While listening to the radio, I heard that old ballad, “Ode to Billy Jo”. When I tried to learn more about what the singer and Billy Jo might have trown off the Talahatchee Bridge, I came across a reference to the movie by the same title that starred Robbie Benson. In the movie, Billy Jo supposedly killed himself after a homosexual encounter at a brothel. Any idea as to how a movie producer could make that leap from the lyrics of the song? Did Bobbie Gentry (the original artist) approve of this interpretation? Thanks for helping to extinguish another random thought that is haunting me.
The movie producer bought the rights to make a movie of the song, and thus was able to do whatever they wanted when they wrote a script. They could have had him abducted by aliens, for all it mattered legally.
I don’t know what Bobbie Gentry thought about it, but I’d guess she’d only quote from the liner notes on John Barleycorn Must Die: “But there are other interpretations.”
Billy Joe dropped his missing dollar off the bridge while trying to see if a duck’s quack echoes; some people say he shot himself with a 1920s style death ray, others say he just drove on the parkway to bring pie.
Death ray, or heat ray?
–CoffeeGuy
Alternately, I think (at the time) friends & I thought the suicide came after the disposal of an illegitimate baby (or fetus) from the bridge. So, either it was either guilt or the aforementioned “death ray”.
–CoffeeGuy
This is not a GQ type question. I have always thought it was flowers that they were seen throwing off the bridge (as in the ones that are picked on Chocktow Ridge and thrown in the muddy waters, referred to later on).
Off to Cafe Society.
DrMatrix - GQ Moderator
A friend of a friend told me that they dropped the kidneys they stole because the victim had eaten a dead lobster so his organs were rotten. Jack Chick drove the getaway car.
There have been at least four threads on this subject, in this forum, within the past year or so. There are a world of thoughts and opinions in them.
I’ve got a dial-up connection and don’t search much. Maybe some of you speedy folks could help the new person out with a search?
Welcome to the SDMB, VTAIR1FAN.
I understood it was a ring that she threw off the bridge. And 1976 really wasn’t that long ago- was it?
No, not necessarily. It all depends on the terms of the contract between the songwriter and the producers. Some authors maintain very tight control over what is done with their material; others waive all control.
Walloon - the song rights may not have belong to Bobby Gentry at that time.
As Elvis Costello says now, “I was furious when they allowed Linda Rondstat to record Alison… but I sure cashed the checks.”
It was all spelled out in the final verse of the song, which was cut from the recording.
“…And though I’m still in pain, I know that Billy Joe is now free
From worry’n about the third English word that ends in -gry.”
A roundup summary:
Bobbie Gentry said she didn’t know what was dropped off the bridge. Maybe she never decided, or maybe she just thought it was more profitable to remain silent and adopt a Cheshire Cat grin.
When the song was new there was widespread speculation that it was an engagement ring which was thrown off the bridge. Allegedly, at one time it was common in some parts of The South to do this to show that an engagement was irrevocably over.
Another common guess is that it was a baby. This never seemed very probable to me, particularly as people should have known that she was pregnant. Then again the young woman who gave birth in the ladies’ room on prom night a few years back had never looked pregnant.
In the movie, she had a doll she called “Benjamin” to whom she used to tell her problems. It serves as a sort of alter ego; there is a scene early in the film where Glynnis O’Connor and her father are riding in his truck. The opportunity arises for her to say something smart back at him, but instead she merely mutters “hush, Benjamin”. When her father asks her what she just said, she replies that she never says anything, a comment on the way she and her concerns are ignored, which was the central point of the song.
Robbie Benson, (Billy Joe), was the only person to whom she had confided about Benjamin. While O’Connor is talking to Robbie Benson up on the bridge the doll is accidentally knocked into the river. This can be taken as symbolizing her saying goodbye to childhood; towards the very end of the movie she tells Benson’s sexual partner that she is just a little girl who doesn’t know anything about the world, a remark which is full of irony.
Benson did not have his experience at a brothel. There were prostitutes in town for some observance such as a county fair, and at first O’Connor thinks the secret he is hiding is that he was with one of them. Instead, he got drunk and had relations with an older man.
This man is a local farmer who talks to O’Connor the morning after it is learned that Benson died. When he confesses to her, she tells him that Benson had told her what had happened, but had not said who the man was. When the man talks about turning himself into the police, O’Connor tells him it would be pointless to punish himself, and she will keep his secret.
At the end of the film, the general opinion around town is that Benson killed himself because O’Connor was pregnant with his child–a theory her own brother accepts. In fact, Benson had attempted to have relations with O’Connor to reassure himself that he could have sex with a woman but, either because of his sexual orientation or merely the tremendous pressure he was feeling, he had been impotent. This had apparently been the last straw which prompted his suicide.
The film was made in 1976, but the song hit #1 in 1967. Still during my lifetime, though, so I agree that the tune isn’t exactly ancient…
Here is one person’s take on the song, complete with speculation that the title character is actually “Billie Joe” and was involved in a lesbian relationship with the narrator.