There Is More Than One Bitch In "The Bad Seed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

                                                 "Oh, her.  That big girl was Mary Beth Musgrove.
                                                   Everyone knows she saw me.  Even Leroy knows
                                                   she saw me."--Patty McCormack as Rhoda Penmark
                                                   in "The Bad Seed" (1956).

                                      Now, anyone on here for long knows how much I love "The Bad Seed," and I hope you do, too.  Rhoda Penmark is indisputably the story's Supreme Bitch, but I want to point out another bitch in the film, Mary Beth Musgrove, portrayed by an uncredited actress named Shelley Fabares--yes!!!!!!!!.  And the girl she is tugging at, also uncredited, is a young Kathy Garver, years before she went on to play Cissy in "Family Affair!!!!!!!!!!"

                                      I have mentioned them before, but I never realized, till recently, how Mary Beth Musgrove qualifies as Bitch Of the Week.  And so she is this week's winner.

                                       You've all met a Mary Beth at some point in your lives.  Lords her so-called authority above all others, puts on a Miss Phony act, so she is Teacher's Pet, and thinks she rules the roost.  Just like Diane Dykeman, and Katina Mataras, in my school days.

                                       Though Rhoda's acts are despicable, I am always glad when she rats out Mary Beth Musgrove.  This girl needed to be put in her place, before she grows up to be chairman of her town council, and run the community into the ground, as she sees fit!  That's what happens to Mary Beth Musgroves.  They stay big fish in SMALL ponds, because they know they cannot handle the competition.  Such types are to be avoided at all costs.

                                       You had to hand it to Shelley Fabares, for such a dead on portrait in only a few seconds.  Interestingly, one of Shelley's most famous older roles was as another bitch--Francine Webster, on "One Day At A Time," in the Seventies.

                                        Too bad Rhoda never had it out with Mary Beth!  Guess who would have lost???????????????