BuffettNews.com

By David Segal
Washington Post Staff Writer

Executives at TV Land surely expected gracious applause when they
announced plans for a bronze statue of Samantha Stephens
in "Bewitched." And why not? Everyone loves the statue of Ralph
Kramden in "The Honeymooners," which was commissioned by the rerun
cable network and is now on display in midtown Manhattan. There were
upbeat reviews for their homage to "The Andy Griffith Show," which
enshrines Sheriff Andy Taylor and young son Opie and which you can
see near the statehouse in North Carolina.

But the plans for the salute to "Bewitched" didn't go over well.
That's because TV Land decided the place for this nine-foot tribute
to America's most beloved housewife witch is in the middle of Salem,
Mass., a town best known for hanging 19 citizens accused of
witchcraft. Okay, it happened a long time ago -- in 1692 to be exact -
- but it's still a sore subject. Capitalizing on that history with a
statue of a broom-riding TV witch struck some locals as in really bad
taste.

"It's like TV Land going to Auschwitz and proposing to erect a statue
of Colonel Klink," says John Carr, a former member of the Salem
Historic District Commission. "Putting this statue in the park near
the church where this all happened, it trivializes the execution of
19 people."

Tonight, the fate of the statue, which is already being cast at a
foundry, will be determined by a vote of the Salem Redevelopment
Authority. That organization owns Lappin Park, where Elizabeth
Montgomery's character is slated for installation.

Mayor Stanley Usovicz, a vocal supporter of the TV Land plan, likes
his odds. No disrespect intended, he says. The town takes its dark
past seriously and deals with it reverently in museums, but that
doesn't mean it should decline to showcase a pop-culture icon.

"Will this statue redefine Salem? Absolutely not," he explains. "Will
it add to the experience of coming here? Definitely."

"Bewitched," which ended an eight-year run in 1972, is one of those
goofy, timepiece shows that seem never to leave the airwaves. It will
officially have cross-generational appeal when Nicole Kidman stars in
a movie version to be released this summer. The family in the
original supposedly lived in Connecticut, but a handful of episodes
were set in Salem, where Samantha attended a convention of witches.
That made it seem like a logical place to the executives at TV Land,
especially when they visited the town during Halloween and found that
thousands of revelers had descended on the place.

"What we saw was a huge Halloween party," says Robert Pellizzi, a TV
Land senior vice president. "So we thought, it certainly makes sense
to ask."

They sought advice about where to put the statue and they made a
generous offer. Not only would the town get the bronze for free, but
TV Land also offered to renovate Lappin Park and to pay for upkeep of
the statue, too. In return, of course, TV Land hopes for public
relations points, including some good photo ops in June, when the
statue is scheduled for installation and unveiling.

So what does this thing look like? Good question. The network wants
maximum ooohs when it whips the curtain off Samantha so it won't
release photos or drawings. But the artists who designed the statue,
at a place called StudioEIS in Brooklyn, shared a rendering of the
piece on condition that it not appear in the newspaper.

So here's a description: Imagine Samantha, dressed in one of the
sensible frocks she wore on the show, sitting on a broom, which is
resting on a crescent moon. The moon, in turn, is resting on the top
of a cloud, which is on a pedestal. Samantha is smiling and her left
arm is turned up at the elbow. It's like she's saying, "It's a cinch
to fly." Her legs are crossed at the ankles.

The sculptors' studio is owned and operated by Elliot and Ivan
Schwartz, brothers who are best known for their casts of the Founding
Fathers -- which can be found in such places as the National
Constitution Center in Philadelphia -- and for commemorative objects
for museums, including the Smithsonian. Last week, StudioEIS was
filled with more than a dozen lifelike military figures, part of a
project for the Marines.

"If I were one of the people who had a house on the beautiful common
there, would I hate it?" asked Ivan Schwartz, sitting at a conference
table last week and discussing the Samantha statue. "Yes, probably.
But it seems like [Salem] was going down that path long before this
TV Land thing ever surfaced."

"That path" is the path of cashing in on Salem's witchipoo backstory,
something the town has been doing for a while. The high school mascot
is the witch, and police officers have a witch and broom stitched
into the emblem on their uniforms. In the run-up to Halloween, a
bunch of costume stores and haunted-house operations open up and the
place is transformed, at least for the night, into a party town. It's
a strange premise for attracting crowds: We hanged people, so come on
down! For residents such as John Carr, the camp is getting a little
out of hand.

"God bless the mayor, but he thinks that statue is contemporary art,"
Carr says. "The whole idea is bad taste beyond belief."

I actually worked at a haunted house business in Salem for about 5 years. The worst thing that town could do would be to let them put that statue up. It's completely ridiculous down there as it is with all of the witchcraft shops and drunken idiots that descend on the place for Halloween. Before anyone accuses me of having a double standard on the subject, the place I used to work for had absolutely no references to witches. It was all about monsters and scary fun.

The truth of the matter is, I would get into it with dumba$$ tourists all of the time, who were sadly and horribly mistaken on what actually happened in Salem's past. 19 INNOCENT people hung, and one pressed to death - and these people would be jabbering about the witches of Salem and how exciting of a time it must have been. Yeah.....20 innocent people died because some pre-teen spoiled brats said they should. The ultimate irony was that those who "admitted" their guilt were set free, it was only those who stood firm to their beliefs that were sacrificed.

BUT, the town will let them put Samantha Stevens up. Because no matter how much they claim to hate the witch business - it's all over their town logos, and it brings a TON of money into the place.

If anyone's REALLY interested in the Witchcraft Hysteria, I recommend the movie 3 Sovereigns for Sarah, or a visit to the Rebecca Nurse house in Danvers, MA.

Sorry about the soapbox tirade, but I take this one a little personally.

I hear ya MM I only live 20 minutes away from Salem I've been going there since I was little, and my bro went to SSC. It is mass hysteria there around halloween. I don't know how I feel about the statue either way...I don't think it will hurt anything because the witch hype is what brings alot of money into Salem anyways. The true facts of the Salem Witch Hunt are already trivialized so much by some of the places in Salem that I don't think one statue is going to make a big difference either way. Although I do agree with you the sad history of the witch hunt is lost on many tourists, I think it's so important to all of us around here, because it is drilled into us in school because it's local and we live here.

The "witch hunt" went far beyond Salem. It was pretty much rampant all over the world and untold numbers of innocent people were either tortured or killed in many various terrible ways.....from pressing to drowning to hanging to being burned at the stake. Number vary from hundreds of thousands to in the millions. It was an easy way to get rid of someone different or that you did not like.No one was safe!

I know the number stands at 20 killed in Salem, but there were many more accused and not all of them were women. Here is a site of a memorial to those twenty people. http://www.salemweb.com/memorial/stonesintro.shtml

Globally most ( NOT ALL) of the women that were accused were more or less what today would be called a Midwife and had experience with and knowledge of herbs and healing...it included women that were outspoken, unpopular,controversial, etc.

( Getting alittle off topic but it is still relevant if you read you will see why.)
These are referred to "the burning times". That time means as much to many of those that are that particular religion, as Hitler and the Nazis "Ultimate Solution" does to the Jews. I have no idea why Hitler and the Nazis attrocities get so much press so to speak while pretty much most of Japan's attrocities are pretty much ignored...occasionally you see mention of Japan's Unit 731 in WWII, but no mention of Japanese Unit 100 or Unit 516. ( Here is one site for you and I warn you before you go there, you will feel a mixture of emotions...and no doubt be grossed out by the details of the inhumanity and cruelty and wonder why you never heard of it before...No graphic photos TG, but the words are graphic enough..... http://www.skycitygallery.com/japan/japan.html They sort of make Mengele look like an amateur....no I am not making light or even remotely joking. I am merely pointing out something terrible happened in very recent history ( 60 years ago) invovling unncountable and inconcievable horror, pain, and death on such a large scale and is largely overlooked and ignored for the most part.)

Many people that profess to be of the Wiccan or other same type of pagan religion remember the burning times and are very aware that they occurred centuries ago could just as easily return today to persecute them. They point out the mass murders and genocide such as those listed above, among others. They feel it could just as easily happen to them.

( Okies back to the topic. My apologies!)

If my memory serves correctly, even the then Governor (?)'s wife was accused and they fled to New York and letters were sent to the King of England to put a stop to the madness...which finally did bring about at least an open end to it, though the hysteria does still occur here and there but not on such a scale.

The town popularized and makes money off the notariety of what happened there. I don't really have feelings on the statue either way. I did like the show and I liked Elizabeth Montgomery (RIP).
I fail to understand why a statue of her in the role she played would be anymore or anyless insulting than the witch emblem on uniform patches or shops or letterhead, and the whole town that commercializes on the witch background and history there.
The town apparently thrives on the witch symbol and the witch history intrigue apparently draws people there.