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Run For Your Life
Starring Ben Gazzara
Episode:
The Sadness of a Happy Time
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To contact us, click Homepage link above
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Synopsis: When Paul falls hopelessly in love with novelist Nicole Longet (Claudine Longet), he flees, but she interprets his action to mean that he is a spy colleague of Mike Allen (Stephen McNally) until the agent reveals Paul's secret. With Lili Valenty as Señora Breda, Michael Stanwood as Henry Kalb, Don Diamond as Esteban, Victor Fiore as the Farmer, Eumenio Blanco as the Bakery Vendor
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Episode 30
First broadcast on
May 16, 1966
Teleplay by John W. Bloch
Based on a story by Patrick Kennedy
Directed by Alf Kjelin
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SEE INDIVIDUAL PHOTOS OF ENTIRE CAST AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE
This page also includes Claudine Longet's original performance of Jobim's "Meditation"
and for part 2
and watch a video clip from the episode on the same page!
Creative Team
Producer
Jo Swerling Jr.
Associate Producer
Paul Freeman
Music
Pete Rugolo
Director of Photography
William Margulies A.S.C.
Art Director
Howard E. Johnson
Film Editor
Robert Watts A.C.E.
Unit Manager
Willard Sheldon
Assistant Director
Edward K. Dodds
Set Decorators
John McCartey &
James M. Walters
Sound
Clarence E. Self
Color Coordinator
Robert Brower
Color by Technicolor
Editorial Dept. Head
David J. O'Connell
Musical Supervisor
Stanley Wilson
Costumes by Burton Miller
Makeup
Bud Westmore
Hair Stylist
Larry Germain
Links to Other Episodes
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Nicole sings a Jobim song in French
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The Plot:
Paul is in Spain, enjoying a romance with French novelist Nicole Longet. Though she knows nothing behind his nomad lifestyle, they spend pleasant days together until an incident one night when American agent Mike Allen appears on the scene. Though Paul greets him, Mike passes without speaking. Later the American agent is involved in a shooting incident and wounded. When Mike tells Paul to call Bailey at the American consulate as he lies on the ground, Nicole decides that both men are US spies.
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Nicole asks Paul if he is a spy
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The next day on the beach, though Paul now denies knowing Mike Allen, Nicole says she knows that Paul has secretly gone to see him in the hospital. Paul makes light of this, but she replies, “even here it comes, that cold, quiet war, a war without armies, only soldiers like Mr. Bailey.” She says that Paul shouldn't deny that Mike Allen is his friend, one of the gray men who fight the silent war. Then she asks Paul if he too is one of these gray men, “one of the invisible army.” He says no, but Nicole responds that she was foolish to believe that they could remain totally alone and lost from the world,
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Mike tells Paul about a remote island
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Nicole adds that she knows that he must go see Mike Paul visits Mike in the hospital where he is recovering well from the gun shot, and planning to go to a primitive Spanish island to recuperate. Paul indicates an interest in the remote place, and Mike says they can meet in Barcelona that night to travel there together, if Paul wants to leave as quickly as that, and Paul grabs at the chance, saying that he's done something he can't afford to - fallen in love. When Nicole returns to the hotel she finds Paul's luggage packed, and asks if he would have left without saying goodbye if she hadn't come in just then.
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Paul promises to find Nicole again, if he can
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She assumes that Mike Allen is the cause of the departure, but Paul denies this, and says that he can't tell her the reason. But she is sure that she knows why his life is not his own. “When I can …. If I can …. I'll find you again,” Paul responds, and asks if she'll be going back to Paris. She says that she might come back to this place to write her next book, adding that they bought many tomorrows from the land lady when they paid for another week's stay the day before. Referring a possible next novel, Nicole says she's just learned that, if it were possible to put into one word, what life is all about, the word would be goodbye.
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Mike says that Paul is not an agent
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Nicole flies to Berlin in search of Mike Allen, and finds him through the US consulate, asking him whether she'd see Paul again, and he rightly says that he has no idea. Nicole tells him that before she met Paul, she believed that individuals were all isolated from one another, but that she was wrong, and feels bound to him.
She says that she has no life without Paul, and needs to know if he left her because his work compelled him. Mike says that he can't help her, and Nicole leaves his office, saying that she is determined to find Paul.
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Nicole learns Paul's secret
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Later, Mike goes to where Nicole is staying, and says that he can tell her where Paul is. When Mike explains that Paul is not a spy, Nicole faces the fact that he left only because of her, and says she needs to know the reason for his disappearance because she loves him. Mike confirms that Paul feels the same, and that is why he went away, so that he would remain a stranger among strangers. Mike goes on to say that Paul stayed with him at the remote Spanish island for only a half day, being unable to tolerate the presence of someone who cares about him, and knows about his secret.
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Nicole returns to wait for Paul
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Then Mike tells Nicole that Paul has only a year or so to live.
As she told Paul she would, Nicole returns to the pension in Spain where they were together. The land lady is overjoyed to see her, and says that Nicole will bring her good luck again. Entering the room where they stayed, she is haunted by the memory of Paul, but he, unable to stay away, is also making his way back to the same place. She busies herself with writing her new book, but is again striking out sentences when she hears the door opening. races to it, and falls into Paul's arms.
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Paul asks Nicole to marry him
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Paul tells Nicole that all the rules, and everything he had built his life on fell apart when he left her. She apologizes for her behavior when he left, and says it will never happen again, telling him that being there together is all that matters. He responds that there is something that must be said, even if it meant that they would never be the same again.
She is clearly fearing a declaration about his illness, but instead, Pauldeclares that he ran because he loves her, then says with great gravity, "I want to marry you, Nicole." She accepts joyously.
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The landlady promises a fiesta in celebration
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But that night, Paul is clearly tormented, as he tries to write a letter to her, again and again tearing the notepaper up, unable to put down the words he feels he needs to say to her before becoming his wife, the truth about his impending death.
The lines still unwritten or unsaid, the next morning Paul and Nicole visit the church to ask the priest to marry them the following day, and then bring delight to the landlady's heart when they tell her the news. She promises them a wedding banquet, a fiesta that night to celebrate their short engagement.
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They talk about their wedding
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Nicole tells Paul that they don't have to marry in church, but he responds that exchanging vows before a priest seems more permanent than signing your name at the Mayor's office.
He asks her if she'd like to have any of her friends from Paris at the ceremony, but she replies that they'd say that she betrayed them.Paul tells her that the next time she sees them, she can tell them she can show them a sequel to her novel “The Sadness of a Happy Time,” to be called “Say Goodbye to Sorrow.”
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The happy couple stand on a table
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Nicole says that she still believes in what she wrote, to live truly is to accept that there is always sadness, but that she was wrong in believing that she could live alone.
That evening there is a grand fiesta in the taverna, with much dancing and celebration of the happy couple. Paul and Nicole stand on a table, and are toasted by all. Paul tells the land lady that she has promised to dance for them, and she offers a toast of her own to “the morning of their lives” before all begin to dance again.
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Paul struggles to tell Nicole about his future
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After Nicole has gone to bed, Paul again tries to write and tell her the truth he believes she must know before becoming his wife. Agonizing over false starts, he finally settles on a text, and takes the note to her room, and places it in her hand resting on the pillow beside her.
He goes out the next morning, and when he returns, Paul finds Nicole packing to go away, not for their honeymoon, but to leave him. When he asks her where she's going, she retorts sadly, “why did you have to tell me?” Then she says definitively, “we can't marry now.”
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Paul leaves his letter in Nicole's hand
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Picking up the letter he wrote, Paul answers hesitantly and with sorrow, “you see, Nicole, I couldn't marry you without ….” Then his mood changes, and crumpling the note, he asks angrily, “does it make that much difference?”
“I already knew,” she replies, and adds that she is aware of the fact that he can't be with someone who knows his secret, and was praying that he wouldn't tell her. She says that she must go for his sake, and that Paul must start living again as he did before. He responds that the old way of living was fine then, but not the only way.
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Nicole says she could never hide her despair
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He says there are other approaches to his situation, but Nicole insists, “I cannot do this to you, Paul, and I can't do it to myself.” She says that she would be unable to hide her despair, taking what joy might be found in the time he has left, adding that her presence would be a constant reminder, making it impossible for him to ever forget the awful truth. But she says what Paul did before, he can do again. To reinforce her argument, she points out that Paul only spent a half day with Mike Allen on the isolated island, ever seeing his fate in Mike's eyes. “No one can hide that,” she adds. “I can't.” Then she leaves the room - and his life.
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Paul is deeply affected when Nicole rings
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Devastated, Paul picks up the telephone to make arrangements to leave himself, but when the land lady comes in to say that his bags are ready to be taken to the train, Paul says that he's changed his mind and decided to stay. He orders a bottle of brandy, but doesn't touch it.
Then the phone rings as dusk begins to fall. It is Nicole. He asks her where she is, hopeful she is returning, but she tells him she is in Madrid.
“I had to call you,” she falters, “to tell you what I couldn't say before I left. I love you.”
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Goodbye
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She repeats the words as he lets the phone slip, holding it to his face. As tears fall from her eyes, she says goodbye, also letting the receiver slip, her head falling against the phone.
Paul sets down the receiver, then picks it up again, and asks to have his train reservation reinstated
He looks around the room where they spent so many happy hours together, and as the sound of her singing fills his head, he leaves the room empty.
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This page also includes Claudine Longet's original performance of Jobim's "Meditation"
and for part 2
and watch a video clip from the episode on the same page!
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Claudine Longet
as Nicole Longet
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Stephen McNally
as Mike Allen
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Lili Valenty as
Señora Breda
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Michael Stanwood
as Henry Kalb
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Don Diamond
as Esteban
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Victor Fiore
as the Farmer
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Eumenio Blanco as the Bakery Vendo
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