The Waltons - After They Were Famous

the fact that when I die probably they will say good night john-boy is something that I just won't have to worry about when that day comes real I the chemistry we had as a group created that kind of intangible magic that just there was a charm to the show you had to grow up on a show I would pick the Waltons hands-down every time we just clicked immediately it was really remarkable it was like we've known each other all our lives there is no doubt about it we are real family with all of its dysfunction and joy and humor and kooky stories Hey Liberty came here everybody is here thirty years ago America gave birth to a TV dynasty whose decency virtue and fresh cheek fellowship captivated a cynical world meet the Waltons seven kids their mom dad and grandparents living a god-fearing good life on the side of Walton's mountain our mountain in winter is something to see times it is just like a person to me giant and wide all covered with snow it changes each day as the heavy winds blow somebody in TV Guide did write The Waltons was the program we all tuned in to to feel bad about our childhoods you know and it's true you know it people would turn it on and go oh my god I can't believe what a horrible childhood I have or they would turn it on and go this couldn't possibly exist nobody's like this The Waltons first ambled cheerily through a blizzard and into our lives in the winter of 1971 with a Christmas TV special the homecoming Oh we're running a Christmas john-boy tonight at midnight my grandpa raised the church veil grandpa says midnight on Christmas Eve cows eat on their knees and pray you believe that john-boy never you wonder I didn't find out gonna come up here night Keep Watch I'm coming with Mary on me to meet ray and you better ask your mama before you go prowling around a slice of midnight how'd you like to bump into Santa Claus America's heart had never been so relentlessly warmed as by the septet of wholesome country kids they didn't know it but once the series was launched in the autumn of 1972 john-boy JimBob Elizabeth Mary Ellen Ben Jason and Erin were destined to grow up together my dad always described it as buying your first ticket to the Irish sweepstakes and winning because the homecoming was my very very first audition and then from that came you know 10 years later I'm still doing this television series so it was a wild ride by the time we finished filming the homecoming I was very attached to these people so I was I was really excited to be able to do the series because it meant that we were all going to be together again young boy about you saying a prayer the family that prays together stays together and the Waltons did for nine years over two hundred episodes and several thousand portions of vittles what's really magical about the show are those characters and those people in that time and that family in that house relating to each other and the Waltons came along during the Vietnam War and in America it was a very tough time there was a lot of discord so I think one of the reasons the show is so successful and still is is because it brought a sense of unity the perfect bond for a troubled nation the Waltons weekly helpings of truth justice mom's apple pie became America's staple diet we are going to keep on trying to strengthen the American family to make American families a lot more like the Waltons and a lot less like The Simpsons people forget when they about the walls there was nothing else like it on the air it was the age of you know super cop super lawyers wonderful doctors this was a show about a poor rural large family growing up in the American depression this show went against type it's become an iconic thing but there were no shows out there about the lives of poor people nobody wanted to be about you know think about people who were darning their socks but darn it people did and the show's homespun philosophy struck a chord with the American people when I was growing up during the Depression I lived with my redheaded brothers and sisters my parents and grandparents at the foot of a mountain which had been in our family for generations that resonant voice heard in every episode belonged to Earl Hamner creator of The Waltons he was the real John Boy and the show grew out of memories of his own childhood in this house in Virginia we had incredibly lovely reviews but eight in each review they said this is too nice it it won't last one said this show is so beautiful it has to die but we didn't the show's foundations in fact went deeper than just Earl Hamner childhood it through also upon the real personalities of its seven young actors Eric Scott played Ben he was 13 years old when the series started because there was so many kids and there was just really so many characters it was the first time there was I think 11 regular cast members that they were putting onto a series I don't think that the producers had as much opportunity to develop the characters with the kids as well as they could have so I think they took some of our strengths on our real life and they started putting that on the script and in that showed during the graduation ceremony when we Martin I don't want you all to start laughing and giggling I mean it's not gonna bother me it'll probably hurt miss hunters feelings all right okay I'll try not to try hard but you look so funny okay you know I was very brash at 21 I mean I'm very full of myself very self-absorbed and crusading young accurate must have been just eating john-boy it was hard to take Richard Thomas must have been very very hard to take a lot of his more infuriating characteristics would be what I would relate to me I want john-boy to you know have sex I don't know whatever was john-boy needed to have and you know there'd be well not yet it's not time or this you know they they were they wanted to move the show in certain ways we wanted to move in certain ways and we always worked it out but it isn't good wait till GW sees this there was a lot of similarities at that point in time between me personally and and the character because I was a real tomboy growing up where that sort of divided a bit was that Mary Ellen wasn't afraid of like getting into trouble or or anything like that and I was always kind of like I didn't really want to be I didn't really want to be getting in trouble at least I didn't want to be caught getting in trouble youngest of the clan was Elizabeth played by six year old Cammy Cutler as far as awareness of what was coming over on the screen most of it was totally lost on me and it never occurred to me that this was like a big elaborate production with with people who were you know spending money and I needed to help it to go along because that never even crossed my mind it was just we were playing pretend and the fast you got it right happier everybody was there was a very special relationship between john-boy and Elizabeth first of all Kenny was the most beautiful child you can't I mean she was exquisite but there's something wonderful about the oldest and the youngest we had really sweet scenes to unit the one that I really remember is um one where I guess he's putting Elizabeth to bed and I had my braids in and he undoes my braids and he recites a poem to me and I remember that I remember how nice it felt to have someone undo my braids I'd remember how beautifully he said the poem and just being kind of mesmerised a Maranatha sweep and fair ah braid no more that shining here as my curious hand or eye hovering round thee let it fly for ten-year-old David Harper plain JimBob was not so much a job as a dream to get to his own personal amusement park the childhood of The Waltons was great because having a movie studio as a playground is like the ultimate fantasy me and Cammie used to play Bonnie and Clyde we would sit in the old sheriff's cart which had the old running boards and the covered fenders so what we weren't doing anything we would get in there and be in our own little world you know it was a lot of fun for the two of us especially when we go off and play Bonnie and Clyde and come back into our scene and like is it over yet we got to go we got a bank to go from with me at the beginning it was David and me together all the time and we played hard because we were encouraged to play hard and they wanted to speak grubby they wanted us to have worn in clothes you know so the Wardrobe people the makeup people never said oh no dear it's not mess up it was like go off on the set we would just joke around constantly and even as the cameras were rolling up until they would say action we were goofing around and telling jokes and then we'd go right into the scene so it had that that energy flow all the time somebody's awesome giggle water we were always sending ourselves up sending up the Waltons you know making jokes about it we had to at least to have nicknames for all of our selves would think Ben was bent Mary Ellen was Harry Mellon I think mine was Han JA for some something really risque like that we were really bad but we had to be we were being the nicest family in America taking them home no not Virginia but to the Californian mountains of Fraser National Park away from the Los Angeles Studios happy childhood hours were spent filming in these hills and 30 years old it's a sentimental journey back to Walton's mountain when this life is over - Oh God - let your show remember this you guys use this barn for the pond right is this where you stole the past yeah okay so like you know they have the actors on the other side of the fence and we you know selling him the cat yeah isn't it great though let me get all them rash now but let me just the shade Michael look hi doctor present and the bed I'll grow into it where I remember us Oh the two that I do remember is her yeah I'm Mary how you doing I'm Eric Eric I remember you too I think he's here one time right over here too yeah and I know you was yeah cuz you swing on the gate grandpa used to swing on the gate oh wow yeah good memory today when we get together there's a lot of energy and a synergy between us because no one no one can know what we all went through working together I was with all of them more than I was with my own family I only got to know my own brothers and sisters um a lot better after the show and then shake so much me so there was rarely a crossword Shay Walton for the walton sisterhood differences of age and disputes about beauty could prove as difficult off screen as on when I grew up I'm gonna marry which men have not the baby's not gonna have any babies would he get a ham Elizabeth puppy I was really a lot longer than everyone and I got everything the youngest get I got spoiled and carried around and made a pet and you know sitting in everyone's lap and being the cutest and I got teased and excluded all of it I guess as Judy was the oldest and she was the tomboy which made her like I'm smart and then Cammie was the youngest so that made her cute so they had to give me some title so people would come to me and say you know like it was a secret and it was a covert negative bad thing and don't tell anybody and don't tell anyone I said this to you but I think that you're the pretty one Mary was beautiful I mean also admired her because she was older and stuff but she was also officially beautiful so there was a lot of that yeah sure I was jealous of Mary she was really pretty I was just some kid you know Erin you look like a ban eat chicken strutting around most the comments that I got on the show were always about being you know like good solid farm girl and stuff which I absolutely hated you I always wanted to be the pretty one and and Mary's character was always the pretty one and I always always said the tomboy was just fine cuz I really was but you know as a teenager you know that was kind of tough oh I don't care if a person has just one nice thing of ruin to wear I don't believe it's wrong to take pleasure in it I kissed and cried a lot that's what Aaron did the show I kissed and cried a lot and ran up the stairs and slammed doors that seemed to be what I did the most that's part of that pretty thing you have to be dumped in love and they called it poppy haha oh I guess they'll never know as the Waltons pinup marry score dates with teenybopper leif Garrett happy days star Scott Baio and even turned her back on a young George Clooney but she preferred to keep her real-life love's well apart from her TV family my first love I never even brought to meet anybody for a long time because it's it's a tough family yes it is a tough gig going in sure is pretty up here there's not a good idea miles to have this picnic three decades on and the tablecloth and Scotch eggs are laid out again as the Walton kids get back on familiar ground that first summer before the show premiere we were wondering with the theme songs so I think probably Richards ideas and it'll be done to the wall brothers and sisters they may have been on screen but they have a venture behind paws woodshed for just a little bit of well hanky-panky we were either kids or adolescents going through that difficult time you know hormones raging so I know there was a time when when I had a kind of a crush on Judy and apparently she did too on me but we didn't know it so you know you kind of go later you go oh if I'd only known at one point I had will crush on Eric at one point I had a little crush on John and I will crush on Richard but David was way too young you know was her kissing go I'll sure I think I think that all of us were doing a little kissing along the way a little bit of kissing not you know that's about it but if you had hundred thousand dollars just for yourself let's say you couldn't spin up anybody else he'd lose it what would you do with it oh I wouldn't know where to begin would it begin weird we're just playing a little game as to what we do if we suddenly got rich hi candy everyone told us if you did a hundred episodes you were set for life well here it is we were doing over 200 shows we did over I think over 225 shows so I thought I had my entire life set up for two times it wasn't like it is now I mean now kids do shows and they never have to work again well they sell it to us to people set them to us you know they said that after the first hundred show they said you're never going okay you know the house we grew up when it cost us $15,000 and I was doing that every week um pretty amazing the numbers and stuff that we were that we were seeing I was driving my Alfa Romeo convertible I had the clothes I remember dry you know flying to Hawaii for weekends so life was good had a good time you were earning money in your you know six seven eight now what do you do buy extra bubblegum there's nothing to spend it on until you turn spitless if your parents aren't spending it and that's the big if am i was lucky cuz oh my my mom's dad with an accountant and she did a beautiful job managing my money so I was very very lucky for me because I was older I basically started supporting my family from the time I started working because my mother then wasn't working because she was taking me to work and my father was sort of out of the picture and he decided he decided since I was working he shouldn't have to pay child support so so it was pretty much you know so I started basically supporting the family so I wasn't as silly in a position to be tucking it all the way neatly grandpa and chose Wow thoughts of the now grown-up Walton kids turn to picnics past and the Walton grownups Mar par and the grandparents soft hearted but occasionally sharp-tongued grandma Walt who was played by Owen corby a real-life matriarch to her brood of young actors we always call Ellen grandma she was grandma and we were the only grandchildren that she ever had ball gets by then I didn't have any grandparents so we just gravitated towards each other and she was very very supportive of my music and encouraged me to do that not much like her character much more fun much more spiritual and worldly she traveled all over the world she went to India she studied meditation with the Maharishi and truly an amazing woman freesia Lord and peasant chicken fricassee put me down you on something of a dark horse in the Waltons fold veteran actor will Gere played grandpa as a left-wing activist he'd been blacklisted and prevented from working during the McCarthy era of the 1950s liberal progressive openly bisexual he was also an active campaigner for gay rights will was the world's oldest hippie he was like this you know 70 year old flower child he loved everybody truly loved mankind and womankind well had a lust for life that was absolutely contagious he was very committed politically very strong about tolerance and about his liberalism was very was very much a cause for him and he had such gusto for the world rock solid and holding the reins of the family Lamar and power who's loved not even seven bouts of colic and nappy could dent Olivia Walton was played by actress Michael Leonard of the growl wait playing John senior to the kids they were much more than just TV parents ralph is the only dad I have and my dad died when I was 16 so I always tell Ralph that you know I see you're the only dad I have left when I was doing the wedding show and I was wearing my my own mother's real wedding dress and I was bawling because he was my dad and I was wearing my own real mother's wedding dress when she married my real father and it was just too strange come on it was an amazing place to grow up we had the most amazing talent around us Michael always watched out for us to make sure that you know we weren't around anything that was too naughty and and they would try and get people to watch their language around us they were really very protective those tadpoles are taking away my appetite mine I don't see why we have to have those nasty things at the table synonymous but put those things away Mariana with Angie what on earth can't and owners all MTAC go start a ball hog farm and get rich like who's out what Seafarer with six hundred million dollars selling bull thoughts likes to restaurants I'm just waiting for the time to come and also will be hands and I'm going home to never-never with the Waltons grown up and gone that house has stood empty and forlorn on a Los Angeles film lot until now today the old porch is ringing once again with the laughter of the Walton clam actually does look pretty good you see that's what tourism will do no the tree has finally grown in it was a pepper tree before but now looks like an abandoned house chits another one metal like nothing no it's person author they write really nice it was offset but ya know it's smaller to it no is no smaller boy I didn't realize until I started working on other shows that other cast members on other TV chefs didn't like each other and I thought well why isn't everybody going to lunch together how odd because we all went to lunch together every day we were together all the time and we all went to lunch and if you wanted to go to lunch without somebody it was a big drama no you can't we all have lunch together there weren't there more steps um yeah yes there were more yeah there were more steps why it was my earlier and there was a rare truth the kids on the show were the kids the kids the kids and people still to this day call us the kids we had a yard yard even within the closest families a time comes for the young to make their own way in the world and so it was with the Waltons at the end of the fifth series john-boy left home I could no more stay on that show another year that he could have stayed in that attic another year writing in his journal I had to leave home I had to get out and you know find out what I could do after this just like him I was in the same boat he was in I had to leave home well don't forget you a home son I never will I was very moved because in that episode I integrated all the elements of my feelings when I left home for the last time and it was the narration after that I found wonderful I did leave Walton's mountain to live and work in New York City I wrote more novels and raised a family of my own in memory I stand before that small white house and I can still hear those sweet voices john-boy walks out in the yard he hears the children all saying good night to each other and he knows that this is the last time that he will be a part of that good night everybody I love you it's very hard very very very painful and it's very easy for me to remember that feeling now sometimes I've kept the show a little bit at arm's length because I think of how deep what how deep a well of feeling it is for me deep down inside I knew that if I spent five years on a series it was going to take ten years to balance the scale so the coming out of the Waltons being successful being a star being hired constantly but knowing that there were certain areas that were off-limits certain kinds of parts that I was not going to be thought of you know you know sexy young guys you know torrid love scenes with fabulous I mean you know the brass ring know you know Richard Tom's pleased he played there brother but you know I mean I know there are jobs that I lost after I left the Waltons because everybody thought I was just you know mr. nice and mr. sweet not really capable of you know playing a role with much edge to it just you know a lot of horseshit soon after John boy's departure for New York the Waltons suffered another loss grandpa actor will Gere died in the summer break between filming we've had some good times everywhere in the next episode the family said goodbye to Grandpa high up on Waltons mountain we came up here in did a a graveside scene and probably didn't really hit us till even months after that very poignant great men a poignancy heightened by Ellen Kobe's courageous returned to the role of grandma having suffered a stroke the previous year you live in I think was a tough day for everyone and it is one of the most memorable moments for cast crew and fans everybody remembers that show because we all said goodbye to him in our own way then as time went on when he wasn't there then you really started to feel it but we do dinner scenes and have the empty chair that would that's when it would really hit you just because there's only four vents doesn't mean we can't talk it wasn't the same without them and it wasn't the same for us either you know and then when we were kind of all grown up and everybody was going every which way I think it was harder for people for an audience to focus on what was going on like where is everybody where are they going you know grandma life is rotten for females nothing but dishes and sweeping and ironing that's it for females people would go through periods of dissatisfaction when they would feel that they're part character wasn't being given enough to do you know the women you know I had these tasks they were always doing it was like you know I mean Ellen was like you know if I'm you know if I if I wiped my hands on my apron one more time I'm gonna go quick or go crazy Oh carry on you were supposed to mop this floor I'll do it right now mom I did it well I'm sorry I just forgot that's the third time this week Michael was just getting dissatisfied mmm from what she said with the lack of challenge in the role after so many years that she felt that it was exactly yeah what what I started running into after they sort of had me married and have a kid you know I was like hanging around the house waiting for some man to make me important you know I mean that's kind of I know she'd joke about more coffee John time to go to bed kids then all of a sudden after Michael left there I was going more coffee daddy okay kids time to go to bed I'm like oh my god I've turned into everything that Michael said she hated and I didn't like it any better after nearly 10 years and 210 episodes the Waltons said their good nights let the coffee go cold and left that old house for good in June 1981 trouble was nobody told the kids I heard the show got canceled um it was in the newspaper no one called us the network didn't let us know it was pretty horrible feeling you know when he worked as a kid you don't really have time for a childhood or playtime and having worked from the age of 8 I was just ready to you know have my own time freedom at last it was you know it was one of those like when you get out of school you know summer vacation type feelings show was done when I was about 22 23 years old and I took about a year I had to do some soul-searching of what I wanted to do it was a tough time I had to mourn the loss of the show that was the place where I found a place to go every day it was friends every day there was a people that they were telling me what a wonderful job I did every day there was a lot of money coming in every day and life there wasn't like that anymore and so I had to sit at home and ate a lot and I watched a lot of TV and I knew the lines better than Hassan banan's I thought it was time to go out and get work Erik Scott began working as a courier in Los Angeles delivering packages by a viciously tyranny one day he found himself in the reception of the company he'd once made millions for the company that made the Waltons and I walk in and I see my picture with all the Waltons right there are not in there in the lobby and um it was a it was an adjustment time I had to realize that that was not the source of of where I was gonna be anymore so it was very humbling to say the least and I I just went and I delivered the package and took a few minutes and I said okay I need to work on this a little bit longer that was a tough day you'll learn to love a grandma all you do is put in a nickel and you can hear your favorite song I was actually working in a record store and when I discovered used albums then I really went haywire I could actually get paid and spend more than my check was you know buying stuff that I liked but that was great that's like if you like music that's like being a kid in candy shop so yeah you know you piss a lot of your money away but you know having started the show at the age of six cami Cutler was only 16 at its end which brought with it a different set of problems dating becomes a really awkward thing because not only because you haven't really had that much access to boys or to dating but because for some boys who you go out with they're not just dating you they're also dating Elizabeth Walton and do you really want a data list mom do you want to date a guy who wants to date Elizabeth Wallman gets complicated do you know I hoped that when the show ended and I was going to do more acting and a lot more music you know and it didn't quite work out that way and I do think that we were typecast they were sort of like go away you know you're not marketable in film and television right now because you're too recognizable and you're too sort of typecast at the moment so you know I just was kinda like go away you know we all felt the need to kind of separate out and I think at the time we saw each other less for a while and I think we all made attempts to distance ourselves and change our images you know and be known for what we were the Walton kids said goodbye to their former selves in different ways for Judy Norton formerly Mary Ellen a photo spread for a men's magazine was her way of shedding literally those hated dungarees had I known it would never go away the air everybody whoever did an interview with me would bring it up again I probably would have said you know it's not worth it's not worth the trouble I mean it wasn't that big a deal to me at the time to do I don't know Mary Ellen's type of character that just might have done something like that in a rebellious moment so maybe it's not that far up well I imagine that yeah at some point when I hold him sagging and decrepit I might I might look back and go hey that once upon a time like Judy no Mary McDonough decided to keep on acting that the pressure of competing for those glamorous roles made her resort to a dramatic image change I wanted to keep working as an actress in my chosen field and when it was suggested to me that I was losing a lot of parts because they went drop-dead gorgeous and bombshell I started to feel um funny about that and and it was suggested that I might want to have bigger boobs because people who had bigger boobs for getting the parts so at the time I was young and foolish and the information that's out and available to women now wasn't available to me and it was really nerve-wracking but I decided to have silicone gel breast implants and instead of helping my career it actually made me very sick I got very very sick within 24 hours I broke out in a rash and then went ten years of declining health until I had them removed and I now have been diagnosed with lupus and I feel the chemicals in mice and my system triggered the lupus response lupus is a disease of the immune system that can prove fatal now president of the lupus la foundation Mary calls on some old friends Richard Thomas included to help out with her celebrity-packed fundraising pot bat the reason why you are here well Richard is here on your freaking loving spur part of me drop of the guest list Sylvester Stallone Ryan O'Neal and happy days dad Tom Bosley it's not just canapes and air-kissing they're all here to raise the profile and swell the coffers of Mary's campaign I think my life is so much more interesting than I ever thought it would be I never thought I would lobby Congress I never thought that I would be giving speeches and I never thought that I would have a disease and that I would be the president of a group that raises money to try and find a cure for it you being here helps support raising awareness and funds for lupus research when you're written off as a pretty one people don't really hold you to a high standard and I didn't hold myself to a high standard I never thought I would be as strong and that I could make a difference cuz I just thought oh I'm just an actress but I'm not I'm so much more than that Mary's activism is fueled by the fear that her illness may have affected the health of her daughter Sydney born after Mary's own health began to deteriorate now nine years old Sydney's only a year younger than her mother was when she first played Erin Walton I think I look at the pictures a night and I think who is that girl who wears that little girl and that little girl went through so much to grow up to be the woman that I am now and and it makes me wistful and it kind of makes me sad cuz I'm looking at that little girl and looking at my own little girl I hope she doesn't go through the same things that I did every year the tiny Virginian town of Schuyler suffers an invasion the fans come flocking to the International walters convention site of pilgrimage for thousands of devotees today is particularly special the ones are coming home see all of you again in about seven years I've been out here that day I'm crazy to company it's pretty overwhelming that the show is still on people are still watching it that they love it as much as they do good morning thank you all for coming and supporting museum being here most of us had not ever been to Virginia until we went back for the reunion and they were expecting a thousand people to show up maximum in this tiny tiny town and over six thousand people showed up and they had to turn thousands of people away thank you I'm Judy and I looked at each other at the opening of the museum with thousands of people around us and we looked at her could you believe this who are these people when I'm joy I'm Lawrence and her name is Tandy and we lived in movin a long time we've watched the Walton series through at least twice and it takes about three years to run it's time when we home to come we we just thought it would be an ordinary day and then our daughter heard that it was going to be a reunion and I think it's wonderful about nine years old and time this are my age now if 110m is in its first year that has been seen by a likely billion viewers worldwide but this is where the hardcore Walt Knight comes into their own crossing continents to pay homage to their icon we look much younger in person right really hard looks like we always learn they were a proper family I always say it's the same as thing they put on television for a long long time it still surprises me so sorry oh yeah to see that here it is thirty years later and you know it obviously touched people's lives well everyone please don't worry about it I mean that's the whole thing is everyone has their own story and everyone has their favorite character me after all this time it's like they still remember and they know so much more about the show than we do the people that I love others oh there's one in every group where you know some couple in their 60s you know around sixty Wilco and say I grew up with you know you didn't but one Walton isn't there today success and fame never sat easily on David Harper's young shoulders the way I look at it was I'm just Joe Friday doing a job and you know they kind of treat you like you're different or special and you know you really kind of feel like like don't recall anything that I did to deserve that you know kind of put you off balance a little bit at least for me personally it does I think it made me socially introverted in a lot of ways I didn't like being recognized and so I think I was very private whereas normally I might might not have been so that's a possible regret right there I did have some tough times I had some very challenging times I should say I got married when I was thirty years old and right after the birth of my first daughter my wife died and she was diagnosed with leukemia and at that point we were getting ready for the chemotherapy and unfortunately Thursday morning they came to me and they said that she won't make the day that we were gonna lose her so she died at 9:30 on Thursday morning less than two days after Ashley was born I I will never forget the feeling of sitting there with Ashley looking at this little baby coming here as I'm overwhelmed with the thought of having a little baby and her mom just dying and the next literally you know a couple floors down the same day and thinking oh my god I've not prepared for this I mean how could you I watched Ashley grow older and and I said you know it's time to find someone to be a mom for her and I got lucky I gotten very very lucky they're doing great now I have little em'ly my sweet little Emma and it's so nice to be sharing it with someone this time I put up signs here welcome home with flowers and balloons and it was so nice to be able to take to bring the two of them home and having my new family like I told Ashley I said look we doubled the size of our family in two years pretty good huh she goes yeah daddy yeah Judi Norton's now living in Canada still acting as well as teaching film and drama but her main supporting role these days is being a mother to her son seven-year-old Devon yeah I always said I didn't want to be a single parent and Here I am being a single parent no I am definitely not not living like the Walton life and I don't know how possible that is in this day and age I mean I think that the things that you can still do have more to do with what the show represented family values and I don't think that you have to have a big family living in you know on a mountain to be able to have that as a core part of your family when the Waltons ended Cammie Kotler went to college and became a high school teacher whilst her two young children are unaware of mom's Mountain childhood her pupils do question her about the fictional family she left behind they do eventually hear like through the grapevine basically Scott was on television his collar was altered and typically the thing that holds in the longest is who have you met Michael I did meet Brad Pitt once and that's exciting but other than that they really I always say the culture of teacher is so powerful that it doesn't matter who you are you're their teacher um and Madonna could become a high school teacher and within a week she would be officially boring life imitating art John warns Lee's made a career in music just like Jason Walton he has a daughter Brighton and his wife Lisa played his fiance in the series keeping it in the family their real-life wedding was conducted by Parr Walton himself we were married by Ralph Waite who is also a minister in real life and it was just just that much more meaningful having somebody that we knew and loved and and you know my TV dad marrying us part-time presbyterian minister Ralph Waite now 72 has enjoyed a distinguished acting career having beaten a drink problem he sits on the board of a Californian alcohol recovery center that has also run for Congress in true Bolton tradition Richard Thomas has gone on to father seven children and amazingly useful 50 he's never left the film business I had to do something else besides I think I'd be a big you know things besides acting breeding I'd be in big trouble you know I've started Chris of 40 television movies which is really amazing Mary McDonough has moved behind the camera to direct her first short feature film in a central role she cast her Walton mama film and stage actress Michael Leonard then Eric Scott like being a delivery boy so much that he bought the company and now owns a successful career business in LA and off them all Jim Bob's the wondering Walton having drifted through a variety of jobs David Harper 40 and single is the one yet to play happy Walton families I'm kind of proud to be the black sheep yeah well I don't know it's it's kind of weird I mean I'm a part of them that I'm also kind of alone or to a degree after time goes by you sort of soften you think well you know those were good days and we did have fun and it was a good show and people do still like it and you realize that it's never going away people are still going to talk about it that some people you're still going to be Jason you're still going to be Mary Ellen as long as you live it there's nothing you can do about it good night John good night Judy good night kami if you had to grow up on a show I would pick the Waltons hands-down every time it is a show of class and dignity and honor and I feel lucky just lucky that it happened to be me good night Mary good night Eric good night David it would only truly be an albatross if it had been a disaster those would be the crosses that would be very hard to them the fact that when I die probably they will say goodnight john-boy is something that I just won't have to worry about but that they come real I good night Richard good night everybody

Channel: All About the Waltons

Views: 1,402,876

Rating: 4.8529296 out of 5

Keywords: The Waltons (TV Program)

Id: eYHo3Ytcb0M

Length: 48min 50sec (2930 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 21 2015