​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
​​​​​​​

Ginger's Susan Hayward Message Board: To reach If You Knew Susie by Trish Sharp, click the profile photo at www.facebook.com/susanhaywardclassicfilmstar and you will see the link.

Ginger's Susan Hayward Message Board
Start a New Topic 
Author
Comment
Explanation, please...

Okay,all you Susie fans, maybe you can figure this one out. I've been watching "Stolen Hours" and can't understand the scene in which John Carmody asks Laura to marry him, and she says that she "can't make any guarantees about my future."

Considering that this scene is BEFORE she read her file in his office and discovered she was going to die within a year, why would she have said that?

Answers, anyone? It's been bugging me.

Re: Explanation, please...

Ah the anguish - Gloria, although I have a copy here of "I Thank a Fool" the other film from the early 60's that was shot in the U.K. - I don't have "Stolen Hours" and have not watched it for years.

However - as I am unable to NOT buy into a Susan discussion, I will venture a thought, but realistically, leave the probable answer to someone with more recent knowledge.

Perhaps she still had some lingering feelings for her racing driver, (Mike, I think his character was named ?)or failing that, her lifestyle up until then which had not delivered "true love" had left her, as a mature woman, slightly chary of total committment ?

Only other maybe I can dredge up - is that although she did not know that she had only a year or so to live when he proposed, possibly, the recent operation had left her with - for the first time - a realisation of the fragility and uncertainity of life ??

One thing I do recall reading way back, was that a scene where Chubby Checker teaches her character the twist was edited out, and I never knew why. Certainly it would have provided a rare moment of levity in a film that was extremely solemn.

Anyway - over to the Hayward aficionados.

Kerry

Re: Explanation, please...

Gloria,

I have also wondered about this scene and as you say, this comes just before Laura discovers her file and the truth about her health. I think maybe it was said in a light-hearted way though as she wasn't too sure regarding the idea of marriage throughout the discussion.

I thought Susan and Michael Craig were really good together and absolutely love the film particularly the scenes filmed in Cornwall with Susan's hair being tousled in the wind instead of perfectly set indoors.

There was a really unnerving dignity the way she portrayed her final scenes and I can't even think of the way this prophesied her demise in real life without getting emotional. Enough said ... a really great film in all respects but it would have been even nicer to have been able to see her "Twist" as mentioned by Kerry and also to see other scenes which were cut out. (I have a couple of clippings of Susan in a dress which wasn't even seen in the film).

Trish

Re: Re: Explanation, please...

Hi,Kerry and Trish;

First off, Kerry, for someone who hasn't seen the film in years, you remember quite a lot about it! (Much more than I had till seeing it lo these many years later!)

Like you, Trish, it was difficult to watch it again knowing how Susan died. And I agree with you that her scenes as she died were amazingly portrayed, with dignity, as opposed to histrionics.

Kerry, I think Trish and I discussed the absence of the Chubby Checker scene before and Trish thought it was because it would have dated the film as the '60s. But, as I said to her, it was already dated by something Susan said in the hospital room as she tried on the post-surgery wigs; i.e, "This really is the new frontier." That was a theme John Kennedy used during his 1960 campaign for president. (Naturally, that would have been known only to Americans, I think.)

Trish, I completely agree that those Cornwall outdoor scenes with Susan's hair being tousled were great, and that she and Craig were good together. But my favorite scenes in Cornwall were with that adorable boy, especially when he comes to get the doctor because his mother came home drunk!

Kerry, if you can, try to get this film. Yes, it's hard watching it knowing how Susan herself died, but it was also a worthwhile movie.