Sunday, December 11, 2016

The Harry Potter-Lizzie Borden connection

Fiona Shaw


It's not the Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans, although we know Lizzie did enjoy the many candies sent to her in jail as she awaited trial.

The real Abby Borden


No, the connection is that while the Lizzie Borden movie is filming in Savannah, Georgia, Daniel Radcliffe is in town filming something else AND I just learned that Fiona Shaw, who played Harry Potter's cruel Aunt Petunia, will portray Abby Borden.

Yes, she is Lizzie's stepmother, who will be brutally murdered.

Abby Borden was said to be very stout, at 180 pounds, so lovely slim Fiona will have to eat more of those beans. She was also 64 at the time of her murder. Ah well, Hollywood is fun in that it "adjusts" things for us. Maybe Shaw's Abby will fight back and grab the hatchet and chase the killer down Second Street.

The family maid, Bridget Sullivan, said a few weeks after the murders that Abby "was treated badly by Lizzie and [her sister] Emma...and particularly by Lizzie." She said that Abby "was too good for them and they did not like her."

Abby had been stepmother to the two girls since Emma was 14 and Lizzie a mere five. In fact, up until just a few years before the murders, the middle-aged Lizzie called Abby "Mother." A money-based dispute led to her suddenly calling her Mrs. Borden instead.

Bridget reported that the sisters never ate meals with the elder Bordens; it was a household divided. And on a hot August morning, someone was pushed too far, and blood was spilled.


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