Susan Slade

November 7th, 2004

Susan Slade

With a Hollywood resume that consisted mainly of westerns and action pictures, writer/producer/director Delmer Daves made quite a career departure in the early sixties when he crafted a series of soapy melodramas for Warner Brothers, all of which featured pretty boy heartthrob Troy Donahue. Susan Slade (1961) is a glossy cautionary tale (of sorts) about the dangers of pre-marital sex and the societal stigma of unwed mothers.

After a decade of running the Corbett Mines in Chile, family man Roger Slade (Lloyd Nolan) packs up his wife Leah (Dorothy McGuire) and daughter Susan (Connie Stevens) and board a ship headed for the states. While en route to the U.S., Susan’s parents worry that ten years in the South American desert may have adversely affected her social development. “God help her if she finds a young man she really wants to love,” Leah muses, “She’s stored up an awful lot to give.”

Susan is soon giving it to Con White (Grant Williams from The Incredible Shrinking Man, 1957) a handsome industrial heir and professional mountain climber. One romantic evening while strolling on deck, Susan asks in her self-conscious stutter why men climb mountains. “Give one of us a virgin peak and we dream about her and get jealous of the men who beat us to her.” It sounds like he’s talking about more than just mountains.

The two begin a shipboard romance in a montage that’s accompanied by Max Steiner’s lush, string-laden score. They even make out while the unmistakable theme from another Daves directed hit, A Summer Place (1959), plays in the background. Despite being promised a wedding, Susan tells Con that she can’t help feeling guilty, “cause we’ve been sinful.”

When the ship docks in San Francisco our two lovebirds must part as Con heads off to Alaska to climb Mount McKinley. Susan and her parents are met by the Corbett family, Stanton (Brian Aherne), his wife (Natalie Schafer from television’s Gilligan’s Island) and their son Wells (future game show host Bert Convy). As a sort of early retirement gift, the Corbett’s give Roger Slade a new seaside home. Schafer takes them on a tour of the house, pointing out the elaborate fusion of Asian and mid-century modern design.

The films of Delmer Daves are rarely subtle. In a moment that screams “plot point”, Aherne pulls Nolan aside to discreetly discuss the heart condition that he’s kept from his wife and daughter.

In an brief throw away moment, Troy Donahue is introduced as Hoyt Bricker, the sullen teen whose father commits suicide after he’s caught embezzling money from the Corbett corporate accounts. When Susan receives a pony for her birthday, she keeps her new horse at the stables near her house. Though Hoyt has been shunned by most of the local society types, hecontinues to run and operate the stables.

Hoyt comes to Susan’s rescue when her morning ride takes a turn for the worse. Donahue’s and Steven’s stunt doubles gallop over the rugged (but still picturesque) California coastline. After being thrown from her horse, Susan doesn’t take kindly to Hoyt’s physical examination to see if there are any broken bones.

Everyday Susan checks the mailbox for word from the man that she loves, “I’m the woman God forgot.” But Con is unable to begin his climb until the Alaskan weather clears. One afternoon Susan takes a train into the city. She tells her parents that she is going to buy a dress for an upcoming party, but after visiting a San Francisco doctor her worst fears are confirmed. She’s going to have a baby. In voiceover Susan frets, “What’ll I do… what’ll I do? Dear God, what’ll I do?”

After a chance meeting at the train station, Hoyt and Susan have lunch together. While getting to know each other, Hoyt opens up, “You’re the first person who hasn’t looked at me like a criminal. Like father like son.”

When Susan learns of his aspirations to become a writer, she offers some sincere encouragement, “I think one day in Monterey they’ll put up a very big sign saying: Robert Lewis Stevenson, John Steinbeck and Hoyt Bricker wrote here.”

With no word from Con, Leah suggests that her daughter’s shipboard romance was only that. “You give, he receives. He doesn’t give back. Oh Suzie dear, that’s not love as it should be.”

In the middle of her parents party Susan finally receives the long distance phone call she’s been waiting for. Only it isn’t Con, it’s his father with the news that Con was killed while climbing Mt. McKinley. Susan does what any pregnant, grief stricken teen would do. She rips off her dress, pulls out her fancy hair-do and puts on her riding togs.

Hoyt hears Susan saddle up and gallop out of the stables. He follows her as she rides her horse to the sea, attempting to swim out into the ocean and drown herself. Susan screams as Hoyt fights to bring her back onto shore, “I wanna die! I wanna die!”

While recovering from her suicide attempt, Susan reveals her terrible secret to her parents. A plan is soon developed. The family will move to Guatemala where her father has a new job contract. It’s a drastic but unavoidable step they must take to protect Susan’s reputation. But the plan soon loses all credibility when Leah explains the rest of the scheme.

Though still beautiful, Dorothy McGuire was pretty much past her prime by 1961, which makes the next plot point so wonderfully ridiculous. When the family returns to the States, they’ll all say the baby is hers! “I’m still young enough to have another child,” McGuire insists, “We’ll be in Guatemala for two years, who’s to know?” Who’s to know?! Even if you were deaf, dumb, and blind you could still figure out the Slade family’s fib.

Before heading south of the border, Susan goes to the stables to say goodbye to Hoyt. Though their romance is supposedly blossoming, their farewell kiss couldn’t be any more awkward or unromantic.

Time passes and Susan soon delivers her baby “brother” Roger, who everyone calls Rogy. Stevens is aglow with motherhood, but her mother quickly bursts her post-natal bubble, “You must start, right now, thinking and saying to yourself, ‘This is not my child, this is my little brother’ and never ever think that it doesn’t matter that people know. It has to matter.”

The Corbett family pays a visit to the Slade’s and they all admire the new baby. Schafer’s eagle eye notes that Susan has changed, “from a girl to a woman”. After a game of ‘who does the baby resemble most’, Schafer also notices Susan’s pride in the newborn, “I’ll bet Susan loves this little thing more than she’ll ever love one of her own.”

During a heartfelt father/daughter talk, Nolan once again shows what a caring and understanding family man he is. He then drops dead of a heart attack. Leah and Susan return to Monterey with the baby but are soon fighting over their new family circumstances. “Everybody is taking my baby from me.” Susan whines.

“We have to build a life for Rogy and us here,” She reminds her daughter while lighting up a cigarette in the baby’s nursery, “Where he can accept his heritage. As my son he can do that, as yours he cannot.” Later, in a blatant moment of foreshadowing, McGuire scolds baby Roger for playing with the cigarette lighter.

Susan soon has a pair of suitors to choose from, wealthy Wells Corbett and well meaning but poor writer Hoyt. Wells is the first to pop the question. “I can hardly walk down the aisle with Wells with a soiled gown,” Susan explains to her mother, “Isn’t that what it’s supposed to stand for…purity? Well, let’s face it, I’m not.”

On evening, after Susan sings Rogy to sleep, Hoyt comes by the house with the news that his book is going to be published. Though his first book will be dedicated to his father, he promises to dedicate all the others, “To Susan, with gratitude and everlasting love.” Before he can convince Susan to marry him, they’re interrupted by Rogy’s tortured screams. It seems he managed to get a hold of that cigarette lighter (ah-ha foreshadowing) and set himself on fire! Hoyt throws a blanket over the flaming stunt doll and they rush to the hospital.

Hours pass as the entire cast sits expectantly in the waiting room. When they receive the good news that he’ll be alright, Susan asks to see him. The doctor tells her that only Rogy’s mother can go in for a brief visit. The moment of truth has arrived…literally.

“He was nearly taken away from me, I can’t deny him anymore.” Susan tearfully explains as she spills the beans about Rogy’s true parentage. The melodramatic revelation is played for all it’s worth, though no one seems terribly surprised to learn that it’ not Leah’s baby.

Hoyt, ever the steadfast hero, declares, “Without you I’m nothing.”

“I love you, Hoyt.” Susan coos, “I love you.”

They seal their love with a kiss, proving that sex before marriage is fine… as long as you have the love of a pouty teen idol.

Stevens, who Hollywood continually cast as a bad girl Sandra Dee-type, is quite good as the “damaged goods” lead character. She has several chances to flex her dramatic muscles and chew some beautiful scenery. But all her dramatic efforts are nearly upstaged by the strange hairstyle she is forced to wear. Her blonde hair is styled short and poofy on top with a long fall in the back. The only respite Stevens gets from this 1960’s mullet is when Susan “goes native” in Guatemala and puts her hair up in a Frida Kahlo braid.

Co-star Donahue is his usual bland but beautiful self. Though their chemistry didn’t exactly read on screen, Donahue and Stevens became life-long friends while working together in Hollywood.

Susan Slade is the kind colorful, glossy, soap opera where the characters suffer grandly in a soft-focus fantasy world. Stars Connie Stevens and Troy Donahue have never looked more beautiful, or fuzzier. Though the plot of Susan Slade deals with controversial subjects, it shouldn’t be considered a “message” picture. Themes like pre-marital sex and unwed mothers are simply dramatic devices for the characters to overcome until all is resolved in a traditionally happy Hollywood ending.

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