Jeannie Out Of The Bottle by Eden Barbara & Leigh Wendy

Author:Eden, Barbara & Leigh, Wendy [Eden, Barbara & Leigh, Wendy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Non-Fiction, Biography
ISBN: 9780307886941
Publisher: Crown
Published: 2011-04-05T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

THIS MAY BE one of the biggest understatements ever made, but for Larry Hagman, the I Dream of Jeannie years were not happy ones. To this day, I believe he much prefers to be remembered for his role as J. R. Ewing in Dallas rather than for his role as Major Tony Nelson in I Dream of Jeannie.

To be fair to Larry, he wasn’t the cause of every single solitary drama out of all the many that unfolded on the I Dream of Jeannie set. One good example was during season three, while we were shooting “Genie, Genie, Who’s Got the Genie,” which aired on January 16, 1968. My mother visited the set for the very first time, and saw me locked into the interior of a safe, with only a gigantic lipstick and a purse for company.

All of a sudden, a flat from the set fell across the safe. Only quick thinking by a crew member saved me from being hit by it. We started the scene again, but then the lipstick toppled over and practically knocked me out.

My mother, watching, gave a big start and said, “Barbara, I never knew that making a TV series was so dangerous!” Of course she didn’t. She hadn’t witnessed Larry in full flight yet.

In his memoirs, Larry claimed not to be able to remember the I Dream of Jeannie years, but I find that difficult to believe, given the high-octane quality of his explosive on-set shenanigans.

On one unforgettable occasion, when Larry didn’t like a particular script, his answer was to throw up all over the set. Nerves? Method acting? I didn’t stick around long enough to find out, but took refuge in the sanctuary of my dressing room instead.

In many ways, Larry was like a very talented, troubled child whose tantrums sometimes got the better of his self-control. The crew, however, quickly lost patience with him and vented their frustration by cutting him dead as often as possible and tormenting him however and whenever they could. Once when Larry demanded a cup of tea (as opposed to his habitual champagne), the crew, exasperated by his high-handedness and demands that a scene be reshot because he didn’t like that particular segment of the script, put salt in his tea instead of sugar.

When the unsuspecting Larry took a sip and spat the tea out in disgust, the entire set rocked with suppressed laughter from the delighted crew, who probably would have applauded if they could have, they so enjoyed humiliating poor Larry.

But when it came to Gene Nelson, to whom Larry had taken an instant dislike when we shot the pilot, Larry hit out hard and often. And as much as I tried to avoid becoming involved in their clash, it was patently obvious that there was a lot of nastiness flying back and forth between the two of them during the early days of filming I Dream of Jeannie.

I was very secure in what I was doing in terms of my portrayal

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