#paulpartain

Chainsaw Trivia - Posted February 12, 2024

🪝"I found Pam’s little swimsuit and matching shirt in a pile on a sale table at Beall’s Department Store in Capitol Plaza on Airport Boulevard in Austin in '71. (same shopping center where Tobe had his vision in Sears n Roebuck) 🤔 I somehow remember paying somewhere around $5 total for both of them..."

"The wide theatrical release of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" in the United States was on October 11, 1974. It premiered in Austin, Texas on October 1st, 1974, before its wider release."

On a stormy night in late November 1973, I’d packed my VW van and headed to ‘Big D’ - Dallas, Texas, hoping to find more acting gigs. New maneuvers. After filming ‘Headcheese’ wrapped, I’d sold my motorcycle and purchased a second-hand VW bus. Dallas is about 150 miles East of Austin. I’d arranged through friends to stay with their friends and look for an apartment. It was me and my stuff, all my worldly goods.

Cut to a year later, early November 1974, I was living in Dallas and working at a popular bar on Greenville Avenue in Old Town Village called “HP Cassidy’s". The club was owned by the Dallas Cowboys’ quarterback Craig Morton and some of his buddies. I’d met my three roommates at my first gig at a restaurant also in Old Town Village, Daddy’s Money, and soon left for the new happening spot, HP Cassidy’s, around the corner. From its grand opening, HP’s was always crowded, with lines down the sidewalk, a good hour to two hour wait was common in its first year. We worked hard and had a lot of fun! One particular night in late October ’74, when I’d just arrived for my shift, it was just getting started. My section upstairs in the mezzanine would soon be full to the max, and it never stopped the entire night. Closing time 2 PM. Keeping up was all we could do.I went downstairs to the bar to order my drinks with the bartender, Mike. “Hey, Mike, two scotch and sodas and one Tom Collins, please.” Almost before I got my order out, Mike asked me, “Hey, Teri, didn’t you tell me a while back that you were in some horror movie back in Austin?” Confused, as I had my mind on getting my drinks out, I replied, "Huh?" You could see the mezzanine from the downstairs bar station and I saw more tables filling up. Plus, I’d not thought about filming ‘Headcheese’ very much since we’d wrapped filming 14 months earlier.

I then remembered I must have mentioned it to him during our many chats at work. Over the 35 years since filming, I rarely told any one about my playing 'Pam' in the film that put Texas film and horror on the map. The previously oppressed genre began to take on a new life of its own around the world.

I replied, “Oh, yeah, right, I did.” Mike then told me that it was out, that he’d seen trailers showing on TV and that I was in all of them, running and screaming. That didn’t make any sense to me. “No, it couldn’t be me, I was the second girl, not the lead. You must have seen the other chick, Marilyn. She played the lead…” Mike interrupted me, “Teri, it was YOU! You’re in the whole thing.” Geez, I thought, that’s amazing. I still didn’t believe it though, until the next day when to my shock, there I was running from Leatherface. I’ll be damned, this is incredible, I thought to myself.

"There are moments in life when you can't believe what's happening is really true. Pinch yourself, you may find out it is." - Pam - The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

We saw it was showing at a theater near some friends who lived in Tomball, a tiny town north of Houston. One of my roomies and I were soon in my VW bus headed to Tomball to see what was then called, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” for my first time. It felt surreal. I’ll tell you that story next time.

Who was the creator of the apparatus that was used in filming the famous meat hook scene? That would be Dottie Pearl and Bob Burns. Together, the night before we were to film, as I recall, they stayed up into the wee hours getting IT ready, but how did they do it?

how did they do it? I remember standing inside the kitchen. I don't have the call-sheets, but I'd bet it was after we'd finished shooting Pam's freezer scene, when she pops out of the freezer. I knew we were to shoot her meat hook scenes the following day. Smiling, Tobe asked me, "Teri, you know we're going to be shooting the meat hook scenes tomorrow, have you thought about that and what you might do?" I responded that indeed I had thought about it, and my thought was that IF she was impaled in a part of her back that didn't affect her spine, she might try, struggle to get off the hook. He listened, liked the idea, and immediately responded with a smile, a chuckle, and a puff on his stogie, probably followed by a gulp of a cold DP. Thinking back, it seems almost surreal that that was the extent of our discussion, but that really was IT. Fortunately, that worked out for us.

Imagine if you will, a bikini bottom made of Parachute strapping. Now imagine needing to conceal the bikini gadgetry under some red corduroy short-shorts and backless bathing suit. Now imagine you need the girl wearing the apparatus to be hanging, dangling from a meat hook, that must hold her weight of 110 pounds, and simultaneously making sure no meat hook actually touches her bare back.

The idea was that the audience sees that meat hook coming ominously close to her back, how do we accomplish this safely? You add another piece of parachute strapping about 9-10 inches, sewn with great care to the top back of the parachute strapping in the back of the bikini. The strap was hidden underneath until The Scene of the drop shot. It had to be hidden inside, out of site until the actual drop by Leatherface as he struggles to hold on to the screaming, writhing, hysterical young woman, who’s trying with all her might to escape this impending terrifying disaster.

Next challenge: You need something on the end of the attached strap, something incredibly strong. They decided a large steel parachute ring, that could be guided by someone crouched below, spotting her, as Leatherface waits for his cue to drop her, would be perfect. The steel ring Must Go over the hook and hold her weight. No room for mistakes.

Another clever part of Pam’s meat hook apparatus was Dottie sewing in the twisted legs of panty hose that had great strength and could be pinned underneath the front edges of Pam’s tiny backless bathing suit top, hidden underneath, which helped to keep the apparatus and suit together, long enough to get the shot.

Yes, they used pantyhose, which btw, only became the rage in the early seventies. Fact. It was for all women, freedom… from garter belts. Yes, we actually wore hose, individually attached to garter belts up until then! A little history: In 1974, actress Julie Newmar successfully filed a patent for “Pantyhose with shaping band for cheeky derriere relief”, a garment innovation made famous through the costume she designed in the 1960s for her role as Catwoman in the TV show Batman.

So, when Pam is hanging on the meat hook, held up only by the strapping and stainless steel loop, what happens? Right, that’s when they added lots of foam cushioning, where 100% of the weight inevitably goes. 😬 My sincere thanks for that!

I vividly remember, Tobe calling cut, and looking out to a line of cast and crew, mouths aghast at what they’d just witnessed. You could hear a pin drop. It seems there was a deep collective sigh. We did it. We got the shot that I later heard some one refer to it as “the money shot”, which at the time went right over my head. What’s a money-shot? For me, that was the moment when it crossed my mind, “Hey, maybe we have something here.”

We began filming that scene around 9 AM and finished in time to enjoy our caterer, Sally Nicholaou’s, delicious lunch. It was fast. The awful part? The blood they used was karo syrup based. There are 3 seconds of blood dripping into the bucket below Pam’s dangling feet, maybe only 2 seconds. I Hope It Was Worth It!! Think Texas heat, Karo-syrup, and flies, plenty of flies. UGH. Pre-planned earlier that morning, Dottie and I ran outside together. We landed at the windmill, me ripping off everything as Dottie took the water hose and sprayed me forever, until I was finally free of all remnants of sticky-icky karo-syrup, parachute strapping, shorts, bathing suit, et-al. LUNCH!!! ♥️🪝

Via chainsawgal  on IG

Flower Child 🌸💐💃🏼🌺🌼🐝 March 1971 - when I was a free spirited little hippie gal, all of 19. My boyfriend of 8 months, George, was taking my picture in front of the house he shared with Gunnar Hansen. It was on Avenue G and 49th St. in Central Austin, near the UT campus. Gunnar and I quickly became sworn enemies. He was relentless in making sure I was left out while he and George went out to hunt chicks, drink beer, and smoke pot. George was quite easily encouraged in all three areas. Excluding me wasn't going to work, especially after I noticed a very handsome fellow eying me on the Shuttle Bus. After 13 months with George, I’d had my fill and was ready to move on. Young and inexperienced, I was only beginning to understand that if they don't value you, don't respect you, they don't deserve you. There would be many more challenges ahead, but extracting myself from someone who treated me as though I was expendable was a powerful lesson. As angry and hurt as I was with George, I was more angry with myself for allowing myself to be tied to someone who undervalued me. At that time of self-protection, I spent less and less time looking in the rear view mirror and gratefully lost track of George and Gunnar dang Hansen. Ah-Love. Good riddance I said. I hoped.

This was one year and five months before Gunnar’s and my paths would cross again. It was on July 18, 1973, the first day on the set where we were beginning filming a little low-budget, aka "scab" film, at that time under the working title, "HEADCHEESE”. The cast, crew, producers, et all were gathered on Quick Hill Road, just outside Austin, Texas. We were standing in groups outside what we later came to know as “The Sawyer house”. The house was surrounded by grazing pastures and vacant land and located at the end of an approximate 100' dirt driveway, located directly across the unpaved Quick Hill Road from what was referred to as the old "Hardesty" house.

I was in for a big surprise that morning. I was standing outside the Sawyer house on that muggy, hot Texas morning, chit-chatting with my acting colleagues, ‘Sally’, ‘Kirk’, ‘Jerry’, and ‘Franklin’ (you know them). We were getting to know one another. We were all dressed in our costumes, all our own clothes that they’d picked out from different outfits we’d brought from home for them to choose from, for us to wear in the film, a strictly low-budget affair. Nearby, parked in the yard of the Sawyer house, was the Vortex RV/trailer/office, a no frills, no AC job, where we were soon to sign our first contracts. Everyone was pretty excited and a bit lost, finding our way. One thing we all had in common, we were making a movie. This was a great adventure we'd make together!

Producer-writer, Kim Henkel, stuck his head out the open RV door and excitedly called over to me, “Hey, Teri!! Come over here! I want to introduce you to 'Leatherface!” OK, I’m ready. Kim seemed thrilled, proud as punch for us to meet. As I stepped inside the steaming tin mobile unit, I made my way down the narrow aisle, walking toward a very large figure, a man with a head full of brown curly hair, who was sitting with his back to me. He took up one of the two banquette seats. Someone was seated across from him, but I can’t remember who. As I got even with him, I noted he was almost as tall sitting down as I was standing up. This guy was big. I was feeling an eerie sense of deja vu. Kim said, “Leatherface, meet Pam!” Ta-da! He turned his head toward me, cocked his head to look at me, both of us prepared to say, “Hey, nice to meet ya!!” Instead, we both looked at one another in sheer horror. We each jerked back with our mouths wide open. Simultaneously, we both blurted out, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE??!!!” They call them "excited utterances." I thought I'd lose my breakfast. Unbeknownst to either Gunnar, or myself, we'd both been cast in this dang little scab film.

We got through the moment, gathered our wits, quickly cooled our heels, and shared little with those around us. I'm thinking, "What have I gotten myself into?" Gunnar and I commiserated over coffee, kicked heels that first day on set, and most fortunately, we had a great time filming our scenes together and working with the entire crew.

A few weeks later, we began early that morning, stopped for lunch, then filmed straight through. During the final hour, they needed a few more shots, we were all wiped out. Around 8:30 PM, we were losing the light as well as the two actors. I'd already lost my voice. Kim Henkel appeared with a bottle of Johnny Walker Black. I took a few slugs and it soothed the pain. To be honest, it might have been Jack Daniels, I don't remember, but it was heep good medicine. Magically I was able to scream for the last few takes.

It was dusk, the heat had subsided as we walked out to Kim's truck. I don't remember the 15 mile drive back to my apartment at 909 West 22nd, just off Guadalupe St., aka "The Drag", across from the UT campus, home. I lived on the second floor and how I got up those stairs, I can't imagine. I was beyond sore. For 12 hours, I'd fought a 300 pound man for my life. My body ached and I felt completely limp, spent. I laid in my bed unable to turn over. I couldn't walk, lost my voice, had to cancel my performance as 'Lizzie', and my understudy went on. I wept for hours. I loved playing 'Lizzy Curry' like I'd never loved a character before. Actor Peter Breck was St. Ed's Special Guest, and played, 'Starbuck', "The Rainmaker". Great cast, such a rare, wonderful experience!

All the scenes with Leatherface that day stayed with me. I woke up throughout the night, anytime I changed position, the pain shot through my body. What a day that was filming, such a powerful experience. That memory has stayed with me. It moved in with me. Waking, sleeping, dreaming, eating, another hot bath, re-living the shoot, wondering... will the damn thing ever come out of the can?❓?

I stayed in bed for two days and was almost alive by the third morning. The coffee was divine. A-h-h-h-h. I'll live.

If I was tired, and I was, imagine how Gunnar felt! And, our poor exhausted crew. Hats off to all of them.

Over the years, Gunnar and George managed to reconcile. In 2012 Gunnar invited me to meet him at El Mercado in South First Street in South Austin, to interview me for his book. At the end, he asked if I ever talked to George, and had a few choice tidbits to tell me… but that’s a whole other story!

On a side note, both George and Gunnar eventually settled down and found the right girls. George married his Annie and they had three beautiful kids, who all settled far away Down Under. Gunnar spent 15 glorious years, his final years, with his love, Betty. At our MoMA celebration August 7-9, 2024, Betty said she felt grateful to have spent those years with Gunnar. Here's a toast to true love! 🥂 So, as you can see, Gunnar and I buried the ol' proverbial hatchet, and got on with things, and the rest, my friends, is history.

Thanks for reading.

Sending love to all.

Rest In Peace 🥀🌹🥀 Gunnar Hansen 1947-2015 George 1945-2017

**Thanks to Eric Goode for the cleanup and colorization on these 50-year-old B&W photos. @ericgoode106 on IG ❤

Saturday, 6 PM, January 22, 2022 Fair to Midland, partly cloudy, clear skies ahead.

xoxo,

Pam 🪝🌹

Pam Lives: Part III Beyond The Texas Chainsaw Massacre The Hardesty's - 1951 - 1962 A School of Delight - The Early Years Sally and Franklin, first cousins, had spent their early childhood years playing at their grandparents once beautiful home. For the last 15 years, especially after Grandpa Hardesty's death in 1963, and Grandmother Hardesty's then failing health, when she became too old to live alone in the house, the 27 windows and 7 doors were soon boarded up. Grandma Hardesty was moved to Luling, to a nursing home near Franklin's family. Saturday, the 18th of August, was to be a very special day for both Sally and Franklin, a day of remembering their beloved grandparents, and the summers they had so enjoyed there as children, running free, swimming, and fishing for tadpoles in the nearby creek. Their cherished memories of watching the stars while sitting on the lawn, or nestled in their grandparents' laps, eating corn, squash, and fresh tomatoes from the garden, had filled their thoughts and sustained them through the years. The Hardesty sons had managed to keep the house in livable condition until Grandpa Hardesty had his last stroke, and soon passed. 

The two grandchildren were left brokenhearted. Grandma Hardesty became lost without her best friend, lost in grief, and was soon forgetting things. One day the month after Grandpa had passed, Sally came up from Houston to visit her with her mother. Instead of standing at the door to welcome them, Grandma Hardesty never moved from her rocking chair, and her eyes looked out the window, as though her mind was somewhere else. When Sally took her hand, Mrs. Hardesty asked who she was. Sally looked into her grandmother’s eyes as she stroked her grandmother’s long white silky braid, she'd combed so many times. Gently she said, “I’m Sally, grandma, don’t you know me?” Big crocodile tears began to stream down Sally’s face and cheeks as her grandmother's eyes blankly stared back. Sally was deeply sensitive and perceptive, most unusual for a child, and always such a determined little soul, full of love and kindness. She pulled herself up on her grandmother’s lap and held her granny close, realizing something was terribly wrong, but hoping if she held her grandma tight, and long enough, surely, surely she would remember her. Unfortunately, Grandma Hardesty didn’t remember her, but allowed Sally to stay on her lap, and rock with her for some time.

Back then it was called, "Dementia," not, "Alzheimer's." Adored by their grandparents, Franklin and Sally were overcome with sadness when they began to realize they would probably never go back to play and run freely in their grandparent’s fields, as they had always taken for granted before, or pick vegetables with them in their garden, ride in Grandpa’s brand new Studebaker into town for groceries. The two people in the world they worshipped and loved so much, were disappearing from their lives. There would be no more Christmas or Easter dinners where the two families would gather. The loss was profound and marked a significant change for them, and for their families.

In their first ten years of life, the two children came every summer from their homes, Sally from Houston, and Franklin from Luling. They would stay from mid-June to mid-August and stay with the old couple in their 100-year-old home tucked away in the country, outside Round Rock, Texas. In the Hardesty’s last three summers in their house, they had also welcomed Sally's friend, Pam, to come with them. Pam would become Franklin's friend as well, and usually stay the first three weeks, and then return for their last week. The three friends enjoyed running through the fields, playing on the old tractor, or behind the barn, and continually investigating the mysterious old outhouse that stood in ruin out behind the house. Each wondered why anyone would need such a thing when running toilets worked so well! Grandma Hardesty laughed at the children's naïveté and patiently explained that indoor plumbing hadn't been installed in the house until 1937, just about the same time they got electricity. The children sat enthralled by her stories. Tears had filled Grandma's eyes when she described the first time she pushed the switch, and the light came on. It was like a miracle! She said it had changed their lives “utterly and completely.” They were no longer in the dark, or lighting kerosene lamps to see, and Grandpa soon bought her a refrigerator to replace the old ice box. 

Sally, Pam, and Franklin had talked endlessly about these mystifying subjects, their young minds trying hard to comprehend it all. They were stunned to learn that there had actually been no electricity until around the same time as the toilets and running water, as the house was outside the city of Round Rock, where it had come years earlier. "No 'lectricity? That's just cwazy!" little Franklin had remarked, mouth agape. Pam and Sally agreed completely, and sat up late by candlelight, whispering long into the night, their minds full of wonder. They only had more questions the next day, and the day after that, and so on. It was a rich and exciting journey they took in the country outside Round Rock, a school of unexpected delight, and marvelous secrets that fueled their endless days of pretend, each playing different roles, imagining stories that they played out day after day. When Grandpa told them about boiling water to bathe in an old tub before there had been plumbing, Franklin asked, "What’s plumbin’ Grandpa?"  Indeed they shared powerful memories and deep emotions of their times spent with the old couple who had taught them so much, and who they felt so inextricably bonded to. 

The home then fell into complete disrepair and neglect, barely surviving the 1965 flood, as well as a small group of local teens who used it as their meeting place for parties, and late-night lover’s trysts, accompanied by a little dabbling in LSD and pot. Later, another group of teen vandals had discovered it, and both groups alternately hung out there. Often they had used boards to build fires in the backyard on cool nights. They could park their cars in back and not be seen by any of the neighbors who lived nearby. Then, one night the sheriff heard a rumor and came out with two deputies to investigate. All thirteen teens got busted for “one roach.” That’s all it took back in 1967 to get put away for 10 years, and that is exactly what happened to 19-year-old Bobby Bush. That was all they found anyway. By a stroke of luck, Bobby and his pals had left their stash hidden far out beyond the back fence, a hundred yards away, bringing only a few joints to the house, which they had already smoked by the time the sheriff arrived. The cops never found the rest of the five pounds of pot and the 37 tabs of Purple Haze. If they had, Bobby would have gotten life for sure. The cops never realized that all thirteen were tripping heavily on acid when they had arrived at 3 AM. As it turned out, Bobby was the only one they charged, but it put such a fear of God into the whole area, so much that the kids decided to never return to the house after that night, except for the one night Leon and Riley snuck back to get the stash. From the road one mile to the South, crossing over the field at night, the two young men managed to retrieve their booty. Bobby went to the pen at Huntsville. He only served three years because his Uncle George had just been elected to the Texas House Of Representatives and pulled some strings for his nephew, but it was a gigantic embarrassment to the family of blue-bloods, and Bobby was relegated to the role of black sheep forever thereafter. After that, the property was all but ignored until Sally, Franklin, Pam Jerry, and Kirk visited.  And now, the Hardesty property was to be sold off. It just felt wrong. For the past five years, their two fathers had been embroiled in a nasty heated debate, causing somewhat of a rift, all over what was to be done with it. Taxes had steadily been going up every year. It was a piece of nostalgia that was in their blood, and yet, an unwanted financial burden on both families. Lives would change forever after 1963 with Grandpa’s stroke, and then, with young Franklin's accident in ‘63. That was a misery that would compel the two brothers to find their souls again, and by that come to recognize what really mattered in life. It worked like bittersweet tonic and brought the families back together because that’s what you did when things got bad, back then, you stuck together. You stuck by them through thick and thin.

End Pam Lives! Part III 🚀💋🎥🪝🪚⛓ 🐓 Cover Designs by Desmond Ambrose Root Pam Escaping - Drawing by @Tadeo Mendoza ** (Inside stories)

The End (For Now)

Next: Tales From The Terrell County Hospital

xoxo,