My Body, My Child

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My Body, My Child
My Body, My Child.jpg
GenreDrama
Based onMy Body, My Child
by Louisa Burns-Bisogno
Written byLouisa Burns-Bisogno
Directed by Marvin J. Chomsky
Starring Vanessa Redgrave
Jack Albertson
Joseph Campanella
Stephen Elliott
James Naughton
Theme music composer Charles Gross
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
Production
Executive producer Herbert Brodkin
ProducerThomas De Wolfe
Production locations Hendersonville, Tennessee
Nashville, Tennessee
Cinematography Tony Imi
EditorsRobert M. Reitano
Ronald Roose
Running time100 minutes
Production companyTitus Productions
Original release
Network ABC
ReleaseApril 12, 1982 (1982-04-12)

My Body, My Child is a 1982 American made-for-television drama film directed by Marvin J. Chomsky and starring Vanessa Redgrave. It was adapted by Louisa Burns-Bisogno from her play of the same name. [1] The film premiered on ABC on 12 April 1982. It includes early performances by future Sex and the City co-stars, Sarah Jessica Parker and Cynthia Nixon. It is also the final television role of Jack Albertson, who was subsequently nominated posthumously for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie. [2]

Contents

Plot

Leenie is a middle-aged Irish-American schoolteacher with three grown daughters. She unexpectedly finds herself pregnant again and is delighted. However, her doctor rejects this possibility because of an unreliable blood test and her age. Thus her symptoms such as troubled sleeping and sickness are misdiagnosed as psychogenic. She is prescribed a host of medications to cope with these difficulties. It later turns out that she is in fact pregnant, and that these medications have been causing irreversible damage to her unborn baby. Faced with the truth that her child will be born with defects, she faces a decision to keep the baby or go against her religious beliefs and have an abortion. [3]

Cast

Critical reception

John J. O'Connor of The New York Times praised the talent involved, but lamented that Burns-Bisogno's play was expanded from a small personal drama into a wider story with "tangential plots and subtexts, most of them having to do with the greed and sheer incompetence of the medical profession". [1] He also noted that characters besides the protagonist are thinly sketched. [1]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 O'Connor, John J. (April 12, 1982). "TV: Vanessa Redgrave as a Wife Facing Abortion". The New York Times . Retrieved May 26, 2025.
  2. ↑ "My Body, My Child". Emmy Awards. Retrieved May 26, 2025.
  3. ↑ "Overview for My Body, My Child". Turner Classic Movies . Archived from the original on November 2, 2012. Retrieved September 1, 2010.
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