Just as Jason catches her sneaking out with Charlie, someone new comes to town. Hating Jason and everything he stands for, Quentin starts up a relationship with Charlie Busch (Stuart Whitman), a handsome carnival roustabout. The domineering Jason works in town to pay the bills, but his efforts to keep the delinquent Quentin in school aren't working.
Relative Jason Compson (Yul Brynner) and his demanding mother Caroline (François Rosay) have moved in to put the place in order. Her other uncle Ben (Jack Warden) is a mentally challenged simpleton who plays on the grounds with the son of the family maid Dilsey (Ethel Waters), the only person in the household that Quentin likes. Quentin's uncle Howard (John Beal) is an alcoholic failure. The crumbling Compson house reflects the disarray of the once-proud family. The film adaption narrows the book's wide scope down to the coming-of-age story of a single character, Quentin Compson (Joanne Woodward). As with other tame Hollywood potboilers of the time, the resulting film leaves most of its 'dangerous' themes unexplored - but also offers several very interesting performances. This time, the same writers pared a multi-generational Faulkner book down to a brief time frame, folding together characters that in the book never met one other.
Producer Jerry Wald immediately tried again with 1959's The Sound and the Fury. The writing team of Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr.'a stew of Deep South situations pleased audiences wanting to see new star Joanne Woodward play opposite Paul Newman. Martin Ritt's 1958 The Long, Hot Summer played fast and loose with the 'unfillmable' William Faulkner by combining a score of his stories into one narrative.
Written by Irving Ravetch, Harriet Frank Jr.
Starring Yul Brynner, Joanne Woodward, Margaret Leighton, Stuart Whitman, Ethel Waters, Jack Warden, Françoise Rosay, John Beal, Albert Dekker. Street Date Septem/ available through Screen Archives Entertainment / 29.95
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