When Bette Davis as Bunny O’Hare came to Belen (Part 2)

(La Historia del Rio Abajo is a regular column about Valencia County history written by members of the Valencia County Historical Society since 1998.

Opinions expressed in this and all columns of La Historia del Rio Abajo are the author’s alone and not necessarily those of the Valencia County Historical Society or any other group or individual.)

Part 1 of “When Bette Davis as Bunny O’Hare came to Belen” described Belen’s first full-length movie’s plot and three-day filming in October 1970.  Bette Davis starred as Bunny O’Hare, while Ernest Borgnine starred as an ex-con who teamed up with Bunny to rob banks while disguised as hippies. Three buildings in Belen were “disguised” as some of the banks the “outlaws” robbed in this truly unconventional romantic comedy.

Extras

American International Productions hired about 200 extras in New Mexico; 40 were from Belen. About half were women and half were men. Many were young, in their late teens or early 20s, ideal for those who played the roles of hippies.

Some extras were easily recognizable in the movie. Sonny Pacheco, for example, played an innocent bystander when Bunny and Bill robbed their first bank. Gilbert Torres and Gilbert Ulibarri posed as motorcycle cops.

Local businesses and police departments cooperated with the movie project. Auge Sales and Service lent four cars for the production, with Eddie Auge, Randy Forsythe, Danny Gabaldon and Dennis Trujillo serving as their drivers.

The Belen Police Department lent two cars and the New Mexico State Police Department lent two more.

Owners of the Oñate Theater cooperated by advertising a bogus movie called “The Case of the Missing Bank Robber” on its marquee. The fictional film is clearly visible in the background as Bunny and Bill, a truly missing bank robber, stand outside the first of the seven banks they stuck up.

Movie makers insisted on painting the name “Los Lunas” on Belen’s iconic water tower. Daredevils Raymond Lucero and Elias Jaramillo climbed the tower to accomplish the deed, although the scene showing the mislabeled water tower did not make the final cut.

Most extras were initially pleased to appear in a Hollywood movie, but their enthusiasm quickly waned.

The News-Bulletin reported that they found the work “almost boring as scenes were shot and re-shot and rehearsals would drag on and on in the unusually cold, damp weather.”

Local spectators were more amused. Ross Lovato recalls the excitement of watching the movie being made just blocks from his home.

Michael Jaramillo, a student at Belen Junior High School at the time, remembers walking down a street and seeing Ernest Borgnine standing by a pickup truck. Michael called out, “There’s Ernest Borgnine!”

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When Bette Davis as Bunny O’Hare came to Belen (Part 1)

Known to be especially friendly with kids, Borgnine did not hesitate to walk over to Michael, give him a smile and shake his hand.

Borgnine even had occasion to visit the old Becker-Dalies general store, where the Wells-Fargo Bank now stands. At least two former employees remember how pleasant he was. Tinky Ulibarri says that her dad, Gilbert Ulibarri, got to know Borgnine so well that he considered the actor his good friend.

Betty Davis was not as kind. One on-looker called her “rude,” and an extra referred to her as “not a nice lady.” Unfazed by such remarks, Davis claimed that “If everyone likes you, you’re doing your job wrong.”

As for New Mexico, Davis complained about riding up and down the state’s rugged hills on a motorcycle, saying, “I’ve never been as petrified in my life.”

World premiere

Unlike many movies, Bunny O’Hare was completed on schedule by the end of October 1970. After post-production, it was released in the summer of 1971.

The one-hour, 31-minute movie premiered at Albuquerque’s Cinema East Theater on Candelaria NE on June 28, 1971. The University of Albuquerque sponsored the event as a fundraiser for the school’s new Fine Arts Center. Tickets sold for $25 each, or about $200 each in today’s money.

Of “Bunny O’Hare’s” stars, only Joan Delaney, who lived up the road in Pojoaque, took the time to attend the premier.

The movie was released in theaters across New Mexico. Especially popular in drive-ins, “Bunny O’Hare” showed in Alamogordo, Carlsbad, Clovis, Gallup, Las Cruces, Las Vegas, Lordsburg, Santa Fe, Taos and of course Albuquerque.

It played along such movies as “Bloody Mama,” “Evel Knievel” and “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

Unfortunately, Belen’s Oñate Theater and Zia Drive-In were closed when the movie was released, although it might have been shown at the Oñate later when the theater periodically reopened.

Also unfortunately, many New Mexico newspapers advertised that the movie was being “filmed entirely in Albuquerque,” neglecting to mention other shooting sites, including Socorro, Chilili and especially Belen.

“Bunny O’Hare” was shown across the United States. At least one former New Mexican watched it in an Oregon drive-in and found it to be a “cool taste of home from 1,500 miles away.”

The film made its first TV appearance on Jan. 9, 1973, as the CBS Late Movie. It was shown around the world, including in England, Scotland, France and Australia.

Harsh critics

Most critics were not kind to “Bunny O’Hare.” Some berated it as a Bonnie and Clyde story featuring two old-timers hoping to relive their youths as free-spirited motorcyclists.

It was no accident that the movie’s original title was “Bunny and Claude.” Even “Bunny O’Hare’s” background banjo music seemed similar to the 1967 hit, “Bonnie and Clyde.” Other critics suggested the title, “Ma and Pa Kettle on Wheels.”

One critic called the movie “trite,” claiming that it “fails to add up to anything resembling entertainment.” The New York Times called “Bunny O’Hare” a “dreadful” comedy “filled with absurd chases” and a plot “as full of potholes as the state of New Mexico.”

Ironically, the movie’s most brutal critic was Bette Davis herself. A month after the movie’s opening, Davis sued AIP for $3.3 million. She claimed that while she had approved of the original script, the final “slapstick” product was nothing like the “humorous social commentary” she had in mind.

“These two middle-aged people find each other,” Davis said. “It was a dear story. But the film has been slaughtered in the editing ... It is enough to make you sick. They have murdered it.”

Davis even objected to her final words in the movie. Instead of “Screw ‘em,” she had wanted a more profane version of the same message. If you read her lips, she yelled the profanity in that last scene, but it was voiced over in post-production. Her intent was to “earn” the movie an R rating. Instead, it was rated PG.

AIP counter-sued for $17.5 million, insisting that Davis’s charges “seriously diminished, if not destroyed, the picture’s chances of becoming a commercial and artistic success.” Both sides eventually dropped their suits.

What did Ernest Borgnine think of the movie? Commenting on the production in his autobiography, the always jovial Borgnine did not take it as seriously as his co-star Davis.

“Honestly,” he wrote, “we didn’t know what the hell we were shooting, but we had a wonderful time doing it.”

Hearing that Davis was suing AIP, he kiddingly told her to “sue them for me, too.”

Life imitating art?

In what may or may not have been a coincidence, three Albuquerque banks were robbed about the time that “Bunny O’Hare” was released in the city’s Cinema East Theater.

On April 24, 1971, a tall, thin, ex-con stole $36,000 from Albuquerque’s Fidelity National Bank. Thieves robbed as much as $10,000 from the First National Bank on West Central Avenue on Aug. 6. In the greatest irony, a Bank of New Mexico branch was robbed on Sept. 24. The same bank had been used for stick-up scenes in the movie.

But the similarities ended there. Each real-life robber stole much more than Bunny and Bill did in all their bank robberies combined. All of the real robbers were males, drove cars, not motorcycles, in their getaways and were never dressed as hippies.

“Bunny O’Hare” helped put Belen on the map

“Bunny O’Hare” was the first Hollywood movie even partially filmed in Belen. Having put Belen on the movie-making map, sixteen other films have followed.

Some, like “Oppenheimer” (2023), have been highly rated, while others, like “Swing Vote” (2008), have been criticized as mediocre.

Regardless of their movies’ reviews, movie makers have usually complimented Belen and its citizens. As “Bunny O’Hare’s” production manager put it, “the reception and cooperation of the citizens of this (Albuquerque) area, and we include Belen, was extraordinary. If the weather disappointed us a little, the cooperation of all your citizens more than made up for it.”

Although movie making in town has been slow as of late, Belen is still open for business. What does Belen offer?

According to the city government’s website, the town offers excellent site locations with a downtown neighborhood that can be made to look like different times and places; accommodating property owners; no filming fees; a quick permitting process; and a welcoming city government with city staff members available 24/7 to assist with local logistics.

We await the next “Bunny O’Hare” to ride into Belen to enjoy these many benefits and to fill our streets with exciting new movie makers, movie sets and legendary actors.