‘Bewitched’ Has Cast its Magical Spell On TV For 60 Years
How Elizabeth Montgomery & Her Special Blend Of Colleagues Cast Their TV Spell With ‘Bewitched
Elizabeth Montgomery, daughter of famed actor Robert Montgomery and Broadway actress Elizabeth Bryan Allen, was actually Hollywood royalty decades before she was cast as beloved house-witch Samantha Stephens on Bewitched.
Everett Collection
A year before Bewitched began, Montgomery fell in love with and wed director/producer William Asher. They met on the set of the 1963 feature film Johnny Cool (she starred, he directed). They wanted to work together on a weekly series. Asher was a prolific director from the Beach Party franchise of the 1960s and produced the famed event at which Marilyn Monroe sang a breathy “Happy Birthday” to President Kennedy. He was friends with CBS executive Harry Ackerman, to whom he and Montgomery proposed a series called The Fun Couple, about a garage mechanic who falls in love with a wealthy socialite. Ackerman liked the idea but had a better one — he replaced the rich-craft aspect of the socialite with the witchcraft essence of Samantha Stephens, a sorceress who chooses to live in the everyday, mortal way (as “Sam” would later profess in many episodes). The series title became Bewitched when Ackerman hired writer Sol Saks to pen the pilot. Samantha (originally named Cassandra, which Montgomery deemed “too mean”) met human husband Darrin Stephens (first played by Dick York, then Dick Sargent), a proud mortal with a strong work ethic, who had a simple request: His new bride must vow not to use her witchcraft. Samantha happily agreed and became one of TV’s first true independent women. “Before I’d finished the first four pages of the script,” Montgomery once said, “I knew I had to be Samantha.”
Led By The Nose
The winning trio of Montgomery, York and legendary actress Agnes Moorehead, who played with daring aplomb Samantha’s feisty mother Endora, were set to begin rehearsals for the Bewitched pilot, “I, Darrin, Take This Witch, Samantha.” As fate would have it, the date was Nov. 22, 1963, the day President Kennedy was assassinated, so rehearsals were postponed. Because they had known and worked together with JFK, the Ashers, along with the rest of the country, were devasted.
Everett Collection
The president’s death had a profound effect on everyone involved, but they were also motivated to continue working on Bewitched and find that something special that would signal Samantha was about to do some magic. Asher reminded his real-life wife of a certain little facial tick she did offscreen when she got nervous. In trying to figure that out, his wife did indeed get nervous — and she wriggled her upper lip. “That’s it!” Asher exclaimed. He just knew. On the series, the twitch was enhanced by a xylophone, and the film of the magic was sped up just a tad.
When Sam’s daughter Tabitha (played primarily by Erin Murphy) came of age, she had her own move of putting a finger to her nose. After all, Samantha could be the only one who twitched.
Everybody thinks it’s just the nose, and that’s why people can’t imitate it. You have to wriggle your upper lip, and then your nose. The appeal was immediate and remains timeless. Everyone wanted to twitch their nose to make their troubles go away.
Everett Collection
Darrin To Be Different
Possibly the biggest double-casting controversy in the history of TV: Dick York and Dick Sargent’s dual turns as mortal ad-man Darrin Stephens on TV’s classic “wituation” comedy.
Everett Collection
Everett Collection
The actors resembled one another, acted like the other, and yet were very different. Sargent, an early contender to play Darrin before filming began, was suddenly unavailable for the Bewitched pilot, and with York’s chemistry with Montgomery unmistakable, Samantha’s Darrin was cast in stone. York already had a lengthy resumé, which included the 1959 movie They Came to Cordura. While shooting that film, he suffered a back injury so terrible that years later, it ultimately forced him to leave Bewitched after the fifth season, where Sargent stepped back in, playing the role for the final three seasons. “I think there was a stronger sense of warmth between Samantha and Darrin when I did the show,” Sargent later said.
“Darrin was becoming a more easygoing presence,” Montgomery later said. “The show’s situation almost became funnier. … It was almost as if Darrin grew as the relationship developed. He didn’t have to be on his guard as much.”
All-Star Team
Gene Trindl/TV Guide/courtesy Everett Collection
With one of the largest casts in the history of television, Bewitched would prove to be a showcase for many stellar talents. Moorehead, a stalwart from her early days with the iconic Orson Welles theater and subsequent film troupe, signed on to play Endora, thinking the pilot would not sell; indeed, in time, she would very much be Endora, one of the hearts of the show. Others included David White as Darrin’s self-absorbed but affable boss Larry Tate, Marion Lorne as the bumbling but beloved witch Aunt Clara, Bernard Fox as delightful Dr. Bombay, Paul Lynde as practical-joking Uncle Arthur (named after a real-life uncle to Montgomery), Alice Ghostley (Lynde’s look- and soundalike dear friend) as witch-maid Esmeralda, and Maurice Evans as Samantha’s debonair father Maurice (pronounced Moor-EESE; it was a role Elizabeth’s father Robert was offered but rejected). Montgomery also did a double turn as Serena, Samantha’s brunette lookalike cousin, billed in the credits as played by Pandora Spocks, and inspired by Montgomery’s real-life cousin Panda.
Though most of the main cast is now gone, Bewitched, led by Montgomery (who died of cancer in 1995), and her famed twitch and sparkle of her star status, will endure for time immortal. Endora once said to her daughter Samantha, in the most famous bit of dialogue in the show, these words about the unique quality of witches … words that could easily relate to Montgomery herself:
“We are quicksilver, a fleeting shadow, a distant sound …
our home has no boundaries beyond which we cannot pass.
We live in music, in a flash of color …
… we live on the wind and in the sparkle of a star!”
@its_teresa4 Endora Wants To Ride..#foryou #endora #flying #broom #goodwitch #samantha #funny #retro #tv #show #bewitched #elizabethmontgomery #agnesmoorehead #tictok #fyp ♬ original sound – Teresa 🎥🎞
Herbie J Pilato is an award-winning writer, producer, actor and TV personality whose acclaimed list of books includes “The Essential Elizabeth Montgomery,” “Twitch Upon a Star” and “Bewitched Forever.” For all things Herbie, visit his site.
Remind 
Witches
October 2023
Take a fond look back at our favorite small-screen spellbinders
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