Caitlin Clarke: Ten Years After
Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the passing of Caitlin Clarke. Please take a moment:
- to reflect on the loss of one of American theater's finest yet most obscure actresses. Reflect that Ms. Clarke would never get, and would never have gotten, the type of fame that some of her Yale School of Drama classmates have today. It is just as well, as fame might have changed her into a self-humiliating monster, like some Disney girl, or even some bane to society like Meryl Steep (remember her role in the Alar Scare?) or Jenny McCarthy (the anti-vaccination queen).
- to reflect that the only thing that has brought her any kind of attention was her role as Valerian in the 1981 film Dragonslayer. That film could have helped her career if not for the following:
- Ms. Clarke, like most of her family, tended to be uncommunicative, a quality that made it hard for public relations people to work with her.
- Dragonslayer was a coproduction of Paramount and Disney. Disney refused to release the film on its original date of XMas 1980. It came out in June 1981 to compete with Raiders of the Lost Ark and Superman II.
- to reflect that the type of cancer that killed Ms. Clarke is still as stealthy as ever, masking itself with symptoms that could pass as other diseases, until it is detected, by which time it is too late. Also, consider that the leading indicator of ovarian cancer — nulliparity — makes discussion of the disease difficult. (Ms. Clarke bore no children.)
Let us reflect that Ms. Clarke has left us some small legacy in the lives that she has touched. Sleep well, Katie.