How did Shirley MacLaine and Anne Bancroft get along on The Turning Point?

The girl who played Shirley's dancer daughter was UGLY. Didn't realize Tom Skerrit was once kind of hot.

My brother and I would play The Turning Point by tossing drinks in each other's faces.

Shirley hardly mentioned Anne when she discussed ‘The Turning Point’ in one of her memoirs. She did make one sort of rude comment that Anne was basically playing herself.

I think she was probably just jealous that Anne got to choose her role first and is generally considered the standout actress of the film.

If there was any drama, I would guess it came from Shirley. Bancroft is one of those performers you seldom hear anything negative about, with the exception of Frank Langella’s portrayal of her as a vain hothead in ‘Dropped Names.’

MacLaine is a bitch who nobody llikes to be around...

In a bio of Bancroft, Maclaine is quoted as saying she found her a little aloof, and that Bancroft surprised her (and the director) when she threw a drink in her face during the bar scene. Apparently, Bancroft decided on her own to do that to provoke Maclaine's genuine surprise. Before the filming of the big fight scene, Maclaine said they talked it over and Bancroft told her not to hold back, even though she was bigger, so Maclaine fought her hard and said Bancroft was a lot stronger than she looked. When that scene wrapped, Maclaine said they said goodbye and the shoot was over. They weren't friendly, but they were both focussed on making the film work.

R5, thank you for sharing.

I love that it was Annie’s idea to throw the drink in Shirley’s face.

I tell this story a lot on DL so excuse me but it is my big brush with celebrity.

I sat next to MacLaine once on a plane and she was very chatty. I was in college and told her that I was taking film electives and had just had a religions of the East class so I knew about chakras which she talked about in her books and his a video demonstrating. I think I won her over since let her tell me a lot of her new age beliefs and advice me of thinks I should do. (meditate, make a plan on my birthday every year and at the moment of my birth time wise release only positive energy into the universe at that moment and then your wishes will come true.....)

Then I started asking about her films. I looked up the year she won the Oscar online and we discussed the other nominees. (She felt all the actresses she won against were very good and laughed at how Streep never goes wrong. I didn't dare ask about Winger. She also told me that this was the year Yentl got overlooked but she wasn't surprised at that because she felt Streisand just made too many enemies when she first started making films and they didn't like to vote for her.)

Steel Magnolias she said was a lot of fun and said Sally Field was the hardest working actor she ever worked with. She said Field would do all her scenes full out even when she wasn't on camera (including the funeral scene) which she said most people don't do. They get lazy when it comes to the takes they aren't on screen.

That was the best flight I ever took!!

You know that Shirley got the film of Two for the Seesaw which Anne did on Broadway, so I don't imagine it was very hard to act envy.

It is hard to find this movie. Is it available anywhere you know of?

r9 it's odd that such an acclaimed movie (at the time) is now hard to find. Out of print on DVD and not available on Blu-ray.

r9 I just watched it yesterday, it had to be on Showtime or HBO because those are my pay channels.

Shirley's not much of an actress, though she's always thought she was great. She's OK in light comedy.

Anne’s so painfully skinny in this movie. Although I guess she always was. How much did she smoke?

And yes Skerrit was hot.

[quote]I think I won her over since I let her tell me a lot of her new age beliefs and advice of things I should do. (meditate, make a plan on my birthday every year and at the moment of my birth time wise release only positive energy into the universe at that moment and then your wishes will come true.....)

I did that on every one of my birthdays growing up, but my wish for a mother never came true. I guess my mother's positive energy was greater than mine, rendering her wish that she didn't have to be my mother more worthy of being granted.

"Anne’s so painfully skinny in this movie."

She played an aging ballerina. They're supposed to be painfully skinny.

R15 well MacLaine actually was a dancer IRL and she’s never been as skinny as a lot of these other actresses.

Bancroft didn’t exactly have a ballerina’s body, she just looked like an emaciated middle aged actress.