A Child Is Waiting
Encyclopedia
A Child Is Waiting is a 1963 American drama film written by Abby Mann
and directed by John Cassavetes
. Burt Lancaster
portrays the director of a state institution for mentally handicapped
and emotionally disturbed children, and Judy Garland
is a new teacher who challenges his methods.
Dr. Clark finds him and brings him back the following morning, and Jean offers to resign. Clark asks her to stay and continue her rehearsals for the Thanksgiving pageant. On the day of the show, Reuben's father Ted arrives, having decided to enroll him in a private school. When he hears Reuben recite a poem and positively react to the audience's applause, he decides to leave him in the care of Jean, who is asked to welcome a new boy to the institution by Dr. Clark.
modeled the film's school on the Vineland Training School
in New Jersey
. He wanted to bring the plight of mentally and emotionally disturbed children to the movie-going public and try "to throw a spotlight on a dark-ages type of social thinking which has tried to relegate the subject of retardation to a place under the rocks." He wanted to cast Burt Lancaster because the actor had a troubled child of his own. Ingrid Bergman
, Katharine Hepburn
, and Elizabeth Taylor
were considered for the role of Jean Hansen, which went to Judy Garland, who previously had worked with Lancaster and Kramer on the 1961 film Judgment at Nuremberg
. She was experiencing severe personal problems at the time and the director felt a supportive work environment would help her get through them.
When original director Jack Clayton
was forced to withdraw due to a scheduling problem, he was replaced by John Cassavetes, was still under contract to Paramount Pictures
, on the recommendation of screenwriter Abby Mann. Cassavetes was fond of improvisation
and his approach to filmmaking clashed with those of Kramer and the leading players.
Most of the students in the film were portrayed by actual mentally-challenged children from Pacific State Hospital in Pomona, California
. After the film's release, Kramer recalled, "They surprised us every day in reaction and what they did." Lancaster said, "We have to ad-lib around the periphery of a scene and I have to attune and adjust myself to the unexpected things they do. But they are much better than child actors for the parts. They have certain gestures that are characteristic, very difficult for even an experienced actor."
Problems arose between Kramer and Cassavetes during post-production. Editor Gene Fowler, Jr. recalled, "It was a fight of technique. Stanley is a more traditional picture-maker, and Cassavetes was, I guess, called Nouvelle Vague. He was trying some things, which frankly I disagreed with, and I thought he was hurting the picture by blunting the so-called message with technique." Cassavetes felt his personal feelings about the subject matter added to the disagreements between himself and Kramer, who eventually fired the director. In a later interview, Cassavetes said, "The difference in the two versions is that Stanley's picture said that retarded children belong in institutions and the picture I shot said retarded children are better in their own way than supposedly healthy adults. The philosophy of his film was that retarded children are separate and alone and therefore should be in institutions with others of their kind. My film said that retarded children could be anywhere, any time, and that the problem is that we're a bunch of dopes, that it's our problem more than the kids'. The point of the original picture that we made was that there was no fault, that there was nothing wrong with these children except that their mentality was lower."
Cassavetes disowned the film, although following its release he said, "I didn't think his film - and that's what I consider it to be, his film - was so bad, just a lot more sentimental than mine." Kramer observed, "My dream was to jump the barrier of ordinary objection to the subject matter into an area in which the treatment of it and the performance of it would be so exquisite that it would transcend all that. Somewhere we failed."
[(Keith and Kerry Simon)] .... Ruben as an infant
said, "Don't go to see it expecting to be agreeably entertained or, for that matter, really uplifted by examples of man's nobility. The drama of social service, written by Abby Mann to convey a general illustration of the philosophy and kind of work done in modern institutions for retarded children, is presented in such conventional terms that it has no more impact or validity than an average television-doctor show... Miss Garland's misty-eyed compassion and Mr. Lancaster's crisp authority as the all-seeing, all-knowing doctor who patiently runs the home are of a standard dramatic order. Gena Rowlands and Steven Hill are a bit more erratic and thus convincing as the highly emotional parents of the boy. But top honors go to Bruce Ritchey, who plays the latter role, and to the group of actual retarded children who appear uninhibitedly in this film. To them and to John Cassavetes, who directed them with notable control... we must be thankful that what might have been harrowing and even distasteful beyond words to behold comes out as a forthright, moving documentation of most unfortunate but hopeful youngsters in a school. From the graphic accounts of how their teachers treat them and train them, how the rule of firm, realistic and unemotional discipline is preserved, and from the simplifications of theory that appear in the dialogue, one should learn a great deal from this picture – all of which should be helpful and give hope."
Variety
called the film "a poignant, provocative, revealing dramatization" and added, "Burt Lancaster delivers a firm, sincere, persuasive and unaffected performance as the professionally objective but understanding psychologist who heads the institution. Judy Garland gives a sympathetic portrayal of an overly involved teacher who comes to see the error of her obsession with the plight of one child."
Time Out London said, "Cassavetes elicits magnificent performances from his cast, making especially fine use of Garland's tremulous emotionalism, although the occasional drifts into didacticism
... entail the sort of special pleading Cassavetes was keen to avoid. Flawed but fascinating."
Abby Mann
Abby Mann was an American film writer and producer.-Life and career:Born as Abraham Goodman in Philadelphia, he grew up in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was best known for his work on controversial subjects and social drama...
and directed by John Cassavetes
John Cassavetes
John Nicholas Cassavetes was an American actor, screenwriter and filmmaker. He acted in many Hollywood films, notably Rosemary's Baby and The Dirty Dozen...
. Burt Lancaster
Burt Lancaster
Burton Stephen "Burt" Lancaster was an American film actor noted for his athletic physique and distinctive smile...
portrays the director of a state institution for mentally handicapped
Mental retardation
Mental retardation is a generalized disorder appearing before adulthood, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning and deficits in two or more adaptive behaviors...
and emotionally disturbed children, and Judy Garland
Judy Garland
Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
is a new teacher who challenges his methods.
Plot
Jean Hansen, a former music teacher, joins the staff of the Crawthorne State Mental Hospital and immediately clashes with the director, Dr. Matthew Clark, about his strict training methods. She becomes emotionally involved with 12-year-old Reuben Widdicombe, and is certain his attitude will improve if he is reunited with the divorced parents who abandoned him. She sends for Mrs. Widdicombe, who agrees with the doctor's opinion that it would be best if Reuben doesn't see her, but as she leave the grounds, her son sees her and chases her car. Distraught, he runs away from the school.Dr. Clark finds him and brings him back the following morning, and Jean offers to resign. Clark asks her to stay and continue her rehearsals for the Thanksgiving pageant. On the day of the show, Reuben's father Ted arrives, having decided to enroll him in a private school. When he hears Reuben recite a poem and positively react to the audience's applause, he decides to leave him in the care of Jean, who is asked to welcome a new boy to the institution by Dr. Clark.
Production
Producer Stanley KramerStanley Kramer
Stanley Earl Kramer was an American film director and producer. Kramer was responsible for some of Hollywood's most famous "message" movies...
modeled the film's school on the Vineland Training School
Vineland Training School
The Vineland Training School is a non-profit organization in Vineland, New Jersey with the mission of educating the developmentally disabled so they can live independently. It has been a leader in research and testing....
in New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
. He wanted to bring the plight of mentally and emotionally disturbed children to the movie-going public and try "to throw a spotlight on a dark-ages type of social thinking which has tried to relegate the subject of retardation to a place under the rocks." He wanted to cast Burt Lancaster because the actor had a troubled child of his own. Ingrid Bergman
Ingrid Bergman
Ingrid Bergman was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films. She won three Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, and the Tony Award for Best Actress. She is ranked as the fourth greatest female star of American cinema of all time by the American Film Institute...
, Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, stage, and television. In a career that spanned 62 years as a leading lady, she was best known for playing strong-willed, sophisticated women in both dramas and comedies...
, and Elizabeth Taylor
Elizabeth Taylor
Dame Elizabeth Rosemond "Liz" Taylor, DBE was a British-American actress. From her early years as a child star with MGM, she became one of the great screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age...
were considered for the role of Jean Hansen, which went to Judy Garland, who previously had worked with Lancaster and Kramer on the 1961 film Judgment at Nuremberg
Judgment at Nuremberg
Judgment at Nuremberg is a 1961 American drama film dealing with the Holocaust and the Post-World War II Nuremberg Trials. It was written by Abby Mann, directed by Stanley Kramer, and starred Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Maximilian Schell, Werner Klemperer, Marlene Dietrich, Judy...
. She was experiencing severe personal problems at the time and the director felt a supportive work environment would help her get through them.
When original director Jack Clayton
Jack Clayton
Jack Clayton was a British film director who specialised in bringing literary works to the screen.-Career:A native of East Sussex, Clayton started his career as a child actor on the 1929 film Dark Red Roses...
was forced to withdraw due to a scheduling problem, he was replaced by John Cassavetes, was still under contract to Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
, on the recommendation of screenwriter Abby Mann. Cassavetes was fond of improvisation
Improvisation
Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...
and his approach to filmmaking clashed with those of Kramer and the leading players.
Most of the students in the film were portrayed by actual mentally-challenged children from Pacific State Hospital in Pomona, California
Pomona, California
-2010:The 2010 United States Census reported that Pomona had a population of 149,058, a slight decline from the 2000 census population. The population density was 6,491.2 people per square mile...
. After the film's release, Kramer recalled, "They surprised us every day in reaction and what they did." Lancaster said, "We have to ad-lib around the periphery of a scene and I have to attune and adjust myself to the unexpected things they do. But they are much better than child actors for the parts. They have certain gestures that are characteristic, very difficult for even an experienced actor."
Problems arose between Kramer and Cassavetes during post-production. Editor Gene Fowler, Jr. recalled, "It was a fight of technique. Stanley is a more traditional picture-maker, and Cassavetes was, I guess, called Nouvelle Vague. He was trying some things, which frankly I disagreed with, and I thought he was hurting the picture by blunting the so-called message with technique." Cassavetes felt his personal feelings about the subject matter added to the disagreements between himself and Kramer, who eventually fired the director. In a later interview, Cassavetes said, "The difference in the two versions is that Stanley's picture said that retarded children belong in institutions and the picture I shot said retarded children are better in their own way than supposedly healthy adults. The philosophy of his film was that retarded children are separate and alone and therefore should be in institutions with others of their kind. My film said that retarded children could be anywhere, any time, and that the problem is that we're a bunch of dopes, that it's our problem more than the kids'. The point of the original picture that we made was that there was no fault, that there was nothing wrong with these children except that their mentality was lower."
Cassavetes disowned the film, although following its release he said, "I didn't think his film - and that's what I consider it to be, his film - was so bad, just a lot more sentimental than mine." Kramer observed, "My dream was to jump the barrier of ordinary objection to the subject matter into an area in which the treatment of it and the performance of it would be so exquisite that it would transcend all that. Somewhere we failed."
Cast
- Burt LancasterBurt LancasterBurton Stephen "Burt" Lancaster was an American film actor noted for his athletic physique and distinctive smile...
..... Dr. Matthew Clark - Judy GarlandJudy GarlandJudy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
..... Jean Hansen - Gena RowlandsGena RowlandsGena Rowlands is an American actress of film, stage and television. The four-time Emmy and two-time Golden Globe winner is best known for her collaborations with her actor-director husband John Cassavetes in ten films, in two of which, Gloria and A Woman Under the Influence, she gave Academy...
..... Sophie Widdicombe Benham - Steven HillSteven HillSteven Hill is an American film and television actor. His two better-known roles are District Attorney Adam Schiff on the NBC TV drama series Law & Order, whom he portrayed for ten seasons , and Dan Briggs, the original team leader of the Impossible Missions Force on CBS's television series...
..... Ted Widdicombe - Lawrence TierneyLawrence TierneyLawrence Tierney was an American actor, known for his many screen portrayals of mobsters and hardened criminals, which mirrored his own frequent brushes with the law....
..... Douglas Benham - Bruce Ritchey ..... Reuben Widdicombe
- John MarleyJohn MarleyJohn Marley was an American actor who was known for his role as Phil Cavalleri in Love Story and as Jack Woltz— the defiant film mogul who awakens to find the severed head of his prized horse in his bed—in The Godfather...
..... Holland - Elizabeth WilsonElizabeth WilsonElizabeth Welter Wilson is an American actress. She was elected to the Theatre Hall of Fame in 2007.-Life and career:Wilson was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the daughter of Marie Ethel and Henry Dunning Wilson, who was an insurance agent...
..... Miss Fogarty - Barbara Pepper ..... Miss Brown
[(Keith and Kerry Simon)] .... Ruben as an infant
Critical reception
In his review in the New York Times, Bosley CrowtherBosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
said, "Don't go to see it expecting to be agreeably entertained or, for that matter, really uplifted by examples of man's nobility. The drama of social service, written by Abby Mann to convey a general illustration of the philosophy and kind of work done in modern institutions for retarded children, is presented in such conventional terms that it has no more impact or validity than an average television-doctor show... Miss Garland's misty-eyed compassion and Mr. Lancaster's crisp authority as the all-seeing, all-knowing doctor who patiently runs the home are of a standard dramatic order. Gena Rowlands and Steven Hill are a bit more erratic and thus convincing as the highly emotional parents of the boy. But top honors go to Bruce Ritchey, who plays the latter role, and to the group of actual retarded children who appear uninhibitedly in this film. To them and to John Cassavetes, who directed them with notable control... we must be thankful that what might have been harrowing and even distasteful beyond words to behold comes out as a forthright, moving documentation of most unfortunate but hopeful youngsters in a school. From the graphic accounts of how their teachers treat them and train them, how the rule of firm, realistic and unemotional discipline is preserved, and from the simplifications of theory that appear in the dialogue, one should learn a great deal from this picture – all of which should be helpful and give hope."
Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
called the film "a poignant, provocative, revealing dramatization" and added, "Burt Lancaster delivers a firm, sincere, persuasive and unaffected performance as the professionally objective but understanding psychologist who heads the institution. Judy Garland gives a sympathetic portrayal of an overly involved teacher who comes to see the error of her obsession with the plight of one child."
Time Out London said, "Cassavetes elicits magnificent performances from his cast, making especially fine use of Garland's tremulous emotionalism, although the occasional drifts into didacticism
Didacticism
Didacticism is an artistic philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature and other types of art. The term has its origin in the Ancient Greek word διδακτικός , "related to education/teaching." Originally, signifying learning in a fascinating and intriguing...
... entail the sort of special pleading Cassavetes was keen to avoid. Flawed but fascinating."