FEATURE

"SALEM WITCH TRIALS"
(Broadcast Dates: March 2 and March 4)

February 10, 2003

A BEHIND-THE-SCENES LOOK AT THE CREATION OF THE SCRIPT, SETS AND COSTUMES FOR "SALEM WITCH TRIALS"

"Why the 'afflicted' girls did what they did is one of the most compelling mysteries... If viewers end up debating why the girls did what they did, then I think I will have done my job." - "Salem Witch Trials" writer Maria Nation

SALEM WITCH TRIALS is the story of one of the darkest chapters in history. It explores how in 1692 the small Puritan community of Salem, Mass. succumbs to mass hysteria - enabling a small influential force to haphazardly accuse, jail, convict and even kill members of their own churchgoing community whom they suddenly deem to be witches.

SALEM WITCH TRIALS, a new four-hour mini-series starring Kirstie Alley, Alan Bates, Henry Czerny, Rebecca De Mornay, Shirley MacLaine, Gloria Reuben and Peter Ustinov, will be broadcast Sunday, March 2 and Tuesday, March 4 (9:00-11:00 PM, ET/PT; each night) on the CBS Television Network.

When interviewed during the course of the production of the mini-series, Writer Maria Nation, Costume Designer Martha Mann and Production Designer Nancey Pankiw explained how, while approaching their separate roles, they strove, through intense research, to create an historically accurate portrayal of the time.

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Bringing the Events of the Salem Witch Trials to Life -- on Paper:

Writer Maria Nation ("A Season for Miracles") spent a year researching the events of the Salem Witch Trials and striving to fully grasp the magnitude and complexity of the era in which they occurred. It was important to Nation to portray a sense of the social and sexual politics and culture of the time. She worked to familiarize herself with the Puritan people and the day-to-day life in their community. Religious mores, a shame-based culture, gender politics, a harsh physical geography, disease outbreaks and Indian attacks all contributed to the culture of fear within this society. Nation believes this "back story" helps to shed some light on how the hysteria and subsequent trials came to be. Nation sees it as significant, as well, that the witch hunts happened during a period in which the colony had no charter. For, in essence, there was no law in the land at the time.

Her research consisted of reading works of various scholars and historians, such as John Demos, Stephen Nissembaum and Paul Boyer, Francis Hill and Bryan Le Beau. She met with Larry Gragg, who wrote a biography about Samuel Parris, and contacted Francis Hill, who was currently in the process of writing a visitor's guide to the 'Salem Witch Trials' after having written her scholarly works, The Salem Witch Trials Reader and Delusions of Satan. From Nissenbaum and Boyer's Salem-Village Witchcraft: A Documentary Record of Local Conflict in Colonial New England, Nation learned how the power and money shift of certain key families related to the series of accusations, which is seen in the film in the conflict between the Putnam clan and the new money class that was represented by Israel Porter and John Proctor. She also referred to the original Parris sermons, which were published by the Colonial Society of Massachusetts.

"The citizens of the colony happened to be quite litigious," says Nation, referring to the letters to the court, petitions, depositions and resolutions she found during her research. In reading these documents, Nation also got a sense of the formality and cadence of the characters' speech and manners - and hints about their attitudes and lives. From the sermons and writings of Reverend Parris (played by Henry Czerny), Nation understood him to be a very stern man; Sir William Phips (played by Alan Bates), an adventurer who was benighted for finding buried treasure off the island of Haiti, was, per Nation, likely more a liberal and progressive thinker, and, although there was little written about Parris' wife, Elizabeth (played by Rebecca De Mornay), there is speculation that she was probably a sickly woman - as she had so few children and died shortly after the trials.

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Though it was vital to bring the key players and historically documented events to life in her script, Nation is leaving some of the more ambiguous circumstances open to interpretation by the viewers. "Why the 'afflicted' girls did what they did is one of the most compelling mysteries," says Nation. "Coming to any kind of conclusion about that in this mini-series would be a disservice to history, but if viewers end up debating why the girls did what they did, then I think I will have done my job."

Puritans Didn't All Dress in Black:

In preparing for SALEM WITCH TRIALS Costume Designer Martha Mann admits she had a slight advantage in that she has designed for stage productions of Arthur Miller's The Crucible. Yet, she still spent a great deal of time pouring over American portraits and paintings of the period, finding that most depicted the wealthy class. Images of Sir William Phips (played by Alan Bates) were in abundance, as one of his friends was a portrait painter in Boston. Per Mann, some drawings, woodcuts and pictorial references of the lower classes exist, but, regrettably, they are skimpy at best.

Countering the public perceptions of how the Puritans dressed, Mann states: "They didn't all wear funny black hats, black coats and big black collars." In fact, only the very wealthy had black clothes because black was a very difficult hue to achieve in dying, Mann said. Most people wore browns, which was much easier to achieve from most plant sources. Additionally, the settlers who came to North America quickly realized that the Indians' idea of making clothing out of leather was a good one. And, since the English were very skilled leather workers, they were soon producing very sophisticated leather clothing.

Because the hard core Puritans were against frivolity - in all matters, including the way they dressed -- Mann's designs stressed the simplicity of the period, during which youngsters were dressed exactly the same as the adults. There were very few accessories, except for a wedding ring for the few who could afford one. However, Mann believes it is important to note that "these were not the poor and downtrodden of the earth." Most of the Puritans were solid middle-class citizens: successful farmers, merchants, trades people and craftsmen.

The Puritans' clothing was functional, comfortable and allowed for a degree of mobility while tending to farming and housework. But in the late 1600s, the shape of the clothing began to change as a result of the fashions arriving from Europe, Mann said. The billowing skirts, balloon sleeves and roomy britches were replaced with a straighter, sleeker silhouette, most apparent in the clothing worn by Sir William Phips and Lady Phips in the mini-series.

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Attempting to Recreate the 1690s Village of Salem in the New Millennium:

There were definite challenges involved in visually recreating a village that existed in the 1690s, but Production Designer Nancey Pankiw rose to the occasion. With just five weeks of prep time and a talented team of set decorators, set dressers, carpenters and painters, Pankiw managed to recreated the world of 1691 through 1693 Salem.

Pankiw selected Upper Canada Village, an historical park in Cornwall, Ontario, as the backdrop for the film's Salem Village exteriors. The site has a large geographical infrastructure which includes plowed fields, row fences, a river, dirt roads and old trees. But, since the architecture of the period depicted in the film was based on English Tudor, facades needed to be built and affixed to the existing structures in the Village.

Pankiw's research included a visit to Salem to study some authentic existing structures, and she referenced a series of books, such as Architectural Treasures of Early America (Architecture in New England), and Everyday Life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which she found to be superb sources of pictorial references. Seventeenth Century scholar Phil Dunning, the Director of Material Culture Department for Parks Canada, also offered some vital information.

Pankiw came to discover that the homes of that time all had a central fireplace with rooms on either side with whitewashed walls. Wealthy people merely had houses with higher ceilings, or more nails in the doors. For the purposes of the film, subtle variations in color, details and furnishings were used in order to differentiate the homes of the various characters. From illustrations and photographs, her team recreated the Salem Village Meeting House - a multi-functional structure that served as a church for Reverend Parris' congregation on Sundays.

Pankiw's research also uncovered the fact that the first settlers in Massachusetts lived in caves and, over time, progressed to dugouts, before adapting the Indian style of home -- the wigwam. It was not until much later that they started to build their houses. Because Brigit Bishop, who was called Salem's "white witch," still made her home in a wigwam, Pankiw's team constructed one for the mini-series.

RATING: To Be Announced

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Press Contacts: Barbara Abseck 212/975-4637 beabseck@cbs.com

Karin Failla 323/575-4269 karin.failla@tvc.cbs.com