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Television Performances by Pregnant Actresses

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Television Performances by Pregnant Actresses Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 5-23-2018 Labor and Delivery: Television Performances By Pregnant Actresses From 1948-2016 Evleen Michelle Nasir Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations Part of the Other Film and Media Studies Commons, Television Commons, Theatre and Performance Studies Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Nasir, Evleen Michelle, "Labor and Delivery: Television Performances By Pregnant Actresses From 1948-2016" (2018). LSU Doctoral Dissertations. 4598. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations/4598 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized graduate school editor of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please [email protected]. LABOR AND DELIVERY: TELEVISION PERFORMANCES BY PREGNANT ACTRESSES FROM 1948-2016 A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The School of Theatre by Evleen Michelle Nasir B.A., Texas A&M University M.A., Texas A&M University August 2018 to my parents for their love and support, to Kirsten for convincing me & to Kevin for everything ii Acknowledgements This project came out of a research trip in 2011. While working in the Ronald L. Davis Oral History Collection as a research assistant for my then mentor and now friend Dr. Kirsten Pullen, I read an interview with Lucille Ball in which she was told by a movie producer to have an abortion so that she could perform in his film. This information sparked a question. What is the history of actresses’ reproductive rights? Seven years later, here we are. I have many people and institutions to thank. First, the financial support of the Louisiana State University Dissertation Fellowship means that I have spent the last ten months completely devoted to the writing and rewriting of this document. There was also some television watching in there too. Thank you. I am also deeply grateful to my friends for their ability to listen, laugh, cry, and write with me. Thank you. Macy Jones was my very first friend at LSU. She and Brook Hanemann, my second friend at LSU, helped me adjust to Baton Rouge, to LSU, and to PhD. life. Katie Morris’ ability to know what I want to say when I don’t is not my favorite thing about her but it is pretty high up there. My favorite thing about her is our friendship. Camilla Morrison’s laughter and positivity has improved my days. I greatly admire and aspire to Carla Lahey’s sense of calm and self-assurance. Kara Ray’s endless support and interest in my work is the sunshine of my day. Emily Piepenbrink was my very first work wife and without her support I would not have made it through any portion of graduate school, thank you. Dr. Kirsten Pullen is the reason that I started graduate school. As a mentor, she saw me as a scholar before I did. She gave me courage to go beyond my expectations. So much of the scholar I am today is because of her advice, scholarship, and friendship. There is no way that I can adequately thank her for everything she has done for me throughout this past decade but I iii will keep trying. I am thankful for Dr. Josh Heuman who alerted me to the existence of Hunter Tylo and to Rebecca G. Pontikes who kindly spoke with me regarding the ins and outs of pregnancy discrimination law and pointed me in the direction of many helpful legal resources. I am also thankful for the conversations about pregnancy performance generated in the ASTR working groups convened by Dr. Alicia Corts, and Dr. Chelsea Phillips. I have to thank the members of my committee, Dr. John Fletcher, Dr. Alan Sikes, Dr. Debbie Goldgaber, Dr. Femi Euba, and Dr. Jacqueline Bach for their time and commitment to the success of this project. Thank you for wanting me and my scholarship to be the best it can be. I also owe endless amounts of appreciation to my mentor and advisor Dr. Shannon Walsh. She has been my biggest cheerleader throughout this entire project. She had enthusiasm for and faith in this project when I didn’t. She told me I was super hero when I felt like a zero. She pointed me toward the light at the end when all I could see was darkness. She made me a better scholar. My father, Adib Nasir, has supported my dreams before I can remember having any. His determination to provide for his family in a country he made his own inspires me every day to do my best and make him proud. My mother, Deborah Nasir-Lumpkin, has always been there. She has taken an interest in every dance class, academic tournament, school play, haircut, hair color (of which there has been many,) craft project, and research question. I know that I can because she told me I could. My step-father Jim Lumpkin has supported my scholastic pursuits by providing me a space to relax on fishing boats and at crab boils. I am a better fisherwoman and person because of him. My mother and father in-law, Tony and Margie Richard, supported me throughout this entire project by asking questions and listening to the long answers. They also are responsible for the creation of my husband Kevin. For that, I am truly grateful. iv My husband Kevin Nasir is the best husband. He has held me up on this long journey with his love and support. He has read, helped write, and talked with me about my work before it was my work. He made my dreams his priority. He has always believed. v Table of Contents Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………………..iii Abstract………………………………………………………………………………………....vii Introduction: A Fertile Idea………………………………………………………………………1 The Birth of Television Pregnancy: “Lucy Is Enceinte” …………………………………….…27 Conception Deception: The “Hidden” Pregnancies of Jane Leeves and Kerry Washington…...95 Labor Pains: Hunter Tylo v. Spelling Entertainment…………………………………………..126 Conclusion: A Pregnant Pause …………………………………………..…………………….153 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………162 Vita……………………………………………………………………………………………...185 vi Abstract Labor and Delivery: Television Actresses’ Pregnant Performances from 1948-2016, examines the labor of six pregnant actresses working on United States television. Mary Kay Stearns, Lucille Ball, Jane Leeves, Kerry Washington, and Katey Sagal all worked through pregnancies while filming their respective television shows. These women exemplify the multitude of actresses who maintained their careers and their pregnancies in the television industry. This is the first study of its kind to examine the labor of an actresses’ pregnant body on film while she performs a role other than herself. Previous examinations of pregnancy in performance are few but have largely focused on representations of the pregnant body in film and television. My study differs from these projects in that it is solely concerned with how the actresses pregnant body affects and is affected by the constraints of the naturalist genre on television. This project is the beginning of an archive of televised pregnant labor. It examines how the television industry, television actresses, and television audiences have learned to accommodate the pregnant laboring body. I argue that pregnant laboring actresses and the television industry that employs them show United States television audiences pregnant bodies at work, and for better or worse, the television industry is a model of how to accommodate pregnancy in the workplace. Ultimately, I conclude that given the restraints of naturalism there is no perfect way for the television industry to accommodate actresses’ pregnancies, but their pregnant performances provide a national platform for pregnant bodies to be seen working by millions of people. In examining the pregnant televised labor of these actresses within the fields of theatre and performance studies, this study troubles naturalism as the default television performance vii genre. It establishes the history of television pregnancy camouflage techniques and questions the effectiveness of those techniques by examining audience response. This project lays a foundation for deeper analysis of the pregnant body in naturalist televised performance. The ways in which an actress’ pregnant body is modified, commodified, camouflaged, or disregarded within the television industry informs how pregnant bodies are discussed and treated outside of the television screen. viii Introduction: A Fertile Idea On December 19, 1948, Mary Kay Stearns was notably absent from the live television show that she shot with her husband, the writer Johnny Stearns. She was in labor. Mary Kay and Johnny was a fifteen-minute television sit-com that aired Friday nights on the CBS network.1 Even though Mary Kay was unable to participate on screen in the airing of the show, Johnny knew the show must go on. He wrote a fifteen-minute teleplay where he paced the waiting room of a labor and delivery ward waiting for the birth of his child. The episode ended spectacularly with Johnny placing a phone call to his mother-in-law and letting her know that Mary Kay had given birth to a boy named Christopher (Stearns and Stearns). Stearns is the first actress in television history to have her pregnancy, labor, and delivery aired live. While her significance to television production history cannot be overstated, Stearns is often outshined by her 1950s counterpart Lucille Ball and I Love Lucy. Ball’s star power and advancements in television production provide insight into why Stearns is forgotten in the shadows of television history. Only one full episode and a few short clips of Mary Kay and Johnny are extant.
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