Retro Television Review: The American Short Story Episode 7: The Displaced Person

Posted on July 19, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Saturdays, I will be reviewing The American Short Story, which ran semi-regularly on PBS in 1974 to 1981. The entire show can be purchased on Prime and found on YouTube and Tubi.

This week, we have an adaptation of Flannery O’Connor’s longest short story.

Episode #7: “The Displaced Person”

(Dir by Glenn Jordan, originally aired in 1977)

Life at a Georgia farm is thrown into turmoil when the farm’s owner, widow Mrs. McIntyre (Irene Worth), agrees to give a job to a Polish refugee named Mr. Guizac (Noam Yerushalmi). As World War II has just ended and Father Flynn (John Houseman) has assured Mrs. McIntyre that Guizac can drive a tractor, Mrs. McIntyre is happy to give Guizac a home in America. Less happy are the people who already work at the farm, most of whom see the hard-working Guizac as being a threat. Mrs. Shortley (Shirley Stoler) worries that her husband (Lane Smith) is going to lose his job to Guizac. Meanwhile, a young farmhand named Sulk (Samuel L. Jackson) enters into a business arrangement with Guizac, one that causes Mrs. McIntyre to change her opinion of Guizac. Needless to say, it all ends in tragedy.

This adaptation is based on a short story that Flannery O’Connor wrote after her own mother hired a family of Polish refugees to work at their family farm, Andalusia. This adaptation was actually filmed at Andalusia, only a few months after Flannery O’Connor’s death. The furniture seen in the house was O’Connor’s own furniture. The peacocks the drive Mrs. McIntyre crazy and which cause Father Flynn to have a religious epiphany are the same peacocks that roamed the farm when Flanney O’Connor lived there. The cemetery that Mrs. McIntyre visits is the O’Connor family cemetery. It brings a sense of authenticity to the film, one that is often missing from films made about the South.

The adaptation moves at a deliberate pace but it’s well-acted and it stays true to O’Connor’s aesthetic. Those who might complain that there are only two likable characters in the film — Mr. Guizac and Father Flynn — are missing the point of O’Connor’s story. Even Mrs. McIntyre, who initially seems to be trying to do the right thing, is blinded by the prejudices of race and class. Father Flynn never gives up on trying to redeem both Mrs. McIntyre and the rest of the world but one gets the feeling that he might be too late.

The cast is what truly makes this adaptation stand-out. Irene Worth, John Houseman, Lane Smith, Robert Earl Jones, they all give excellent performances. Samuel L. Jackson was very young when he appeared in The Displaced Person but he already had the screen presence that has since made him famous. The best performance comes from Shirley Stoler, who plays Mrs. Shortley as being a master manipulator who, unfortunately, happens to be married to a worthless man. Mrs. Shortley does what she does to protect her husband. Mr. Shortley does what he does because he’s a loud mouth bigot. Everyone has their own reasons, to paraphrase Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game. In this story, those reasons lead to tragedy.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story Episode 6: “I’m A Fool”

Posted on July 12, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, after an introduction from Henry Fonda, The American Short Story presents a short film about a young man discovers that he’s a fool.

Episode 6 “I’m A Fool”

(Dir by Noel Black, originally aired in 1977)

In this adaptation of a Sherwood Anderson short story, Ron Howard (back in his younger days, before he became better-known as a director) stars as Andy. Andy is a young man who runs away from his safe and comfortable life in search of adventure. He gets a job as a “swipe,” which was apparently what people used to call the folks who took care of the horses at a racetrack. He and an older black man named Burt (Santiago Gonzalez) travel the racing circuit in Ohio and form a tentative friendship. Burt can tell that, for all of his attempts to come across as being tough and worldly, Andy is a virgin who gets drunk easily and who has no idea what the real world is like.

Andy claims to be a proud member of the working class but then he meets a pretty and rich girl named Lucy (Amy Irving). Andy introduces himself as being Walter, the son of a wealthy stable owner. Andy and Lucy spend the day together and Andy comes to realize that he loves her and that she seems to love him as well. But then Andy realizes that she only knows him as Walter and that it’s too late to tell her the truth. “I’m a fool,” Andy says before leaving with Burt.

This 35-minute short film featured good performances from Ron Howard and Amy Irving and some lovely shots of the countryside, showing why a life of wandering through rural Ohio might appeal to a young person searching for meaning. There’s a great scene in a bar where the outclassed Andy tries to prove himself to a bunch of snobs by drinking whiskey and smoking a cigar. Unfortunately, the strength of Sherwood Anderson’s original short story is that it puts us straight into Andy’s head and allows us to see the thought process that led to him coming up with his foolish lie. Despite featuring narration from Ron Howard, this adaptation doesn’t really accomplish that and, as a result, the viewer is always on the outside looking in.

It’s not a bad adaptation but it can’t beat sitting down and reading the original story.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story #4 “Almos’ A Man”

Posted on June 28, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we have an adaptation of a Richard Wright short story.

Episode #4 “Almos’ A Man”

(Dir by Stan Lathan, originally aired in 1976)

David (LeVar Burton) is a black fifteen year-old living in the Deep South in the 1930s. He works on his family’s farm and takes care of a mule named Jenny. He considers himself to be almost a man. His mother (Madge Sinclair) and his father (Robert DoQui) disagree.

David knows the one thing that he need to make himself a man. He needs a gun and, this being the 1930s, he finds one that he can order from a Sears & Roebuck catalogue. His mother says that there’s no way she’s letting him get a gun. His father is a bit more open to it. David secretly sends away for the gun and, as you can probably guess, tragedy ensues.

This was a downbeat adaptation of a similarly downbeat Richard Wright short story. David obsession with being a man makes sense when you consider that he lives in a world where everyone — from his parents to the menacing white people who show up towards end — calls him a “boy.” The white people even call his father “boy” and it’s a reminder of how that term was used to dehumanize and degrade black men, even someone like David’s father who has raised a family, takes care of his farm, and who is, in every way imaginable, a man.

Nicely done, this one, with good performance from Burton, Sinclair, and Doqui. As for Richard Wright, he had been dead for 16 years by the time this premiered. He died in Paris, having left the United States in 1946. He’s remembered for his novel Native Son and his memoir, Black Boy. Personally, I would add that he should also be remembered for his essay that appeared in the anti-Communist collection, The God That Failed. This adaptation of Almos‘ A Man does a good job paying tribute to Wright’s voice and legacy.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story #3 “The Jolly Corner”

Posted on June 21, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we have an adaptation of a Henry James short story.

Episode #3 “The Jolly Corner”

(Dir by Arthur Barron, originally aired in 1975)

In 1906, Spencer Brydon (Fritz Weaver) returns to America from Europe, where he’s spent the majority of his adult life. Brydon has specifically returned to oversee some properties that he has inherited, including his childhood home and an adjacent building that’s going to be turned into an apartment complex. The middle-aged Brydon reconnects with his old friend, Alice Shaverton (Salome Jens), and finds himself wondering what type of man he would have come if he had stayed and worked in America as opposed to living a life of leisure in Europe.

Soon, Spencer comes to feel that his alternate “American” self is actually haunting his childhood home, his so-called “Jolly Corner.” His American self haunts him like a ghost, a menacing shadow that continually forces him to ask “what if?” He becomes obsessed with both his former home and his shadowy alter ego. But is this American version of Spencer Brydon real? And if it is real, what does it want from the Spencer Brydon who went to Europe?

This was a really well-done adaptation of a Henry James short story, one that was full of gothic atmosphere and which featured a compelling lead performance from Fritz Weaver. As directed by Arthur Barron, this episode did a good job of portraying the story’s horror elements while also reminding us that James’s story, for all of its talk of ghosts and alternate realities, is ultimately a portrait of a really bad midlife crisis. Spencer did what a lot of rich Americans do. He went to Europe to escape the responsibilities of his home country. And now, in middle-age, he’s asking himself, “Is this all there is?”

If nothing else, watching this episode might inspire the viewer to read more Henry James. That’s a good thing.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story 1.2 “Parker Adderson, Philosopher”

Posted on June 14, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, we have an adaptation of an Ambrose Bierce short story.

Episode 1.2 “Parker Adderson, Philosopher”

(Dir by Arthur Barron, originally aired on January 8th, 1974)

This adaptation of an Ambrose Bierce short story takes place during the Civil War. Parker Adderson (Harris Yulin) is a Union spy who is captured behind Confederate lines. Brought into the ramshackle Confederate camp, he’s put into a small cabin. He knows that, as a spy, he’s going to be executed in the morning and he seems to be at peace with that. For the most part, his captors treat him humanely. Though they may be at war, there doesn’t seem to be any real animosity between Adderson and the Confederate general (Douglass Watson) who is in charge of the camp. They are two men who have a job to do and they both seem to respect each other. At night, the General and Adderson have a conversation, talking about the war and mortality. Adderson gets a last meal. Everything seems to be strangely peaceful …. until Adderson discovers that he’s not going to be executed the way that he wants to be executed. By the time the morning sun rises, three men are dead. The formerly philosophical Adderson dies in a rage against his captors while the General dies with the peace and grace that Adderson originally envisioned for himself.

This was an effective and melancholy adaptation of Ambrose Bierce’s short story, one that captured both Bierce’s anti-war sentiments and his cynical view of the human condition. For all of his efforts to put himself above the realities of war, Adderson falls apart once the reality of his impending death becomes obvious. Meanwhile, the previously boorish general finds a certain redemption in his death, perhaps because the General, unlike Adderson, never tried to rationalize the violence of war or the cruelty of fate.

It’s a nicely-done episode, featuring good performances from both Watson and Yulin. I’ve gotten so used to seeing Yulin cast as corporate and government villains that it was really eye-opening to see him playing a complicated character for once. Clocking in at a little over 30 minutes, Parker Adderson, Philosopher is a thought-provoking look at war and the men who fight it.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story 1.1 “The Music School”

Posted on May 17, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, we start a new series of reviews with an adaptation of a John Updike short story!

Episode 1.1 “The Music School”

(Dir by John Korty, originally aired on January 1st, 1974)

The first episode of The American Short Story is based on a story by John Updike. Alfred Schweigen (Ron Weyand) is a writer who sits at his typewriter and who occasionally looks out the window of his office. His wife playfully sprays the window with a garden hose and the writer thinks about how she’s in therapy because of his affairs. He remembers taking his daughter to her music school and thinks about the sounds of music floating through the building like ghostly memories. He thinks about a priest who, while talking to a bunch of “Protestants and non-believers,” explained that it was now permissible to chew the Eucharist wafer instead of waiting for it to dissolve. He thinks about a friend of his, a computer programmer, who was apparently assassinated by a random sniper while his family watched. In his mind, Alfred takes the random thoughts and occurrences and builds a story around them.

It’s an interesting episode, even if it doesn’t quite work. Tasked with bringing Updike’s words to visual life, this episode far too often falls back onto cliche and Ron Weyand often looks more annoyed that sincerely perplexed by life’s mysteries. (The writer’s narration is provided by Henry Fonda, whose middle-American voice doesn’t quite match Weyand’s petulant performance.) It’s a midlife crisis type of story, one in which the writer tries to deal with his own ennui and infidelities by turning them into fiction. Unfortunately, this is a case of what was compelling on the page falling flat when it’s adapted for film. I appreciated this episode’s ambition, even if it didn’t work in the end.

Next week, the American Short Story interprets a story by Ambrose Bierce!