Brigid Bazlen

Brigid Mary Bazlen (June 9, 1944 – May 25, 1989) was an American film, television and stage actress. Although she made only three Hollywood films, The Honeymoon Machine, King of Kings, and How the West Was Won, she is still remembered for the latter two. Bazlen retired from acting while she was in her late 20s, and she died from cancer at the age of 44.

Early life and career Bazlen was born in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. Her father was Arthur Bazlen, a retail chain executive, and her mother was Maggie Daly, a newspaper columnist with Chicago's American (Chicago Today and the Chicago Tribune). Maggie Daly was, with her three sisters, one of what Time magazine referred to as "the celebrated Daly sisters", who were known for their writing and work in journalism, fashion and advertising. Life magazine ran two feature stories on the sisters with a young Bazlen appearing in the second. Columnist Maggie ("Daly Diary" in Chicago's American), the oldest sister, a one-time model was known for her lunch time Chicago fashion shows and as a radio and television talk show guest and TV show host. Kay Daly, who worked in advertising with such people as Richard Avedon, became a Revlon vice president responsible for its advertising. Novelist and writer Maureen Daly became famous for writing Seventeenth Summer at age 19. Sheila Daly, the youngest, who wrote a Chicago Tribune teen column beginning at a very young age, eventually went into advertising as well.

Bazlen was "discovered" in 1950 at the age of 6 waiting for a school bus in front of her house by an NBC executive. The network was testing for the then groundbreaking soap opera Hawkins Falls, Population 6200 (which went on to become the first successful television soap opera) starring Maurice Copeland and Bernardine Flynn, and the executive asked Bazlen's parents for permission to test her. While her mother initially refused, she later relented and Bazlen won a part and became a regular on the show for two years, winning rave reviews.

The Blue Fairy (1958) In 1958, Bazlen won the starring role in the children's program The Blue Fairy , broadcast by the independent station WGN-TV in Chicago on Monday nights (7:30 pm – 8:00 pm). It was one of the earliest children's shows to be produced in color. The producer of the show had spotted Bazlen playing hopscotch outside of Bazlen's Chicago home and told Bazlen's mother that "your little girl is just right for my TV series". In the show, the Blue Fairy, played by Bazlen, lived in the "Blue Forest". Dressed in a blue gown and diamond tiara, she also clasped a silver wand. At the beginning of each show, Bazlen, suspended by wires, would fly (as if on elfin wings) across the stage saying "I'm the Blue Fairy, I'll grant you a wish to make all your dreams come true." She would then sit on an oversized mushroom visited by creatures such as Tugnacious R. Jones, Myrtle Flower, and an old nasal voiced wizard (which were puppets designed by George Nelle and writer-director Don Kane), and introduced stories enacted by the Rufus Rose Marionettes. They also engaged in projects which included constructing a popcorn machine that would not stop popping and making a sewing machine that turned out marbles. Bazlen won enormous critical praise for her performance (one critic describing it as "beguiling" and "mesmerising" and Hedda Hopper declared Bazlen "the Celtic Alice in Wonderland"), and the show was recognized as the top children's program of 1958 winning a Peabody Award. Bazlen herself said of her role that she "flew around and had a wonderful time". Although The Blue Fairy could only be seen locally in Chicago on Channel 9, the Peabody Award it won brought it and Bazlen to national attention. The show also inspired Ernie Kovacs into doing one of his notorious comedy sketches where Kovacs (wearing a mustache, chewing a cigar, dressed in a blue gown and blonde wig, and holding a silver wand) flew across a stage, slammed head first into a wall on the opposite side, and was then left dangling in mock lifelessness in mid-air.

Too Young to Go Steady (1959) Based on her performances in The Blue Fairy, offers poured in for Bazlen. Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein wanted her to co-star with Mary Martin in the theatrical production of The Sound of Music, Otto Preminger wanted her for his upcoming production of Exodus, and Paddy Chayefsky wanted her for his Broadway play The Dybbuk of Woodlawn. Bazlen's mother, however, turned these down and instead allowed her to take a part in the NBC TV comedy drama Too Young to Go Steady. The series starred Joan Bennett, and Bazlen played her daughter Pamela Blake. Martin Huston, then 18, was cast as Johnny Blake.

King of Kings (1961) Bazlen portrays Salome, seen here performing an erotic dance in order to incite King Herod with lust into giving her "anything [she] wants" – in other words, the head of John the Baptist. Through her role in Too Young to Go Steady and because she was "precociously attractive" (as one critic put it ) in a way similar to Elizabeth Taylor at the same age, Bazlen came to be dubbed "the next Elizabeth Taylor" and was signed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (who started promoting her as "the new American Bardot"). The first film she did for MGM was King of Kings, which also starred Jeffrey Hunter as Jesus. Bazlen played the role of Salome. Bazlen won the part when she met the film's producer, Samuel Bronston, at a party to which Bazlen's mother had taken her. Bazlen said of the offer, that "It was like [being spotted] all over again, for Mr Bronston offered me the Salome part straight away." Bazlen's performance has likewise been re-evaluated down the years as being superb (her voluptuous seduction of a drunken lascivious Herod winning her especially rave reviews. Bazlen said of her role as Salome: "A fantastic amount of research went into King of Kings and it seems that Salome was in her teens when she demanded the head of John the Baptist. She may well be the first juvenile delinquent on record. Some people are surprised that I used no veils in my dance, but it is a false assumption that Salome did a strip tease. I had to form my seductive charming of Herod with a pure Oriental-African dance movement of the period." According to Christopher Sandford in his biography on Steve McQueen, Bazlen briefly became involved with McQueen while making The Honeymoon Machine, although McQueen fought "Bazlen nonstop" over issues relating to the film. Nevertheless, Peter Haigh in ABC Film Review said of her performance in the film that Bazlen "displayed a nice sense of comedy", and Bazlen said that she found making the film "less of a strain" than the making of King of Kings.

Film and television appearances Hawkins Falls (1955, TV series) as Nellie Corey Too Young to Go Steady (1959, TV series) as Pam Blake The Honeymoon Machine (1961) as Julie Fitch King of Kings (1961) as Salome How the West Was Won (1962) as Dora Hawkins Days of Our Lives (1965, TV series) as Mary Anderson #1 (1972) Bright Promise (1969, TV series) as Nurse Radford (1972) (final appearance)