- Welcome back to another segment
of behind the scenes of "The Waltons."
Today I'm going to be joined by Tom Bower,
who played my husband Curt on "The Waltons"
for a number of seasons.
And Tom has been kind enough to agree to join us
to have a little bit of a question and answer segment,
and talk about being on "The Waltons."
All right, well, I want to welcome you,
and thank you very much for coming
and spending some time with me
to talk with all of our lovely viewers,
who have loyally watched all of us
for like 50 years now.
Welcome to-
- [Tom] Thank you.
- [Judy] To my little channel here.
- Thank you for having me.
This is,
it's quite a testament to the show
and to your continuity of keeping it alive.
- [Judy] Oh, thank you.
I know I get asked a lot of questions
about everybody in the cast,
but you are certainly someone
that I get asked about a lot.
I guess we can start at the beginning.
There was, of course, the episode that you did
in the second or third Season, "The Wing-Walker."
So that was your first introduction to "The Waltons," right?
- [Tom] Right, with Lee Purcell.
She played a stunt flyer.
Well, she was a wing walker.
I guess I was the pilot.
- Yeah.
- [Tom] That was my introduction to the show.
So how many years before the wedding would that have been?
- [Judy] I think it was,
I think that was the 2nd Season, "The Wing-Walker."
So then the character of Curt was introduced in Season 5.
- All the original cast members were still there,
which was a blessing for me
to be there at a time when Richard and Will Geer,
all the original people were still with the show,
and it was a great benefit.
- What was your,
what was your whole audition process like for that?
Because I've been asked if you and I read together,
which we never did.
- [Tom] No, we didn't.
I did have quite an extensive audition period.
I probably had to come back three or four times.
But yeah, they put me through the hurdles
to get that job,
and I felt so very lucky to have gotten it.
It was a perfect time for me to be a part of the show.
- [Judy] Yeah, and so how was it being Curt,
and joining the family, so to speak? (laughs)
- It was a little,
a little intimidating
because all of you had been together for a while,
and you really had your drills down.
I think one of the hardest things to learn was what to do
and what not to do when you had a big family dinner.
Would not get caught eating a lot of mashed potatoes.
I'd be eating a bushel of potatoes
before the episode was through.
So that was a great lesson.
And there were a number of other things
that were quite a teaching benefit.
Just being around Will,
what he knew about horticulture or unionism in America,
or what he knew about Woody Guthrie,
'cause he was,
Will was a very good friend of Woody.
He would teach you a lesson about everything in life
if you just stuck around and kept your ears open.
- Yeah, I mean, Will was always fascinating to work with.
I think that coming in as a teenager for me,
I didn't always know how to utilize some of the people
that I was privileged enough to work with,
and I didn't know what questions I should be asking,
which was not... (laughs)
I missed so many opportunities.
People will ask me,
what was it like working with Beulah Bondi,
and did you ask her all...
I'm like, no, I was young and I was clueless. (laughs)
- [Tom] Yeah.
- [Judy] So we worked with some amazing people,
but in some cases, in many cases...
I just talked about working with Sissy Spacek.
Well, it was very early in her career,
so she was not the megastar that she became.
Although, it was clear that she was brilliant
from the beginning.
Yeah, it's weird when it's your show.
You just kinda it's all about you. (laughs)
But I think we always felt and tried
to make people feel very welcome on the set.
So I hope that you felt that way.
- Everyone did.
Richard was most gracious.
We caught the same ride home a number of times.
I got to know him better just with those rides home.
Well, I knew Ralph before I ever did the show.
He was a good friend of a friend,
a guy by the name of Jack Kehoe.
It was like meeting old friends again.
And I played golf with Bob Donner.
We played every Thursday,
every Thursday that we were off.
So I knew Bob for years and years,
right up until the time of his passing.
He was a great golfer,
and we would do celebrity golf tournaments,
and he would be the guest comedian.
He was a hoot as a standup comedian. (laughs)
- [Judy] He was so funny.
Are there particular episodes or storylines
that you were involved in on the show
that stand out for you?
- I'll always be fond of The Wedding.
I just...
That was such a wonderful show.
I felt it introduced me as a character to the family,
and the whole storyline.
I thought it was really well-written.
And when I've seen it over the years,
it stands up pretty well.
- [Judy] Good.
I mean, people seem to really like the relationship
between Curt and Mary Ellen
and felt that the way you played the character,
based on how it was written,
and how you chose to play it,
that he was someone who could handle her.
It needed someone as strong as Curt's character
to match up with her,
and not just be walked over.
- Yeah, and I think his forwardness
with all the people in town.
He had that effect.
It was written that way.
- [Judy] And it was a fun thing about him,
that he didn't worry about his bedside manner
or being really soft and empathic at any point.
He was just kinda no nonsense and did the job.
It was effective. (laughs)
- It really went against type,
and it went against cliche.
Ralph was a little upset with me
that I had become a little better groomed
in the second season of the show.
I had gotten a haircut,
whereas in The Wedding, it was a little bit tousled,
and a little,
little rugged in appearance.
I think he was right. (laughs)
If I had it to do over again,
I would have followed his advice.
- The big thing, the big elephant in the room,
regarding the character of Curt,
it was killing him off at Pearl Harbor,
and then bringing him back.
So the question's then,
to the degree that you are interested or willing to share,
in terms of did you know Curt was gonna be killed off,
was that...
I knew nothing until scripts showed up.
- Well, this is something
that Bob Donner had great fun with.
Every time we'd be playing with someone,
he would say, "Tom, tell them why you left the show."
(both laughing)
I asked for a very small raise,
so they sent me to Pearl Harbor.
(laughs) So then, when they decided
to bring the character back,
washed up on a shore somewhere,
which I didn't think was a great idea anyway,
I asked for the same small raise.
So when they wanted me to come back,
and I asked for the same raise as I had asked for before,
they just cast a different actor,
a guy by the name of Scott Hylands,
who I knew very well.
We were great friends, Scott and I.
We didn't have any conversation
about his coming on the show as Curt.
- Yeah, well, I knew nothing of what was happening.
I mean, we knew that the character was a doctor
and was in the Army,
so we had all those storylines
where you were here and there various times.
Yeah, and then there was the going to Pearl Harbor thing,
which, yeah...
And it was a really,
it was a strong episode, I thought.
I thought it was a beautiful episode,
and I thought that it,
in terms of the show,
it really brought the war home.
Because I said, well, they're not gonna,
they're not gonna kill off one of the sons,
who were going to war.
So this was a way of really bringing it home.
Same thing when they killed off GW Haines.
These were things that would impact
and show the effect in the community
and on the family of the war.
So that kinda made sense,
but it never made sense to me
about bringing the character back.
And I think that's one of those that I hear the most about.
Why did they do that?
That makes no sense.
- And they had already brought back a new John Boy.
- Yes, they had.
Yeah, the new John Boy was already in too.
Well, cool.
Well, I will not keep you any longer.
I want to thank Tom for coming by today,
and spending some time with us,
and answering some questions that you have been asking me,
and to share his experiences with us on "The Waltons."
I'll be back with more behind the scenes of "The Waltons,"
and more Ask Judy.
Thanks for watching.