- Welcome back to another segment of
"Behind the Scenes with the Waltons."
I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful Christmas and New Year.
Today I'm going to be talking about the episode
from Season 2, "The Theft"
where John Walton is accused of stealing.
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One of the first things I noticed
when I started watching this episode again,
was this moment very early in the episode
when Olivia is at the kitchen sink.
And just for a few seconds here, as the frame is wider,
you catch in the upper corner what we call a C-stand.
This stand would have been holding some sort of a flag,
or something to sort of craft where the light is shining,
or prevent it from being too bright someplace.
So just a little issue there with something
being caught by the camera that shouldn't have been.
As an actor you're always aware of where the camera is,
and where the lights are, and things like that.
At this moment, when I come over to show this magazine,
when I first sit down,
you'll see that my hair kind of falls in front of my face.
Well, immediately the cameras can't see my eyes.
So actors get used to things like putting the hair back,
so that the camera can see you.
I wouldn't necessarily automatically do that in real life,
but knowing the camera is there, it gets to be an instinct.
Being in the heart of the Depression, times
are tough for the Waltons,
and Daddy is having to pick up work
wherever he can to make ends meet
because people aren't always able to pay their bills to him.
So in this case,
we find out that John is working for the Claybourne family.
Now I'm looking at a magazine where there's this wonderful,
let's see, it's a 1934 Nash car that I say was $760,
and who could possibly afford a car like that?
And someone mentions the Claybournes could.
And then I make a comment about how I wonder if Stuart Lee,
the Claybourne's son knows how gorgeous I've gotten.
And I love how matter of fact I am about saying it,
with this sort of as if to say,
well, then if Stuart Lee knows that,
then, of course, he would want to marry me,
and then we'd have all this money.
Jason, who was playing cards
immediately pipes up about making fun of me,
but I wonder if Stuart Lee knew how gorgeous"...
He's just mocking me,
and I threaten to give him a bloody lip.
Again, very much something that Mary Ellen
would threaten one of her brothers with.
Shortly after that,
Grandma comes out of the mystery door in the living room.
That door that is just inside to the left of the front door
that we never quite know what it is.
And here is one of the only times
I have seen someone go in or out of that,
and here is Grandma,
I would guess exiting her bedroom from that door.
While fixing a refrigerator at the Claybournes,
John is invited by Mrs. Claybourne
to come have coffee in the drawing room, and he does,
and she has all these lovely pieces of silver.
And at one point you actually see John pick one up,
and take a look at it.
Probably doesn't see a lot of that kind of silver,
except perhaps at the Baldwins
who probably have a lovely silver tea set,
but not too long after that, Mrs. Claybourne discovers
that a couple of Paul Revere silver goblets are missing.
She can't find them anywhere.
And so her speculation is that someone has taken them.
And this leads to the idea
that the only person who has been there is John Walton,
and John Walton must have taken those goblets.
And she insists that Stuart Lee call the sheriff.
When Sheriff Bridges comes to the house to question John,
John gets very irate.
He refuses to defend himself,
and he gets very snappy with John Boy,
insists that he go in the house,
he won't answer any questions.
And it's very out of character for him.
Very rarely did we see John really get irate like that.
It happened occasionally,
you could see that he had that temper,
but for the most part he controlled it.
I love in this scene how Grandpa is defending John.
And also just reminding everybody
that John can take care of himself.
Sometimes I didn't really see the relationship of Grandpa
as John's father.
I mean, you certainly saw them argue at times,
but it tended to be more John disagreeing with Grandpa,
and them bickering about things,
but in this case, I was suddenly reminded -' that's right',
he raised this bo'.
He and Grandma raised John.
So this was a moment
where I was aware of him being John's father,
and defending his son.
As the children are hanging out on the front porch
because Daddy is acting so mysterious,
so they're worried.
Mary Ellen in particular can't think of doing anything
because how could you do something,
anything with Daddy acting so mysterious?
And there's a whole series of classic Mary Ellen eye-rolls
during this scene
as John Boy comes and sits down next to her
on the porch swing.
And as various different things are said,
she just keeps rolling her eyes at him,
like, how could you be so ridiculous and naive, John Boy,
to not realize how important all of this is?
So I really loved watching all of that.
Because of how upset Mary Ellen is about what's happening,
she talks with mama,
and Olivia just consoles her when Mary Ellen
just doesn't know how to deal with what's happening.
And it's just a lovely scene where Mary Ellen
is just worried and upset, and doesn't know what to do
with all of these emotions she's feeling.
And Olivia is always so wise,
and compassionate in dealing with
all the different personalities of her children,
and Mary Ellen makes a comment about,
I don't know how you could possibly love me
when I'm so ridiculous.
And Olivia is very cute.
She's like, well, it's not always easy,
which as parents, I know I've certainly felt at times.
I love you dearly, but you make it hard sometimes.
Here at the Walton dinner table,
we are having corn on the cob for dinner,
one of my favorite meals as a kid,
and everybody is really quiet, unusually quiet.
Usually the dinner table
was a place where there was just nonstop chattering.
John notices that John Boy is missing,
and someone says that, oh, he wasn't hungry.
And, finally, Mary Ellen in a snit gets up and says,
you want to know where he is?
He's in the barn because he got in a fight at school
because kids were saying mean things about Daddy.
And then she storms off.
After Mary Ellen's little dramatic stomp off,
John and Olivia look at each other,
and John says he'll go talk to John Boy,
and Olivia will go talk to Mary Ellen.
John goes out to the barn to talk to John Boy,
and they argue because John Boy can't understand why
John will not defend himself.
And John feels like
he's not ready to explain himself to anybody.
Doesn't need to explain himself to anybody,
and that they just need to trust in him.
It doesn't end well.
The next day at Ike Godsey's pool hall,
Ike is playing pool with the sheriff,
and with a neighbor, Dodge.
John comes in, he asks Dodge about a back bill that is owed,
and Dodge basically accuses John of being a thief.
And John gets up in Dodge's face.
The sheriff breaks it all up,
but John is beginning to recognize
the situation he has created for himself
by not letting people know where he was.
Ben has been selling magazines,
and John Boy and Ben cook up this little idea
where they will go to the Claybourne house.
And Ben is going to try to sell magazines
to see if he can talk to Stuart Lee,
and maybe find out what's going on.
As he is pitching his magazines,
he talks about the "Saturday Evening Post"
as one of the magazines
that they can purchase to be delivered.
And it reminded me of the time when the Waltons
were on the cover of "Saturday Evening Post."
This was back in, I believe 1973.
It was a November/December magazine cover
where we are having a Thanksgiving dinner.
Ben discovers a few things.
Stuart Lee doesn't tell him anything,
but Ben remembers something he saw in a movie one time,
and that you can tell something about a person's,
what their money situation is like
by looking at their shoes.
And Ben notices that Stuart Lee's shoes look old and worn.
So he relays this to John Boy who then starts thinking,
this is kind of odd.
And maybe all is not as it seems
regarding the Claybourne's financial situation.
John Boy goes, talks to Ike,
finds out the Claybournes have run through all their money,
and they are buying on credit like everybody else.
Mrs. Claybourne goes to the Walton house to insist
that John return the items that she feels he has stolen.
He, of course, continues to deny that he stole anything.
Stuart Lee arrives and confesses
that he is the one that took the items and sold them
because their finances are gone basically.
And he was trying to protect his mother in the same way
that his father protected his wife,
and that he recognizes that that was a mistake.
They both apologize to John and take their leave,
and promise that they will let the sheriff know
the truth about John.
John asks Olivia if she ever for a moment
really believed he took the items, and she said no.
And he finally is ready to confess
what he was actually doing in Charlottesville that day.
And Olivia immediately realizes
that he has hocked his wedding ring.
And although she understands why, she basically says,
"I love that ring, and do you think we can get it back?"
And there was hope that perhaps in the future,
they will be able to retrieve the wedding ring.
And that's what I have for you for this segment of
"Behind the Scenes of the Waltons."
I'll be back with more "Behind the Scenes of the Waltons"
and more "Ask Judy."
Thanks for watching.