Northern Virginia | June/July-2006
1978, Director Ron Maxwell

After laughter and sniffles were heard in all the right places during the April 8 screening of this forgotten WW2 fable, the credits rolled and the house lights came up. An audience member thanked Ron Maxwell, the filmmaker, then asked him to contrast today’s audience with viewers’ reactions back in 1978, when Verna: USO Girl launched the careers of Cissy Spacek and William Hurt.

The award-winning Northern Virginia based director of Gods and Generals (2003) said “No, thank YOU. Verna went right into [TV on] Great Performances,” Maxwell explained, “and so tonight is only the second time I’ve watched this film with an audience. The only other time was at the cast and crew screening in 1977.”

That’s a pity. There’s something magical and enduring in this bittersweet comedy about show business, celebrity—and wartime. With Zelig-like precision Maxwell injects 1970s actors back into 40-year-old newsreel footage of B-list acting troupes sent overseas to entertain U.S. troops in Belgium. The doomed love story sparkles with the same chemistry as The Purple Rose of Cairo. Cissy Spacek wins you over with her portrayal of a no-talent hack who, paradoxically, is bursting with star quality. She mesmerizes the troops she entertains even as she sings off-key and bungles her dance steps. “Her next movie was Coal Miner’s Daughter,” Maxwell told the festival audience, “so we all know that Cissy Spacek can really sing.”

But Spacek was Maxwell’s second choice for the role. “A month before shooting, the script was [up to] until she’s killed. We had no ending. We were getting set to fly over to Germany to shoot on a 14-day schedule. It was just crazy. Then Mary Beth Hurt, who we’d cast in the lead, left the production to do Interiors for Woody Allen. Mary Beth’s husband, Bill Hurt, was just out of Juilliard and this would be his first film performance. His agent called me a minute later and said, ‘Do you still want Bill?’ ”

If Verna won’t screen at a repertory theatre near you any time soon, you can buy it on Amazon.