- Welcome to a new segment of behind the scenes
of "The Waltons" and "Ask Judy."
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Mike asked, "Did we get a lot of fan mail?"
Yes, yes we did.
I remember getting bags of fan mail.
So yes, in the thousands, definitely.
The show, once it took off,
it was hugely popular and we all got a lot of fan mail.
So that was exciting, particularly in the beginning,
to realize that people were watching the show
and enjoying it, and wanting to reach out to us.
So, we appreciated that.
Another question,
this one from Tamara or Tamra,
"Was it hard to memorize the lines?"
I never had a lot of trouble memorizing lines.
I could sort of get into a zone,
and knock them off pretty quickly.
Some people struggled more with that than others.
It is kind of a muscle,
and if it's being exercised regularly -
I'd been memorizing lines since I was very young,
I was kind of in a groove,
so it never presented a real problem for me.
She also asked, "How long were the workdays?"
The workdays,
were for us, eight hours.
That was child labor laws.
If you were over a certain age,
and it must've been at least five,
because Kami, the youngest, who played Elizabeth
was able to work those eight-hour days as well.
Plus, then on top of that, an hour for lunch.
Once you were over 18,
you could work 12-hour days.
And there were times where we did that.
Sometimes on like a Friday,
sometimes we worked longer
if there was a particularly long day
or something that they wanted to get,
that they needed to maybe do at night.
There were some times where we worked longer than that,
because you also had to give actors
12 hours in between days.
So if you finished at eight o'clock one day,
they couldn't bring you in
before eight o'clock the next day.
So if they knew they were gonna shoot
later into the evening,
they would choose to do it on a Friday night.
So if we didn't finish filming until 10 o'clock it
didn't matter, 'cause the next day was Saturday.
We took Saturdays and Sundays off.
So that was our usual workday.
Shoot calls could be anywhere
from 6:30, 7:00 in the morning.
Sometimes we started 8:00 or 8:30.
So our hair and makeup calls
would be half an hour to an hour before that,
so that we were ready to be on set by 8:00 or 8:30
when they started shooting,
If it was outdoors,
and it was shorter, like in the winter,
then sometimes shooting calls
were more like seven o'clock in the morning.
So they were, for me, who's not a morning person,
there were some early calls (giggles)
She also asked, "Did I take classes in acting?
As a child, I did have an acting coach
for when I first started acting, at about six or so.
And then I worked with a theater repertory company
from the time I was about 10 or 11.
So I had quite a bit of training prior to "The Waltons."
I'm not sure with all the other kids,
I know for Mary and Kami,
it was their first acting job,
so they were just naturals.
Eric had done -- worked quite a bit before.
I'm not sure if he had any coaching or classes before that,
same with Jon Wamsley,
David Harper was also pretty young,
so I think it was one of his early roles.
And her last question was,
"Did I ever consider a different profession?"
Not really, because I was doing it
from the time I was very young.
There were times where I thought, "Wow, if I wasn't acting,
what might I do?"
When I was in my teens and started doing
a lot of horse riding and jumping
and some competition, stuff like that,
I loved it so much that there were times I thought that,
if I weren't acting,
I would be interested in pursuing work with horses,
you know, maybe learning to be a horse trainer
or something like that.
Because my acting career went well,
I never, at that point, was in a position
to have to make that decision.
And then later in life, I just kept adding things
to what I did, like writing, and directing, and singing.
So, I've never totally stepped away from acting.
I just keep adding other things (chuckles).
Next question.
"Were there any friendships with other actors working nearby
or child actors in our onset school?"
In our onset school, it was only "The Walton" cast,
but we did meet other actors who were on the lot,
particularly when we were working on the backlot
because there might be other shows filming there.
"The Dukes of Hazzard" filmed
at Warner Brothers at the same time.
So I knew, you know,
Tom Wopat and John Schneider.
I knew Catherine Bach, James Best.
I had actually played his daughter
in a episode of "Felony Squad,"
an old show, like in the 60s when I was young,
he played my father.
So, I knew a number of those actors,
and they would sometimes drive their car,
the General Lee through our set,
they'd drive it into our front yard.
So, we would have fun like that sometimes.
Also there were TV shows that had softball teams,
and "The Waltons" had a softball team that I played on,
and Mary played on, and I think Eric played on,
and some of our crew did.
And we would play other shows, I believe.
I know we played "Happy Days."
I think we played a "Star Trek" team,
And then we would play other --
I remember playing a team that Alice Cooper was on.
And then just around the lot,
our company also produced the show, "Eight Is Enough,"
so I knew those cast members.
I became friends with them,
and some of them like Willie Aames,
did an episode of "The Waltons"
before he did, "Eight Is Enough," so we knew him.
Rademes Pera, who did an episode,
The Ceremony on "The Waltons,"
then filmed "Kung Fu" on the Warner's lot.
So he would come by and visit and we would hang out
at the lot as well.
So yes, we did cross paths
with other actors who were working on the lot.
And that was always fun.
Another question,
someone asked if "Mary McDonough was as big as snoot
in person, as Erin was on the show?"
Absolutely not!! Mary is one of my dearest friends
and has been since then, and she is kind and generous
and just a wonderful person.
She's someone that everybody gravitates to.
So, not at all a snoot.
So I'm happy to set that straight.
Mike asks about Earl Hamner,
and what was he like in real life?
Earl was around the set a lot,
because initially he was a creator
and a story editor on the show.
He became a producer, so he was on the set a lot
and was very much engaged in the show all the time.
He was a wonderful man.
We used to call him Uncle Earl,
and he was gentle, witty.
He had a wicked sense of humor,
just a genuinely good person that I dearly loved.
It was a real loss when he passed.
Mike also wanted to know, "How much the stories
that happened were true to life?"
That, I'm not entirely sure of.
I think there was --
a majority of it took a lot of artistic license.
I think there may have been stories that were based,
in some degree of truth or based on something,
someone that Earl knew,
or a story he was familiar with.
But in general, the stories were more fiction than fact.
So thanks for that question, Mike,
Thank you again for your questions.
That's what I have for you on this segment of "Ask Judy"
I will be back with more of your questions,
and more behind the scenes of "The Waltons."
Thank you very much for watching.
See you next time.