acting is what I wanted to do.

Estelle gained attention and
recognition playing Cherie,

a great part in William Inge's
stage play Bus Stop ,

portrayed on screen
by Marilyn Monroe.

This was the first real
recognition she got in print.

Because Andrew was
a toddler then,

the thought of going to New
York

and trying to be in the theater

seemed like a horrible
grungy life.

I could just picture myself in a
hovel in Greenwich Village.

It was one or the other,

or it was to stay in
Memphis forever.

Everyone in Memphis laughed at
me and thought I was uppity,

that I thought I was better
than everyone else

because I wanted to talk
in a different way.

But I saw it as my only way out.

She was discovered in classic
magic of the movies fashion

when a visiting talent
agent spotted her

working as a junior
fashion model

in the tea room at the old
Goldsmiths Department Store

in downtown Memphis.

I modeled junior sophisticates
and Mr. Mort clothes

at Goldsmiths, Memphis's largest
department store

as my first job.

And of course I had
a baby at the time.

I made $38.86 a week.

And I used to have to take
Andrew to the nursery

while I went to work.

My parents did not support me
wanting to be an actress.

They had the attitude that I had
to get it out of my system,

that I was a bit crazy to do it.

They were very concerned
about me.

My mother said that she
hoped I would fail

and come back to Memphis
where I belong.

I was told that I should
have better sense

and stay home in Memphis, but
I couldn't do it.

When I discovered acting
was my destiny,

it was either New York
or Hollywood.

The odds against getting
anywhere in the movies

are so great that if you had
realized it beforehand,

you'd stay home.

But I wasn't a happy child.

I wanted to be an actress.

United Artists press
agent Irving Schiffrin

arranged for a meeting
with executives

at 20th Century Fox.

They took photos of Stella and
offered to screen test her

there in New York.

But she had to get
back to Memphis.

The New York executives sent
the photos to California

and the executives there
liked what they saw

and offered for Stella to
come to Los Angeles

for her screen test.

The studio had told Stella that
they were interested in her

for the role of Jean Harlow in
a potential upcoming film.

I went to California
in August of 1958

and made the screen test and
waited for my results.

Stella didn't get the
Jean Harlow role,

but the studio liked what it
saw in the screen test

and 20th Century Fox signed her
to a three year contract

in 1959 with a studio option
every six months.

Estelle's early maturity on
screen may have reflected

her own turbulent private life.

The marriage was volatile and
shortly after one year,

Herman moved out and Estelle
filed for divorce.

My next job was at
20th Century Fox

where I was making $250 a week

and I thought I was
really rich.

I left Andy with my mother
because I wasn't allowed

to take him out of state and
I moved to Los Angeles.

Upon arrival in
Hollywood and under the advice

of an agent, Estelle
changed her name.

When I was introduced
as Stella, I said,

"That last name doesn't look
good with a ph.

"I'll just make it a V."

That was the big change.

I was then an actress
with a stage name.

Studio biographies originally
claimed Stevens was born

in Hot Coffee, Mississippi.

That was a fabrication of press
agents who referred

to her as the cream
of Hot Coffee.

Because anything sounded better
than Yazoo City.

Stella's on-screen
acting debut was in a speaking
role

in Frank Tashlin's comedy
drama, Say One for Me.

I was a chorus girl and
I sidled up to Mr. Crosby

in a red spangled,
very tiny costume

and I asked him to zip me up.

They used to always try and
paste net over my cleavage.

They had this idea that I was
too sexy for the screen.

Seeing what they show now and
what they used to show before,

it was pretty silly.

Not long after
filming, Stella was back on the
studio lot

doing a photo shoot when she
passed director

Edward Dmytryk.

She was soon called back to the
studio for a small part

in Dmytryk's 1959 remake
of The Blue Angel,

which starred Curt Jurgens
and May Britt.

We were cast in the remake of a
film called The Blue Angel.

I say remake because I'm old,
but I'm not that old.

You know, the original was
Marlene Dietrich.

Stella Stevens and Barbara
Luna were essentially

chorus girls behind May Britt
and Edward Dmytryk's remake

of Joseph von Sternberg's
The Blue Angel.

They met again on Synanon ,
Frank Tashlin's movie

and became friends for the
rest of their lives.

The system was very unkind.

They apparently, I would say
used the word force

for the lack of a better term
to work on films

that they did not want to be in.

Well, when I started
in business,

almost everybody who worked
was under contract

to one studio or another.

And, you know, nobody
made a lot of money

except maybe the big stars.

And even then they didn't
make a lot of money.

It was the studios
who made money.

You have a contract with them

and they're gonna try
to build you up

and put you in films.

And sometimes it works out and
sometimes it doesn't.

Despite appearing in two films,

Stella's contract at the studio
lasted only six months

and 20th Century Fox
did not renew her.

I worked for four months
on Say One For Me.

However, no one told me to
pick up a work card.

So apparently the studio never
knew that I worked.

So they dropped me.

So now Stella is entering a
tough part of her career

where the studio finds a clever
way to drop her contract.

She's fighting for custody
of her son, Andrew,

and money's tight.

So along comes Playboy,
offers her $5,000.

She doesn't think it's gonna
be that big of a deal

and she does it.

I was very new in Hollywood.

Had only been out
there six months.

And I had no money coming in

and I didn't know
anyone out there.

And I was offered a great deal
of money for doing it.

So I said, well, it's
a job, you know.

It's just like any other
kind of work.

When I did it, they
paid me half of the money.

And if I wanted the
other $2,500,

I would have to work as a
hostess for Playboy parties.

I said, shove it, I will not.

She did a lot of good movies
in the sixties

and she was actually one of
the most charming

of the leading lady comedians
out there.

Look what's happened
to Li'l Abner.

Paramount was producing a film
version of Li'l Abner.

Based on Al Capp's comic strip

and the hit Broadway musical
of the same name.

Stella auditioned for
the great role

of the vampish Appassionata
von Climax

and won it over a multitude
of other actresses.

Sensational Stella Stevens
as Appassionata von Climax,

General Bull Moose's
sexy secretary.

Does that mean you
get bed and board?

Extremely.

This was an enormous
coup for her.

And she was cast to
take over the role

that Tina Louise had
created on Broadway.

A parody of a sex symbol.

Fate intervened and
two significant things happened

in Stella's career.

One, ironically, she
won a Golden Globe

as new star of the year
for Say One for Me

for 20th Century Fox.

The studio that had just
dropped her contract.

And two, Paramount Pictures
signed her

to a seven year contract.

For me it all started when
I did Li'l Abner.

The head of publicity
at Paramount

basically made me a worldwide
sex symbol.

He had me doing a lot of
layouts with photographers,

indoors, outdoors,
here and there,

being seen in different places,

going to the best restaurants,

meeting wonderful actors
and directors.

Those were the golden
years of Hollywood.

It was a very exciting time.

Things were looking
up for the starlet

and Stella panicked about
the Playboy photos.

She tried to buy back
the pictures

and dissuade Playboy
from exploiting them

in connection with her
new movie role.

I called Hugh Hefner and
I said, I'm sorry,

I know I made a deal with
you to do a layout,

but I don't want to.

And he said, "Oh no, you have
a contract with us".

You have to do it.

I didn't have any options
at the time.

I would say for Stella,
you know,

in that era to do Playboy, to
then lead to movies,

that's how it went, you know.

Unfortunately for women
back in the day,

that's how you got the Hollywood
boys to notice you.

The photos became a
celebrated Playboy centerfold

and Stella was named Playmate
of the Month

for January 1960.

It was my decision
and mine alone.

Hollywood, November 18, 1961.

Paramount Pictures
calls a meeting

of its female contract players,

Stella Stevens and only Stella
Stevens shows up.

She's it, the only actress
the powerful studio

has under contract.

And the betting around town
is that Paramount

will build her into a star
of Marilyn Monroe

Elizabeth Taylor importance.

♪ I've entertained
Above the clouds ♪

♪ From Timbuktu to Rome ♪

♪ Guys who've seen me taking
Off ♪

♪ Don't wanna go home ♪

♪ So stand by for the greatest
Show you're ever gonna see ♪

♪ But even if it ain't I know
You won't walk out on me ♪

Stella was thrust into
the final years

of the golden age of Hollywood.

She became a bonafide starlet.

During the golden
age of Hollywood,

if you're a contract actor,

you were either filming
every day

or you were in the taking
stills every day.

You were promoting your movies.

You were promoting everybody
else's movies.

It was a complete
and total factory

and they made sure that their
contract players

and their stars worked
every single day

for the good of the studio.

Those battling her
for custody of her son in
Tennessee

believed that Hollywood was no
place to raise a child.

This belief was only
strengthened

after Stella's nude layout
appeared in Playboy.

When Stella and her
husband Herman

were going through
their divorce,

their son Andrew was caught
between two worlds

of Hollywood and Memphis,
Tennessee.

I was 16 when Andrew
was born

and when I went out to
Hollywood, I missed him so
much.

I saw a film in which Frank
Sinatra sang "High Hopes".

That inspired me to go back and
get my baby from Memphis

and bring him to California.

After the divorce, a very bitter
custody battle

erupted between Herman
and Stella.

Herman, supported
by his parents,

wanted Andrew to stay in
Memphis, Tennessee,

whereas Stella wanted
her son with her

in Los Angeles, California.

When I was very young, and
I know it's strange

because I have a distinct
memory of this,

I was at my mother's
parents' house

who were taking care
of me alternately

with my father's parents

and they said they had
a surprise for me

and they opened the door to
one of the bedrooms

and my mother walked out.

He was three and so to this day,

Andrew is scarred from that.

They took us to the airport,

put us on a late night flight
back to Los Angeles.

I'd never flown in
a plane before

and I later learned that my
mother had defied a court order

and had taken me out of state
without the court's permission.

But less than a year
later,

Andrew's father and grandfather
took a clandestine trip

to Beverly Hills to
kidnap Andrew back

and take him home to Memphis.

I'd been in Los Angeles
for a year or so

living with my mother and I
guess I was getting close

to around five years old

and my mother was getting ready

for a photo shoot or something

and I was outside at a rented
house on Benedict Canyon

riding my tricycle
in the driveway

and as I rounded the corner
from the garage,

I saw a blue station wagon
in the driveway

and I rode my tricycle
closer to it

and I saw my granddaddy
in the window

and I said, "Granddaddy," and
he got out of the car

and he hugged me and
I looked back

and there was a man at the front
door ringing the doorbell

and I said, "What was that?"

And he said, "That's
your daddy."

And my father saw me and
he ran to the car,

put me in the car and they
peeled out down Benedict Canyon

as my mother ran out of the
house screaming,

"Andy, Andy."

My ex-husband came and stole
my son from me,

charged me with contempt
of court

and took him back to
Memphis, lied to him

and said, "Your mother doesn't
want you anymore.

She's got too many boyfriends
in California.

We'll give you a motorcycle,
a pig, a dog, a bunny,

a cat, whatever.

We love you and your
mother doesn't."

Finally, when I went to court,

the bailiff thought
it would be a joke

to put the Playboy spread
under the glass

on the judge's desk.

During my mother and father's
custody battle,

my father's petition was more
for me to live with his parents

because he clearly
was not capable

of taking care of a child, but
they desperately wanted me

and Meme and Granddaddy and also
my mother's parents

were collectively like
my real parents.

It was settled by the
court

that Andrew would live in
Hollywood with his mom,

but would spend summers and
vacations with his dad.

However, presiding
judge, Greenfield Polk,

admonished Herman and
Stella saying,

"He is not your child and he
is not your child.

He is my child and a
ward of this court."

Just before I turned
six years old,

I learned that my mother had
won custody of me

and at my sixth birthday party,

with all my friends in
the neighborhood,

I had to say goodbye to everyone

because that night she took
me to the airport

and we were booked on
a red-eye flight

to go back to Los Angeles.

And I remember standing on the
tarmac, waiting for her,

and she was posing for pictures
with photographers

and I was saying, "Come
on, come on."

Stella's acting
career was really taking off

and in addition to the movies,

she was doing prestigious
and the top one-hour

television shows that
were on the air.

And at this time, it was every
network's dream

to have a movie star as a guest
star on a television show.

Stella appeared in the
anthology series

Alfred Hitchcock Presents
in early 1960

in an episode called
Craig's Will

co-starring Dick Van Dyke.

Tom, how much did he leave you?

One dollar.

One what?

I don't believe you.

But he wouldn't dare.

You're his only living relative.

This is almost, what did he do
with all that money?

Who did he leave it to?

His dog.

There were so many
well-crafted mini movies

in the early days of television.

When young, hopeful actors
on the way up

were able to work with
trusty veterans

from the golden days
of Hollywood.

I didn't know who Robert Altman
was at the time.

He had been working in
television in black and white

and his first big thing in
color was Bonanza.

I thought I'd bring it as long
as I was coming.

It's not much.

I was up for the role,
but everybody said, "No,

she'll never get that."

Here...

I went into the office
for the meeting

and they said, "Hello".

I said nothing.

They asked me how I was.

I said nothing.

I sat there silently.

They talked and they talked
and then they got it.

That I couldn't hear
them at all.

And I got the part that way
because I acted

as though I couldn't hear,
that I was deaf.

Don't worry, I'm not
gonna take it back.

Stella's performance in the
episode of Bonanza,

Silent Thunder was just
astonishingly good.

It was playing a deaf
and dumb girl.

This was their version of
The Miracle Worker

or Johnny Belinda.

And Robert Altman was simpatico
with Stella

and he saw the real gem of a
performance she was giving

and he let her run with it,
which was so wise.

And it's some of the absolute
best work she ever did.

A little known fact is that
Stella was also a member

of the Skip Jacks, a late 50s,
early 60s vocal quintet.

You've heard their work without
knowing it.

Since she
performed the theme song

for The Flintstones and The
Patty Duke Show.

But movies were
Stella's passion

and her theatrical film career
was starting to blossom.

And she's like the legit above
the title lead.

Under her new contract
at Paramount,

Stella was cast in the movie
originally titled Deadlock

but released as Man-Trap.

Nina, the character I
played in Man-Trap

made quite the impression
at the time.

She was the total
opposite of me.

I was an introverted, bookish
sort of person

who wanted to learn to become
a good writer

and here's this woman who
is a nymphomaniac

and the challenge really
intrigued me.

Some of the most fun
parts I've played

have been nymphomaniacs, but
it was very risky,

very taboo at the time.

I'll be ready for you in just a
minute.

I gotta go make myself look
pretty for you, don't I?

She sought to work on better
projects with top directors.

John Cassavetes cast her as
the female lead

in Too Late Blues.

Cassavetes was the consummate
maverick filmmaker

who delved into the psychology
of human relationships.

He did and so did I since I
started in theater.

Whoever told you that's
what you had to do

in order to reach somebody.

Are you kidding?

Just where do I stand without
my body, huh?

Tell me that.

The film showcased
her dramatic gifts

and starred pop singing
sensation Bobby Darin

in his first dramatic role.

The more glorious story is
when I'm standing

against a wall in another scene
and he walks over to me

and kisses me with this
passionate kiss.

Well, we kissed and kissed.

When he stood back, he had
an erection this big.

The guy on the catwalk
noticed it,

so everybody on set knew about
it after that.

Hollywood in the 1960s was
a different town.

It was a different era.

The casting couch was very real.

There was an entire town full of
early day Harvey Weinsteins.

Well, it's not only the
producers and the directors,

it's the agents and
the casting people

and the fellow actors
and the businessmen

and anybody who sees you and
knows that you're an actress,

I think.

Men ran the business and
men behaved badly.

There were many attempted rapes

if I would have meetings
with people

without having a chaperone
with me or something.

Now that I've gotten older, you
know, I'm over 30 now,

so people don't jump on me
like they used to,

but that was a big problem.

With her talent and
her career on the rise,

Stella was able to evade
the casting couch,

but her beauty attracted men
like moths to a flame.

Ms. Stevens is admired by Cary
Grant,

who saw her in the Paramount
Commissary one day

and insisted on having lunch
with her for the entire week.

I dated Cary a couple
of times and I loved him
dearly.

We never had an affair, but we
were great, great friends.

Actors are business, not
pleasure for me.

And there's very good reason.

Actors are selfish and so am I.

You have to be if you want to be
ambitious in this business.

Early on, she was lumped
into a situation

of sort of like after Marilyn
Monroe, after Jane Mansfield,

after Mamie Van Doren, but what
Stella Stevens had

in the sixties, she became a
really, really, really

good comedienne.

The studio sent
Stella a script to co-star

with another music singing
icon, Elvis Presley.

I started hearing Elvis music
at the drive-in diner

in Memphis called the
Jungle Garden.

I remember hearing
That's All Right

and Blue Moon of Kentucky.

He was great, an instant hit.

♪ Let it go ♪

I was still a baby, still young,
but I was old enough

to fight with the studio and
say, you're not gonna put me

in this piece of junk and
make me the girl

that Elvis Presley dumps
for another girl.

That's not what I had in
mind for my career.

If it isn't your boat, it's
girls. Girls, girls, girls!

And they promised that the
next film would be

with Montgomery Clift.

I finally said, "Yes, I'll do
the Elvis picture.

It's only six days work and
I'll forget about it".

Stella felt coerced
into joining the cast

of Girls, Girls, Girls!, and
the film she was promised

with Montgomery Clift
never materialized.

I was actually miserable
making that film

and that's the one film I've
done that I have never seen

in my life, nor will
I ever see it.

So I hesitate to talk about
it in that it was such

an unpleasant experience for me.

Why?

At how I was treated on the
film by the producer,

the director, the people who
decided how I would look

and what I would do.

At this point,
there's always been this idea

that Stella Stevens was the
most photographed woman

in the world and it was true.

The studios got behind her with
their publicity machine

and it was absolutely
incredible.

Photographed at premiers,
photographed on dates at
Ciro's,

photographed at home,

photographed wherever she went
and then in studio,

portraits for magazine
covers, ads,

sometimes endorsing other
people's movies,

it just never stopped.

They wanted Stella Stevens
to be a part

of the American movie
going consciousness

and there was no social media.

So the way it worked was to
get her on the cover

of all of the hundreds
of movie magazines

and there was Stella Stevens,
in some cases more so

than somebody like
Elizabeth Taylor.

It was Stella Stevens looking at
you from the magazine rack

and everybody was buying
those magazines.

When I was six years old and
my mother was shooting

The Courtship of
Eddie's Father,

I got to meet my childhood
hero, Ronny Howard,

who played Opie on The Andy
Griffith Show.

The Courtship of Eddie's
Father brings together

two of the most delightful fun
stars of recent years,

Stella Stevens and
Jerry Van Dyke.

All right, now move straight
forward from the hips.

See where my hips are?

Oh, I do, I do.

My favorite director
is Vincent Minnelli.

I believe he is the most
fabulous genius

I've ever worked with.

Vincent was the husband
of Judy Garland

and that's what impressed
me initially.

Then I learned of all the films
that he had done

and I thought, oh my
God, I'm so stupid.

I realized what a genius he
was.

So, Stella Stevens was the girl

in a whole bunch of
movies in the 60s

where she's supporting the
other big stars

or upcoming stars of the time,

whether it be Jerry Lewis,
whether it be Dean Martin,

whether it be Glenn Ford,
whether it be David McCallum.

When I was a young kid,
my parents took me

to the drive-in in
Sarasota, Florida

to see a movie called, The
Nutty Professor.

It starred Jerry Lewis and it
was like a Dr. Jekyll

and Mr. Hyde and I was a
monster movie fanatic.

Well, I came out of there being
a Stella Stevens fanatic.

There's never a dull
moment on the set

when Jerry Lewis is
making a film.

Jerry not only acts
in but also directs

his newest motion
picture in color.

Stella Stevens, Jerry's
leading lady,

gives him a knowing wink.

In The Nutty Professor, I
was scared to death

during filming.

I didn't know what to do.

I thought I had to be funny and
when I look back at it today,

I kind of cringe at a few
of the things I did.

I don't know any place.

In addition to his
other talents,

Jerry Lewis was an innovator,

the first actor director to
use video playback

to scrutinize his comic
performances

before printing a take.

Cut!

Because of my Catholic
grandmother,

my mother enrolled me in Beverly
Hills Catholic School

for the first and second
grades.

And about that time, my
mother's centerfold

in Playboy came out.

And I remember being
shamed by the nuns

and being told that my
mother was a whore

and a harlot was gonna
burn in hell.

And I was sent home crying.

So when my mother was doing
The Nutty Professor

with Jerry Lewis, she
told him the story

and all of the anguish I
was going through

at Catholic school.

And he said, "Get
him out of there.

Send him where my kids
go to school.

Black Fox Military Institute in
Hollywood, it's great".

So the following year,
I was enrolled

in an all boys private military
institute in Hollywood.

And I didn't have nuns shaming
me about my mother,

but I had grades 1 through 12
of horny boys masturbating

to pictures of my
mom in Playboy.

And actually I was in
Playboy magazine.

I was the January 1960 playmate
of the month.

And the preacher in the First
Baptist Church

in Memphis, Tennessee preached
a sermon against me,

setting me up as a young lady
who was typical

of all young women led astray by
the evils of Hollywood.

Would you advise other girls
to pose this way

to further their careers?

I don't like to give anybody
advice about anything.

I tell you, in a way it's
a help, I guess,

because it is some sort
of recognition.

But if one is an actress and
trying to convince people

that she can act as
I was trying to do,

then it can be a detriment
actually,

because nobody believes that
you can do anything

other than take your
clothes off.

So Stella and I had
a lot in common

because we both posed
for Playboy.

Now she did it in 1960s, so it
was even more scandalous.

I think that the Playboy thing
definitely prevented her

from getting roles in maybe a
lot of prestige movies.

She became labeled as
a sexpot,

a term she despised throughout
her career.

And one she believed stunted
her career-long,

deep-rooted ambition
to direct films.

All of a sudden I got
sidetracked into being a sexpot.

Once I was a pot, there was
nothing I could do.

There was nothing legitimate
I could do.

The thing is, it also
affected our jobs.

I was a makeup artist
for productions.

I worked for many big directors,
but I lost my job.

I worked for 10 years, and
when Google came out,

I lost my job because the
parents had no idea

that I had taken my clothes off.

Well, I think that every girl
that appeared on Playboy

took their chances of being
deemed sort of a sex goddess

or not to be taken seriously
as an actress.

People in this town just
couldn't get out of their minds

that she was Stella,
vah-vah-voom, and Playboy.

And she really was
more than that.

And she never had a problem
with nudity.

I don't think she saw what
the big deal was.

But trying to marry that with
being a respected actress

and artist I think proved
more difficult

than she thought it would be.

Are you the only
Playboy playmate

who has become successful,
is that true?

I don't really, I don't
really think so.

I can't think of
any others.

Well, actually, of course there
was Marilyn Monroe

and there was Jane Mansfield and
both of them are dead.

Yes, but both of
them had attained fame

when that happened, I believe,
hadn't they?

No, not really.

No, that was actually
the very beginning

of both of their careers.

Unfortunately, I'm the only one
still alive, I guess.

When Sesame Street first came
on the air in 1969,

I begged them to allow me to do
the alphabet or anything,

but they would not allow
me on the show.

I wasn't allowed to be featured
in certain magazines.

I was blackballed from anything
decent after Playboy.

Later that year,
Stella was loaned out to MGM

and again, starred opposite
Glenn Ford

in the Civil War comedy,
Advance to the Rear.

Another of my favorite
directors is George Marshall,

who directed Advance
to the Rear.

I worked with a lot
of good directors,

but he was a great
comedy director.

He could make anything funny.

After roles previously
promised to her

in Harlow, The
Carpetbaggers, and Sylvia

were given to a fellow studio
star, Carol Baker,

Stella requested an early
release from Paramount

and signed with Columbia
Pictures

for the remainder of the 1960s.

So then I went to Columbia
for five years

and did some good films.

Columbia was the last studio
I had a contract with.

Stella's first film at Columbia
was a gritty

and sincere drug addiction drama
called Synanon.

Joanie, doll face with a
deadly expensive appetite.

What are you, my nurse?

Nope, just another dope fiend.

Stella and I worked
together again

in a film called Synanon,

and it was very personal
for all of us.

When my mother was
working on Synanon,

she started hanging out with
a guy I thought

was the coolest guy
I'd ever met,

Alex Cord, who was her co-star.

She clearly was having
a relationship with Alex Cord.

They didn't flaunt
it on the set,

but you could tell by behavior,

by the way people talk
to each other,

you know, body positions
and so on,

that there was a spark there.

He was an ex-Rodeo
cowboy.

He'd been gored by a bull,

had this really gnarly scar
on his abdomen,

and he rode a Triumph 650
Bonneville motorcycle.

More and more, movies
were shooting on location

rather than on sets built
on a studio backlot

and filmed on significantly
longer shooting schedules

than films today, sometimes
for months.

This was the case for Stella's
next assignment

for Columbia Pictures, a dark
comedy shot in London

called The Secret
of My Success.

As Stella continued to work,

her son was raised more by his
housekeeper, Annabelle,

who lived at the Stevens house
during the week.

When Stella filmed The Secret
of My Success,

England was just too far to go

to visit during the school
year.

When I was 11 years old, I went
to school one day

and all the kids said,

"Did you see this new movie
called The Silencers?"

And I didn't think
anything of it

because I wasn't really
a Dean Martin fan.

He was an old fogey as far
as I was concerned.

But everybody said, "You gotta
see it, you gotta see it."

So I went to see
The Silencers.

Oh my God, Stella
is in this movie

and she is so funny,
but she is so sexy.

Now do I look like
an enemy agent?

I don't know, I haven't seen all
the latest models yet.

The Silencers was originally
going to be

a straight, dramatic, very
gritty espionage story,

just like Donald
Hamilton's book.

But then they decided
to make it a comedy

and they have Dean Martin

and they needed a comic
foil for him.

He wasn't going to
be the funny one,

it was going to be his partner.

And here comes Stella with
this delightful,

wonderful physical performance.

She's tripping over herself

and getting at all
kinds of problems

with machine guns and stuff

that Dean Martin has
to save her from.

And she is fantastic and
actually carries the movie.

She was ahead of her time

because she was able to combine
beauty with comedy

and also do physical
comedy as well too,

which back in the day,

they really didn't let women
be that funny.

You couldn't steal the scene
away from the man,

but she was clever enough to
work it in her own way.

The sex has always
been comedy sex

and I like the pacing of comedy

and I like the excitement of it.

And I love action, I love
physical comedy.

The movie that the
wild, more raunchy,

bodacious, stronger, slightly
more vulgar,

Stella Stevens started to
emerge

is in a really good action
movie

she did with Glenn Ford
called Rage.

She sparks incendiary
reactions in an all male world.

And even if you look at the
poster for Rage,

this wasn't just alluring and
she looked nice in her dress.

There's a sexual animalism,

which fits with the storyline
of that movie.

My role as Perla, the whore,
was a very good one.

She was the first whore I
played with a heart of gold

and that kind of stuck with me.

And she did that so well because
she had that angelic face,

that beautiful face, but she
could be ballsy, oh boy.

She could sock it to you
if she wanted to.

♪ Each new producer that you
Meet thinks he's a gem ♪

♪ They all want you to go and
Do the town with them ♪

♪ Remind them that the morning
Starts at 6 a.m. ♪

♪ When you're making movies ♪

Studios often teamed their young
contract players

with veteran movie stars.

You have starring roles in three
motion pictures now.

Tell us first about the
part that you play

in How to Save a Marriage.

Well, I played Dean
Martin's mistress.

What's he like to work with,
was that fun?

Oh, he's just great.

In 1967, Stella was
again cast opposite Dean
Martin,

only this time she shared above
the title billing

with him as well, along with
Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson.

The film was a romantic
comedy called

How to Save a Marriage and
Ruin Your Life.

It's called, How to Save a
Marriage and Ruin Your Life.

I always call it , How
to Commit Marriage.

Well, I don't know
why I bothered

to stay on as your mistress.

You are not my mistress,
it's over.

I sent you that note.

I am not a public utility, you
can turn off with a note.

How to Commit Marriage is a
really funny movie.

That's a really, really
good movie.

Oh, we
should say something.

Why is it the wrong men always
start conversations?

Not bad
looking, but I wouldn't leave
home for.

When he
leaves this elevator, you'll
never see him again.

You say something.

Pardon me.

Yes?

Do you have the time?

No.

It's 10 after five.

In that movie, she's just coming

from a very, very
innocent place.

And in most of her comedies,
she was coming

from a very innocent place.

In the 70s, she never played
innocent again.

Roger Ebert correctly identified

How to Save a Marriage and Ruin
Your Life as old-fashioned,

especially compared to smart,
contemporary comedies

like The Graduate.

It was a very cute movie.

The problem was, cute was over

by the time the film
was released.

So the romantic comedies with
all the sexual suggestiveness

of Doris Day and Rock Hudson or
Doris Day and James Garner

and those films, that
era was done.

So here comes this movie that
came along too late.

The world and Hollywood were
changing at warp speed.

Fueled by the war in Vietnam,
social and political mores

were rapidly changing
in the late 1960s.

And audience tastes
and expectations

in film were changing too.

1968 was like this watershed
year for the movies

because absolutely everything
changed.

The kind of sex you could
show on the screen,

violence you could show
on the screen.

So things like, The Graduate,
Bonnie and Clyde, Easy
Rider,

just about wiped away
old Hollywood.

And suddenly there
was new freedom

for this whole new wave
of filmmakers.

Old Hollywood had
died and with it,

the innocence of its movies.

In its place, stark and bold
films evolved,

which challenged and replaced
Old Hollywood.

Now Sol Madrid is
a very good film.

It's a really cool film.

And it starred David McCallum
at the height

of his almost rock star
pop idol fame.

Can't you ever be nice?

No.

Why not?

Stella's role in this film is
actually quite dramatic.

A small time crook steals
money from the mafia

and splits it with
his girlfriend.

They flee to Acapulco and
Stella's character

is taken captive by the cartel

and shot up with heroin till
she's turned into an addict.

I remember going to Mexico

and visiting the set
of Sol Madrid.

I think we're in Acapulco.

And for the first time,

I saw people openly
smoking marijuana.

Use of the drug
became widespread

in the upper middle class in
fashionable society

and particularly in the music
culture and in Hollywood

with actors and directors who
were revolutionizing

and abandoning the
old studio system.

Next up for Stella under her
Columbia Pictures contract

was Where Angels Go
Trouble Follows.

And she got to work with one
of her Hollywood idols.

Where Angels Go
Trouble Follows.

That was actually the first,

that was the first movie
I ever saw of her.

And I really liked that movie.

I thought that movie
was really cool.

The comedy pits an old school
mother superior

played by Rosalind Russell

against a modern thinking young
nun, Sister George,

played by Stella Stevens.

The film was a showcase for
me as Sister George

who literally looked
at the world

through rose colored glasses.

I thought it worked quite well

and Rosalind was funny
and wonderful,

a very giving actress.

You'll be flying high

on the wildest runaway
joy ride of all.

Fabled Hollywood
director Henry Hathaway said of
her,

Stella Stevens was born to
be in the movies

and to drive men crazy.

Henry Hathaway was prophetic

and Stella drew the attention
of a different type of suitor.

Of course Sidney Korshak

was one of the most powerful
men in Hollywood.

There's no question about it.

And he was from a
very early date.

While moguls, crime bosses,
law enforcement

and politicians have always been
visible to the world

and the press, Sidney Korshak
was a power broker

who was invisible.

Up until this time Korshak
was, you know,

he was anonymous.

Nobody knew who he was.

If there was ever
any problem with,

especially with organized
labor.

Korchak stepped in
and fixed things.

And he had the threat
of violence

from the Chicago mob
behind his words.

Revered and feared
throughout the industry.

And although married
with a family,

Korshak had a penchant for
beautiful actresses

and Stella Stevens had
caught his eye.

He pursued her relentlessly

and eventually they
began an affair.

Seems like I was always
with older men.

When I was 18.

Attracted to
power.

Attracted to success, yes.

And power.

I'm sure that Stella
was quite aware

that to get close to Sidney
Korshak was a dangerous thing.

The word was that
if Sidney Korshak

gave the word and said
that a studio head

was supposed to do something
or other,

that it was as good as
coming from Nitti

or Paul "The Waiter" Ricca or
any of the other mobsters in
Chicago

and that they were to do
whatever Sidney told them to do.

Everybody is familiar with
Sidney Korshak.

My goodness, that man
was notorious.

I mean, if you were in New
York or Las Vegas

or Los Angeles, no
matter, in Europe,

no matter where you went, this
man's name came up.

In the case of Stella,

she got tired after
a period of time

of being the other woman.

She didn't want to just
be a mistress.

She wanted a more solid
relationship

and she finally told him that
she'd had enough.

Around this time,
Stella became reacquainted

with a struggling actor
named Skip Ward.

Skip had worked in a small role
playing a football player

in the 1963 film, The
Nutty Professor.

So Stella finally ended things
with Sidney Korshak.

Which a lot of people thought

was a very dangerous
thing to do.

You don't tell Sidney that
your affections

are no longer called for.

On top of that, she moved Skip
Ward, her new boyfriend,

into our house on
Coldwater Canyon.

They were on for, I think,
several years, actually,

and I think Stella was quite
taken with Skip

because whenever we
saw them together,

they seemed to be very happy.

The final movie under
Stella's term contract

with Columbia Pictures was
The Mad Room,

which were shot in 1968 in
London and released in 1969.

Shelley was under
a lot of stress

when we were filming
The Mad Room.

Robert Kennedy had been shot
during production

and she had a very bad
reaction to it.

She had been soothing her nerves
with white wine

and shouldn't have been.

I swore I'd never work
with her again.

There was a male role
in The Mad Room,

that of Stella's fiance,

and she defiantly fought with
Columbia Pictures

to hire her boyfriend, Skip
Ward, to play that role.

She dug her heels in and she
fought harder and harder

and harder until finally the
studio just gave up

and relented.

I do believe that
Stella was told

in no uncertain terms by Sidney

that if she did, in fact, leave
him for Skip Ward,

that Skip Ward's days in
Hollywood were over

and that he would never work
in this town again.

He's my true love.

I have a perfect life with
the man I love.

I'm much happier than
I've ever been.

Skip was very low key.

So when I would hear things
about him being

part of the druggie world, same
thing with Stella,

it, that didn't sound
right to me.

That just sounded
like bad gossip.

I think as much as I wanted
to go back to Memphis,

Skip wanted to get me
out of the house

so that he and Stella could
party more and more blatantly.

They were trying to hide
it from me as a kid

and not doing a very
good job of it.

He got my mother to
agree to enroll me

in a Catholic boarding school
in Northern California.

I had a plan which was
to get to Memphis

for my summer vacation and
go see Judge Polk.

I was a ward of his court
and petition him

to allow me to dictate where
I wanted to live

and move back to Memphis.

I told Skip this.

He told my mother. She
got very upset.

When Andrew was 12, he came
back from Memphis

and said, "I hate you.

I hate California.

I hate the maid.

I hate your friends.

I hate my school.

I hate everything here."

I said, "Okay, tomorrow
you get on a plane

and you go back to Memphis."

We didn't see each other or
speak

for over four years after that.

So Stella's son is transferred

from an all-boys
military academy

to a co-ed public high school
in Memphis, Tennessee

in a poor section of town.

I walked around the
house like a ghost.

I couldn't go into his room,

but finally I got over
it, you know?

You get over anything.

I just kept doing
what I was doing.

When Stella was
offered The Ballad of Cable
Hogue,

Sam Peckinpah's reputation was
already growing and growing,

and The Wild Bunch had not
even been released yet,

and she wanted to have
that experience

with a really fine, rebellious
director.

I'm quite excited
about this film,

The Ballad of Cable Hogue,

because I feel it's the most
important film

and just the most exciting film

that I've ever been
in in my career.

This is the pioneer.

This is the man whose
faith, stamina,

and risk capital conquered
the frontier.

Why do you think
it's so important

over the other things
you've done, Stella?

Because it's a story
about true love,

and I think true love is the
most important thing

in the world, and it's a story
about two people

who find each other
and fall truly,

deeply in love with each other.

So she signs on for
The Ballad of Cable Hogue,

which became known by everyone
involved with it

as The Battle of Cable Hogue,

because they were shooting
in Echo Bay, Nevada,

which she fell in love with,

but the weather would
not cooperate,

and the shoot went on forever.

Cable Hogue says, "Do unto
others as you would have them.

Do unto you."

When the film was released,

and it was released after
The Wild Bunch,

and it did not do well,

but everyone lit up to Stella's
performance,

and they were like, "Wow, this
woman has been hindered

and kept down with all
of these movies

that she's been making
for these studios,"

and here she comes in
with this sweet,

glorious comic performance,

and it was like a revelation
to the reviewers,

and they were much more
interested in her

than they were in
the movie itself.

Stella Stevens has
blossomed into

quite a marvelous actress in
The Ballad of Cable Hogue.

There aren't many actresses who
could be both funny

and feminine at the same time,
but she is one of them.

When Peckinpah was brought
on to The Getaway,

Steve McQueen was
already attached,

and so the big question was,
who's gonna play Carol?

When I finally said, "Okay, yes,
if she comes back,

I will play Hildy in The Ballad
of Cable Hogue,

but you must promise me and
your hand on it

that we will do another
picture together.

You have to give me
another film."

And she kind of thinks it like
a little clear that,

okay, I did Cable Hogue for
not that much money for you,

so I expect another movie,

a bigger movie in
return for this.

But, you know, if I do
this for you, Sam,

then you're gonna have to
do something for me.

Peckinpah's choice was
Stella Stevens,

because he thought, one, she was
perfect for the character.

She's from the South, and he
also thought that she,

and he also loved
working with her.

When the picture came
up, I met with Sam,

and yet, when Steve McQueen
and I sat in a booth

at lunch together,
he said to me,

"I have to tell you one thing.

I consider you competition."

And I knew I wasn't gonna get
the picture, and I didn't.

I actually think Steve is an
honestly refreshing

selfish movie star.

He's like, "Wait a minute, this
is my fucking movie?

Everybody's gonna go see it
because I'm in it?

I make this whole, this movie's
for my company,

and I'm gonna spend six months
making this movie

so Stella Stevens can get
an Oscar nomination?

Fuck that shit."

The next feature film
for Stella was 1971's

A Town Called Bastard , also
known as A Town Called Hell.

Stella was second billed above
the title with Robert Shaw,

along with Telly Savalas
and Martin Landau.

The blonde one, they
call the witch,

and she is Stella Stevens.

I complained bitterly to my
agent saying, "What is this?"

He said, "It's filler,
it pays your rent,

just don't talk about it."

I guess I had to learn to
look at it that way.

After that, she said, "Gosh,
no more bad movies

if I could help it.

I don't wanna just
go into something

and then have it flaunted if
it's lousy like this."

And so she began doing more
and more television,

and it was good television.

Growing up in the 70s,

I realized that there were
two Stella Stevens,

especially as far as her being
a leading lady.

There was the 60s
Stella Stevens,

which was the blonde bombshell

that had overtones
of Marilyn Monroe.

But the Stella Stevens
I grew up with,

the Stella Stevens that I
knew was the 70s.

Stella Stevens, when I thought
of Stella Stevens,

that's who I thought of.

She was tough, she was strong,

she was sexy and sexual and not
in a coquettish way.

I have to make a living,

but most people who
make a living

don't see their work exposed on
the screen to the public.

Sometimes it can
be a lot of fun,

the playing and the acting,
but it's work.

In those days, it
was a bigger deal

when film stars appeared
on television.

Excuse me, baby,

but can you direct me to the
little red school house?

♪ Nothing's wrong in doing the
Charleston, Charleston ♪

♪ I want to be a vamp ♪

♪ I want to draw the men to me
Like bees to honey ♪

One of the shows that
she appeared in

was the William Castle
anthology series, Ghost
Story,

was hosted by Sebastian Cabot.

And it was, in fact, the last
time she really used

her influence to get
someone hired.

And in this case, it was her
boyfriend, Skip Ward.

Take two of these, man.

They'll solve your problems.

Guaranteed to give you fast
relief from headache pain.

You don't want a headache,
do you, man?

So come on, take a couple.

After that, she and
Skip Ward broke up

and she kicked him out of their
Coldwater Canyon house.

One day, his clothes
were out on the lawn

of the house on Coldwater
Canyon.

That made my eyes pop.

Wow, you're tough
to be with.

You're saying the
last, then he--

Well, I would say every
relationship lasted

about a year and a half.

And after that, it sort
of petered out.

Why is that,
Stella?

Busy?

It would just be that people
grow and they grow apart.

Stella's breakup with Skip Ward
was devastating for her

because she had discovered that
he had been cheating on her

while she was away on location.

And she felt betrayed, but
also felt foolish

and wanted just to get away
from Hollywood

and the machine and the gossip
and all the bad things

that went with working in the
movies at that time.

So she decided to retreat
to Echo Bay, Nevada,

which she had fallen
in love with

while making The Ballad
of Cable Hogue

for the glorious desert
solitude and the beauty there.

And so that she could
practice other art,

including painting,
photography.

And while she was there,

she also wanted to experiment
with psychedelics.

I think when my mother realized

that the only man she
ever really loved

and gave her heart
to after my father

had cheated on her and lied
to her and used her,

it just sent her into an
emotional spiral.

I guess they had a
row of some kind

and that was the end of them.

I was either a sophomore or a
junior in high school.

And I got a call from a close
friend of my mother's

who asked me if I might consider
talking to my mother

and maybe meeting her somewhere
to try and reconcile.

And I was very reluctant.

We had a whole new life.

I was playing in a rock
and roll band.

I had a girlfriend.

I just, I didn't see the point

in opening that whole
can of worms again.

But both of my grandmothers
were very supportive

of me reconciling with my mom.

So I did it.

Aspiring to tackle
roles that elevate the status
of women,

Stella burned her bra in the
first film about women's lib,

Stand Up and Be Counted.

She invited me to come to
St. Louis, Missouri

to the press junket premiere

of the first women's liberation
film called

Stand Up and Be Counted

that she starred in with
Jacqueline Bisset.

I met her in St. Louis

and we actually had a
very pleasant time.

We stayed away from
touchy topics.

Yeah, now all of a sudden women
are burning their brassieres

and they're standing
up for their rights

and okay, we want to
be independent.

That's terrific.

That's wonderful.

I know that my grandmother
fought for what she believed in.

She really paved the
way for women

and women in the film industry
and she was a bad ass.

After a period of
reflection and healing,

she was offered a film role
to co-star opposite

ex Cleveland Browns football
star, Jim Brown.

Jim Brown is Slaughter.

I think Slaughter was a really
is a magnificent action movie

and she is fantastic in it.

Stella Stevens is the
girl.

Are you disappointed?

No.

That's good.

To my health.

You want him, don't you?

Yes.

Yes, I want him!

Slaughter was a smash hit with
the black audience

and that gave her a tremendous
amount of fans

amongst black males.

I think in Slaughter,

that was probably one of the
sexiest roles I played,

but it was not a very popular
picture for me

and I don't think they have
played it very much on
television

- because there was a very
explicit love scene in it
- Right.

between me and Jim Brown.

Jim Brown is fantastic
in Slaughter.

He's just as strong
an embodiment

of king of cool masculinity
as McQueen is

in The Getaway.

So if you ask me, she didn't
suffer at all.

Stella had her share of
controversies in her career.

She did one of the first
interracial love scenes

with Jim Brown, which
unfortunately,

she didn't have a problem
with doing.

She thought it was great.

I mean, I don't think I would
have had a problem

doing a love scene
with Jim Brown.

She just dives in and
grabs hold of that material

with her teeth and she is great
playing opposite him.

She holds her own and
she is fantastic.

Unfortunately, she
was shunned for it

not only by her community,
but by her family.

And that takes a brave
woman to say,

"No, I'm going to
do the love scene

and I'm going to be
very proud of it."

At the screening of
the film,

a man in the theater
in Memphis stood up

and screamed at me, "You slut",
and walked out of the theater.

But later in the
year, Stella's fortunes
changed.

When she was cast in Irwin
Allen's hugely successful

disaster film blockbuster, The
Poseidon Adventure.

I was very proud I was
in that picture.

We spent 14 weeks working on it.

Everybody knew how good it
was going to be.

The Poseidon Adventure is an
imaginative melodrama

chronicling the struggle
of 10 passengers

to save themselves after an
ocean liner capsizes

when struck by a mammoth
tidal wave.

And there is Stella arguing
with her cop husband,

Ernie Borgnine.

She used to be a hooker
and she's the one

who's in control
of the marriage.

He's busting balls with
everybody through the entire
movie

and she busts his balls.

And she is terrific.

She's also the comedy relief
of that movie,

which was no easy task, but
she was up for it.

But I remember when
I was a little kid,

the moment when she actually
thinks he might've died

and then he's okay, and then
she yells at him

for scaring her, and then
I actually realized

that she actually
cared about him,

that it actually made me
feel pretty good.

But you know, when
I read the script,

I said, "The fat lady's gonna
get a nomination."

And sure enough, she did, she
did, she saved everybody.

I want you to give this to
our little grandson.

Why, I'm going somewhere
you are not going?

When they told me Shelley
Winters was doing the film,

I said I was not gonna do it.

Then they said I wouldn't have
to be in any scenes

with her one-on-one.

So I broke my vow and agreed to
do the film with her.

Poseidon Adventure was
nominated for eight Academy
Awards

and as Stella had predicted
Shelley Winters was nominated

for Best Supporting Actress.

The film has become a cult
classic because people loved it

and saw it so many times they
knew it by heart.

And it was still good
again and again.

Poseidon Adventure,
we thought,

oh, that'll give her a boost.

But when you're in a
film where the film

is really the star,
you know, I mean,

you had Shelley Winters and
you had all those

wonderfully talented actors, but
the film was the star.

So I don't think anybody really
got enormous recognition.

I was disillusioned
early by thinking

that I was gonna find great
stardom in one project.

Everybody kept saying, "one
picture is all you need

and that'll put you over the
top", but that's not true.

After Poseidon, there was
not a big uptick

in movie roles in
big productions,

but there was a lot of
opportunity for Stella

with independent producers.

I think that I am still
just starting out

and I hope I'll be
discovered soon.

35-year-old actresses
couldn't sustain

the career longevity
that they can today.

In her film career, an A-list
movies began to flounder.

So she turned more and more
to television.

Along with all the TV
movies, she guessed it on,

you know, all these TV shows.

No, yeah, you know, so Stella
Stevens with Banaceck,

with George Peppard's
Banaceck.

But if Stella Stevens was the
star of a Police Story,

no, it was about Stella
Stevens.

She was the female cop.

She wasn't the female dealing
with the male cop.

no, the episode was about her.

With fewer studio
offers, she was forced to take
on

caricature-ish roles in more
low-budget, independent films.

So these movies, Stella's
name was important,

not only for box office, but
it was important

that she be in these films
because very often

she was the one person
in the cast

who was really bringing
the goods.

Stella Stevens had a magnificent
career in the 70s

and did a ton of really
good stuff.

And by the way, if you like
Stella Stevens

and you get her resume and then
just start going down

in the 70s, you watched this TV
movie, you watched Arnold,

you watch any episode of any of
the shows she guest starred,

she's kicking ass
on those shows.

She's terrific.

When Stella's son, Andrew, was
a senior in high school,

he had been studying acting and
now he had been involved

with district, regional, and
statewide acting competitions

and had won every single one.

He did study very hard.

I don't know how much
I had an influence

in helping him in his career.

If I could have been of help, I
would gladly have done so,

but I never physically went out
of my way to do that.

Andrew did it on his own.

In a field that his mother
had warned him,

would either drive you crazy
or break your heart.

I graduated high school in 1973

and my mom asked me to come
visit her in Los Angeles

before I went away to college,
which I did.

And I went with some friends
to a party one night

and I met a man I had
no idea who he was.

The agent that Andrew
met was none other

than super agent Dick Clayton,

who'd represented everyone from
James Dean to Farrah Fawcett

and Jane Fonda to Harrison Ford.

Even the number one box office
star at that time,

Burt Reynolds.

So based on Dick Clayton telling
me if I stayed in LA

that he would put me
to work as an actor,

I moved to Los Angeles instead
of going away

to college in Florida.

Andrew always wanted his mail to
be able to come to him

saying "Andrew Stevens
Hollywood."

And so I expected all of this.

And when it finally came to be,

it was something that had
been inevitable.

So my name is Steven Seligman

and I am the trustee and
executor of Stella's estate.

She had a home in Beverly
Hills that was empty

most of the year.

So we made an arrangement for
me to be her tenant

and caretaker, which became a
lifelong relationship.

My mother smoked a lot of pot.

So she decided to grow
a lot of pot.

She was going to plant the
entire hillside

with buckets of marijuana so we
could move them around

and make sure that they got
plenty of sunshine.

And that was the beginning
of several years

of growing marijuana.

So then Stella finds a new
chapter for herself,

which makes her very popular in
the African-American community.

She does Cleopatra Jones
Casino of Gold.

And she's got some great fight
scenes in that.

And next thing you know,
she's very popular

with the brothers
and the sisters.

And at the very top of
this pyramid of blood

and dope and sin and gold,

the most evil woman
in the world,

the Empress of Pride.

It makes no difference
to me how you die.

The picture shot in
Hong Kong.

So it was nice to go there for
a couple of weeks.

I played the dragon lady and I
got to fight six foot Tamara

Dobson to the death.

But now she's met her
match and more

in six feet two of dynamite.

Stella retreated from Hollywood
once again

and bought a ranch in
Washington state

near the Cascade Mountains

and then opened an art gallery
and a bakery

in the small town of Twisp.

The film community believed she
was abandoning Hollywood

and retiring from the screen.

Well, it had nothing
to do with retiring.

Instead she was regrouping,

getting in touch with
the real world.

In Washington, I had
human contact

for the first time in
nine or 10 years.

There's a joke that
California people

don't know their neighbors.

I didn't know my neighbors.

I had no friends except those
I worked with,

those who told me to
keep my mouth shut,

to be careful and
not say anything

or my jobs would be
taken away from me.

Someone would go and rip it
all out from under me.

Eventually Stella
met a local man

in the small Washington
community

and they started a very normal
relationship.

In the days when I was
looking for a man,

I was looking for
a sense of humor,

someone that I could talk with
and exchange ideas with.

She also moved her
mother's brother,

whom she called uncle Mutt,

up to Washington to caretake

and help her with the ranch
and the animals,

two llamas and quarter horses

that she would trail ride
for hours at a time.

All right, Frank.

Crank.

Cranking.

We're going to make pictures.

Stella had hopes of
re-elevating her film career

and she received
an offer to join

the all-star cast
of Nickelodeon

directed by Peter Bogdanovich.

Cut.

That's it.

Nickelodeon was
his Valentine to

the glory days of Hollywood

with an all-star cast led
by Ryan O'Neill,

Burt Reynolds, Tatum
O'Neill, John Ritter

and Stella among others.

It was also not a great time
for Peter Bogdanovich

who told me that he had
horrendous battles with the
studio

because he demanded
a bigger salary

than Burt Reynolds
and Ryan O'Neill

and because they wouldn't
let him have

Cybill Shepherd in the film.

And he was just plagued

with nothing but financial
disasters

So unfortunately what
should have been

this wonderful boon for Stella
did not happen

because the movie bombed.

As her sex symbol
days were waning,

Stella's ambition was to
become a director.

But female directors were few
and far between at that time.

Her relentless attempts
at getting support

from industry executives
led nowhere.

I think one of the biggest
disappointments for Stella

was that she wasn't able to
fulfill her career dream.

She wanted to direct.

She wanted to produce.

But back in those days, the
studios didn't give

leading ladies an opportunity to
go into another chapter.

Stella had always expressed
the desire to direct

and she had discussed it with
agents, managers

and whatever and offered
her services

and no one was picking up on it.

I've had years of time when
I did not work a lot

and I have had one of the
hardest struggles

of anyone I've known to try to
go from acting to directing.

Because of starting out a sex
pot, a sex symbol,

Right.

this has been a detriment in
trying to have people

take me seriously as a director.

But I find that those clouds
are going away now.

I directed, I financed and I
starred in as the interviewer.

I was on the other side of the
camera as I am from you

in a film called The
American Heroine

which is about contemporary
heroic American heroines.

Women who are considered the
heroines of their communities

and of all who know them.

Stella worked
prolifically in episodic
television,

television movies and pilots
for The Love Boat

and Hart to Hart
demonstrating her range

from comedy to drama.

I had an agent who was very
strong in television

but I didn't do a lot of feature
films during this period.

As she matured, Stella played
a brothel owner

in the prime time soap opera
Flamingo Road

which ran for two seasons
in the early 80s.

I'm playing Morgan Fairchild's
illegitimate mother,

unbeknownst to her adopted
mother Barbara Rush

on Flamingo Road.

When I played a madam, the moral
majority got all upset.

They wrote letters to NBC and
the next year I was an ex-madam

and there were no girls around
and the show was cleaned up.

Her views of sex,
sexuality and genders

were far ahead of their time.

I've always been a rebel
about censorship.

I don't think children should
be able to see

the horrible things
that they do.

I don't think lovemaking
on soap operas

is as bad for children
as seeing killings

and murders and slashings.

Stella is one of those women who
I think people look to,

you know, someone who did speak
out but of course,

it had to be extremely difficult
back then.

They still say that there
are only two sexes

when there are definitely
more than two sexes

and to say that some sexes are
good and some sexes are bad,

it's just preposterous.

To bring that up, you know,
for her, you know,

it could have ruined her career
but she didn't care,

you know, she had a mission and
she said what was on her mind

and then she stood by it.

Definitely ahead of her
time in the 70s,

like to speak out
for gays, I mean,

you could get blacklisted
for speaking out

for both for racism and for gays

and she was brave to do both.

Stella was linked
in gossip pages

with many men over the years,

yet remained unmarried
throughout her adult life

and Hollywood career.

She did, however, in 1983,

start a relationship with
guitarist Bob Kulick.

formerly with Meatloaf's band.

After a little over a year,

she repeated her
familiar pattern

and moved Bob into her Beverly
Hills home.

Bob was a Jewish,
crazy musician

who loved to play music
and loved Stella.

How were they together?

He's a musician, he's a rocker

and there was a kind of a,

is the word juxtaposition?

But they went they went together

for a very, very long time.

And somehow it worked.

We've been together, it'll be
four years in Thanksgiving,

so it's a long time.

She basically, well, she
basically supported him

because he didn't have,

he couldn't have supported
himself in the lifestyle

that he was in.

When things were good with them,

they were really good and when
things were bad,

oof, you know, the roof
could blow off.

She was tough as hell.

She wasn't, she wasn't some
little, you know,

fainting, fainting little
girl, you know,

she was definitely tough and
she spoke her mind

and sometimes to her detriment,

but she definitely
spoke her mind.

In overview, I do feel here
are two really

incredibly gifted,
talented people

who really did love
what they did

and were great at it,

who I don't think got some
of the bigger picture

where you fit in in life

and how can you both
love each other

in a healthy manner.

During the 1980s, she
continued to work regularly,

guest starring on many
hit TV series

and 1983 was a prolific
year for her,

if not the quality film career
she had had in the 1960s.

Now we're talking about
a 20 year career

that extended into the 80s.

It extended longer than that,

but I'm talking about
where it's like,

where she's still 100%
Stella Stevens.

A general public misnomer
is that actors

make a fortune from residuals.

That's far from true.

Residuals generate a pittance
for most actors

who routinely receive checks
for less than $50

per rerun of the
film or TV show,

sometimes even less than $1.

In order to continue to survive
financially,

she took roles as cameos on
television shows.

So I may not be as successful
financially as some people

and I may not have as much
power as some people,

but I have a lot of happiness.

In 1989, Stella
finally realized her career
long dream

and was hired to direct her
very first film,

ironically titled The Ranch.

I went up to Canada and did a
film called The Ranch

and Andrew in it takes
the lead role,

which is a comedy role.

The Ranch was a low budget
independent comedy,

shot entirely in Calgary,
Alberta, Canada,

during a writers and director's
strike in the US.

Nobody in town was working

and I'd been offered a stage
play in Calgary, Alberta, Canada

and I was up doing the Ellie
Greenwich musical,

Leader of the Pack

and a woman came up to me after
the show one night

and she introduced herself.

She said she was a producer and
she had a comedy film

that she was intending to
shoot in Calgary

and she wanted me to play
the lead in the film

and she wanted my mother
to direct it.

Did you tell him if he didn't
play the scene

the way you wanted him to,
that he was grounded?

No, I didn't resort to
that,

but I actually did pick up
a buggy whip one day

when everybody was trying to
tell me how to direct.

I said, there are too many
directors on this set

and I sent a wrangler
for a buggy whip

and walked around for
a couple hours.

Stella commented that
Andrew seldom

got to do comedy roles,

much less the sort of
slapstick comedy

that she put him through.

In fact, he called
one of his scenes

a Jerry Lewis type scene

and he is not known
for his comedy,

but I enjoyed working with
him in that genre.

- Did he listen to
you?
- He did actually very much

and I think we grew closer

from the experience of
working together.

She really made this opportunity
happen for herself,

but after The Ranch, which
was a comedy,

chances for her to direct
another movie

just were not forthcoming.

I've gone into despair
many times

and the only thing that
has kept me going

has been working as an actor.

She always went full
force

in every one of these
independent movies,

which she could have very
easily blown off,

but she refused to.

Her ethic would not
let her do it.

I realized how shallow
the business is

and when I got to
be 45 years old,

I didn't think anybody would
ever hire me again.

So now when they hire me,

it's just gravy on a wonderful
career I already have.

If the idea of being an actress
is to work, she worked.

She worked a lot.

The enormous growth of home
video in the 1980s

created a market
for fresh titles

that people could rent or buy

once they'd seen the movies
they already knew about.

This led to a boom in
production of quickie films

that made an equally
quick profit.

So long as there was at least
one recognizable star

in the cast.

Andrew directed Stella in his
directorial debut,

The Terror Within 2.

And Andrew, of course,
is your son

who we had on recently,
Andrew Stevens.

Oh, I understand you did, yes.

Talented actor, director, producer.

Yes, he's going to direct
his first movie

and I'm going to be in it.

How neat.

Yes.

What's it gonna be called?

It's going to be called The
Terror Within 2,

which is a sequel to a film
he did last year

called The Terror Within,

and it's for Roger Corman.

But Andrew has written
the script

and is directing it
and starring in it.

Why don't you go get some sleep?

I'll stand watch down
here for a while.

You know I can't sleep
without you.

It's the first time a mother
has directed her son

in the first film she directed

and her son has directed
his mother

in the first film he directed.

It was a major breakthrough
in our relationship.

As his career took off,

Andrew would go on
to hire his mother

in 11 films and television shows
over the coming years.

Stella was so busy
in 90s television.

I mean, it was just incredible,

just going from show to show
to show to show,

but also independent producers
came to Stella

over and over and over again
and she wanted to work.

And the opportunity to work
just was never ending.

You're doing a soap opera.

You're on Santa Barbara now.

It's amazing, yes I am
on Santa Barbara.

And how many people in a career
can work for 30 years

and find something totally new?

She came on to the soap operas

and she worked on General
Hospital

and she was a true professional,

even though it was
a different medium

because it was three cameras and
it was live kind of.

And she took right to it and
everybody that worked with her,

I asked them about it and they
have very fond memories

because she was very
professional and was very good.

The difference in daytime,

strangely enough it scared me
to death to begin with

and now I think I'm
thriving on it.

In 1998, Stella sold her
ranch in Washington

and moved her quarter horses
down to the San Fernando Valley

where she could groom them
and take care of them

and ride them at her leisure.

You know, it's kind
of interesting.

I think Bob rose to the occasion

because when Stella brought the
horses to Los Angeles,

for some unknown reason,

Bob just loved going out to
be with the horses

and be with Stella.

Bob had said to me, at some
point in time,

I think I might've said
something about her repeating
things

and him saying, "Oh, well, she
just always does that.

She forgets things, that's
just who she is,

but she'll remember the
important things".

But I didn't believe that.

In 2005, I moved my family from
Los Angeles to Texas

to raise my kids in a different
environment.

And there was some discussion
with Bob,

some of Stella's friends
and some relatives,

that my grandmother's great
aunt and her mother

both had early onset dementia

and both later succumbed from
Alzheimer's disease.

And there was some conjecture
that potentially my mother

might have a propensity
for the illness.

Despite memory
issues,

Stella continued to work in
independent film.

It was back to the
direct-to-video market movies.

And she continued along
those lines.

I worked with Stella
one more time

on a movie called
The Glass Trap,

which was about giant ants

invading a high-rise
office building.

She was already entering into
some kind of memory loss.

You know how you can tell when
you talk to somebody

that they kind of know you,
but they don't?

I remember picking her up
for lunch one day

and she opened the
door and she said,

"Oh, did we have plans?"

And I had spoken to her about
an hour before that

to remind her that
I was on my way.

And so it got to be pretty clear

that this was something
more serious.

In 2006, Stella
appeared in the Crying Game
episode

of the series Twenty
Good Years.

Twenty Good Years starred John
Lithgow and Jeffrey Tambor.

Stella's guest star appearance

would be her television
swan song.

I want everyone to hear what
I'm about to say

to this beautiful woman.

Oh, Henry, you're being silly.

50 years ago, you married a
skinny, love-struck boy.

Well, I'm not so skinny now, but
I'm even more love-struck.

So I want to ask you something.

Martha, will you marry me again

and make me happy for
the next 50 years?

Of course I will.

You sweet, wonderful man.

Mm.

Man, I'm glad that's over with.

After five years of
no work as an actress

and now struggling with
severe dementia,

Stella somehow managed to work

on the low-budget sci-fi
comedy, Megaconda.

She had aged noticeably
in the years

since I'd seen her
on Glass Trap.

And she had a very difficult
time getting through the role

to the point that we laid the
script on the bar

and she would hold her
head in her hands

and just look down
and see the line

and she would come back up and
she would do the line.

And we got through it and
everybody was very
understanding,

but it seems to me at that time

that we kind of hit the end of
what she was able to do.

Unfortunately, dementia just
sucks the life force

out of somebody.

After Megaconda, I don't
believe Stella

ever worked again.

As far as I know, that was the
end of her acting days

and maybe it was for the best

considering the struggles
that she had.

As my mother's disease
progressed,

I was living in Texas, had Bob
and a very close-knit group

of friends and caretakers
were very hands-on

with my mother and made sure
that she was well taken care of,

particularly when
Bob was working.

It was hard for Bob
to handle that

because all of a sudden
her partner

was turning into a father figure

and she's turning into a child

and he was not a patient
father figure.

Bob and I started speaking
on a regular basis

and it became more apparent
that we really needed

to collaborate on
putting my mother

into a good memory care facility

because it became untenable both
practically and financially

for her to remain at home.

Stella was a wanderer,

so periodically she would go out
onto Coldwater Canyon

where she lived and would wander
away from the home.

I think it was the firemen
on Coldwater Canyon

found her and brought her
after she'd fallen

and she was bruised on her
whole left side,

her face and everything
was bruised.

But that was the kind of thing
that they were trying to
prevent,

was her doing those
kinds of things.

You know, we tried
to keep her busy

and we tried to keep her mind
off what was happening

because those are
the tough times

when dementia is in its
early-ish stages

and the poor person knows that
something's wrong.

After moving into the
care facility,

my mother's cognitive abilities
continued to decline.

She can no longer take
care of herself.

She had no memory of having a
son or grandchildren.

She had no recognition
of her friends.

Occasionally there'd be a spark
of a vague familiarity,

but she ultimately lost language
and lost the ability to speak.

The very last time I saw her
at an autograph show,

she really did not
know who I was

and that was really kind of sad.

That was sad.

Even though everyone was very
patient with her,

but I think it was extremely
hard for my brother,

who again just saw her as a
strong, domineering woman,

turn into a child and it had
to break his heart.

I was seriously concerned about
the handling of the money by
Bob.

Out of the blue, I got a call
from Steven Seligman,

whom I hadn't spoken
to in years.

He told me that Bob had
moved to Las Vegas

and was stepping down as the
trustee of my mother's estate

and as her primary caregiver

and that he was turning
everything over to Steven,

who was the second named
successor to be trustee.

I told Steven that I would, of
course, help in any way possible
with the transition

and the next day I got another
call from Steven,

who said that Bob had
mysteriously passed away.

It seemed like, because of
Stella's condition,

that she would pass
sooner than Bob,

the situation being Bob passed
before her and it was a shock.

We all knew what happened
to Bob, really.

It was not put out, what Bob...
what happened to Bob.

His cause of death
was not released.

But there was no question in any
of our minds what had really
happened.

Remarkably, Stella
sustained a career

that spanned over six
decades,

starring in over 60 films and
hundreds

of hours of television.

But her greater contribution
was as a proponent

for equality and human rights.

All in all, I've had an
excellent adventure in my life.

If there's anything that I stand
for, it's peace and harmony

and trying to make the most of
every moment of our lives.

I believe that love
can conquer hate.

I saw Bob Hope at 83 cracking
jokes and having fun.

I said then that I never
wanted to quit.

I wanted to be like this man.
I want to go on forever.

I want to die on a movie set.

She has a career to be admired

and that there's damn few
actresses

that can say that they
had the career and

the impact and just the
consistent good work

that Stella Stevens did.

Stella recently passed away and

we don't know whether or not it
was the timeline,

but her passing wasn't
recognized at the Oscars.

In last night's Oscar telecast,

film stars Paul Servino, Tom
Sizemore,

Anne Heche and Stella Stevens

were among those whom the
Motion Picture Academy

of Arts and Sciences failed to
honor in its In Memoriam
segment.

More than an iconic movie star,
Stevens,

who passed away on
February 17th,

was a staunch advocate for
women's rights

decades before
the Me Too movement.

She was very outspoken against
racism in an era of segregation

and a champion for human rights
and people of all sexual
identities.

Her contribution to cinema,
however, was often underrated

and sadly she never received

her star on the Hollywood Walk
of Fame.

After a long battle with
Alzheimer's disease,

Stella Stevens has died.

She was 84 years old.

Two, ten, six.

Speed.

All right, action...

Professor?

Yeah.

Go.

Are you all right, Professor?

Go ahead.

Are you all right, Professor?

Well, I have these hemorrhoids
that happened today.

Oh, you need a shave.

All right, cut.

♪ Stella means celestial star ♪

♪ Che bella, the loveliest by
Far ♪

♪ The moon and the stars give
Their heavenly light, ♪

♪ But none in the firmament
Shine as bright as Stella ♪

♪ Stella, her star with its
Glow burning white ♪

♪ None in the heavens are
Shining as bright tonight ♪