Help with the Ending

I've read the George character was based on Jon Peters - the swinging stylist who later married Barbara Streisand. Jay Sebring was devoted to only one person: Sharon Tate. But ultimately, there's more Warren Beatty than anyone in George's satyr persona.

by - Tura23 (Thu Feb 2 2006 14:53:30 ) Ignore this User | Report Abuse


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The Manson connection is because when the screenplay was being written originally the character of George was loosely based on popular hairstylist Jay Sebring. Sebring was one of the victims of the Ciello drive murders, an event which many believe to have been event which brought the peace & love ethos of the 60's to its final end. I seem to recall reading that the script for Shampoo had been written before the murders - so any resemblance or reference to them is most likely a case of 20/20 hinsight, unless the director was extrordinarily prescient. Considering that the film was made so close to the time of the murders, I really doubt that it has any subtext relating to them. Even so, its interesting to watch it with that in mind.

I took the scene at the beginning where Hawn is so scared to be left alone and paranoid about what she hears as a hint to the Manson murders.

Great movie!

The film is a culmination of all things which eventually lead to the end of the 60's, and the bloody end to the Summer of Love. The characters are in fact based on those who were killed by the Manson family ion Augaust of 1969. Warren Beatty and the film's screenwriter Robert Towne were both very good friends with Jay Sebring, the famous 'Hairdresser to the Stars', who was murdered along with Sharon Tate, Abigail Folger and Voytek Frekowski at Cielo Drive up in the Hollywood hills. Warren Beatty's character of George is clearly based on that of Jay Sebring and Julie Christie's and Goldie Hawn's are both composites of actress/model Sharon Tate. Very, very haunting to me is a scene early on in the film where Warren Beatty's character comes home to Goldie Hawn's and she is really scared and in a panic, and she is telling him about hearing gunshots coming from somewhere out in the Hollywood hills...the scene is just a hint or a premonition relating to the tragic murders that their characters will eventually become victims of...There are many more scenes relating to the characters being based on those of the victims of the Manson family murders but I find this the most chilling and memorable. Many of her friends have told that in the several months before her death Sharon Tate was having premonitions about her own death, including the time where she was at a friend's house and she was coming down the staircase, and there sitting at the bottom the stairs, she saw an apparition of herself with her throat slashed. Tate stated that the apparition just looked up at her, with eyes and mouth wide and both hands clutching the bloody throat, as if asking her for help. She spoke about this haunting and terrifying incident often during the weeks and days leading up to her death and in fact she had discussed it with friend and fellow actress Joanna Pettete on the very day of her death while having lunch on the lawn of her Cielo Drive home. However, I speak in forked-tongue!! But then if I told you that Chuck Manson was actually a patsy and a 'CIA Plant' and if I told you the real truth and all the groovy details behind the Laurel Canyon music scene and The Look-Out Mountain Project and how it was all a way to put an end to the Anti-War Movement, well, it would truly curdle your blood and you would not sleep well for a long, long time!

Omg! I never read so many comments on Shampoo, and, some very fine, and out there, rubbish ones,too! Ah, the times of this fantastic,clever,classic movie about a certain LA, that still somehow believe it or not, exists, are everlasting! Great! It's deserved!
I think that only a few people got it straight! It is all about politics and money,no great mysteries!
George, not just made -penned, i mean, over Jay Sebring, but, also, Jon Peters and, a few others,including MM's last hairdresser,nevermind,it was Beatty's most perfect role!
The movie was a smash,in 1975 and all over the World!And Julie Christie was almost otherworldly! She is phenomenal in the black sequined,wildly back revealing dress, and, she could wear it with an unique class, i don't think today someone could easily find someone able of such grace,and, guts,at the same time!
Her portrait of Jackie was true to so many women i know.. I mean, i live here/there! She leaves George because of Lester's fortune and power, the money ,of course,and, she is absolutely not sought after Sharon Tate, whatsoever!
Christie who was a good friend with Sharon, would have never allowed it! Christie modeled her character over herself,a bit, too! She was spending long afternoons with the writer, Robert Towne, and Hal Ashby, the director! They were all very close! And,of course,she had been Beatty's lover since 1967! So, she knew all about the movie from the get go! By the time of the shooting their relationship started to gone bad! She left him, they then returned together, after, a while, for a few months, but,it was over! At least, they always remained best friends!
She did Heaven Can Wait with Beatty, and, she would have been Louise Bryant, in REDS as well, since she helped writing, but, turned it down! Ahh, only Julie Christie could afford such things!
Maybe some atmospheres were inspired by the Manson's characters,of course,everyone had been on a shock without memories of anything else that atrocious,not publicly anyways,and even MM had just killed herself or murdered a few years before, so it is normal all that would somehow come out,but,not Christie's character,ever was based on Sharon Tate! No way!
She was depicting, instead, the classic "new Beverly Hills wife", some singular trophy, destined to an even more cruel destiny than Felicia's in a way! She may be happy for a few months, yet distraught for the rest of her life! Yet, in a Society where money, even that gained with corruption at the highest levels,or stained, with blood and Wars,monnies rules, she chooses the money, being the only God real ruling, and, not a pathetic hairdresser, whom may even change his mind the following day, and leave her for any other babe!
Over that logic, she is the winner,and, she definitely comes out way more mature and driven, shrewd and tragic than George! Her behavior is already clear, from Christie's perfect performance: after, George leaves her while almost about to climax in one hell of a culminating scene,at the Party in Bel Air,she remains alone in the cold light, almost naked, petrified, but, almost painfully aware of the situation and realistic,at least, of her destiny! Memorable, genius shot! Now they'd go over a 20 minutes of self explanatory dialog and ruin it all!
Great script! Great director, casting,and style.
I knew them all! My mother (never an actress,no, she did it as a favor to friends) was one of the prettiest& most frantic Hair Salon's customers! However, you may see her,barely a few seconds in a couple of moments, she was on set, truly, for 4 months! They took time to shoot perfect films, then! And it shows! It could never been more perfect than it is!
And, still happy for mother, who, at least, for once in her lifetime,accepted to make fun of herself!
This movie was not filmed in 1968, just to clarify some people's post's confusion! It was taking place on Election Eve 1968!
It was shot between March and September 1974! Not every day of course! But, definitely, they must have filmed so much material,these days we would have a "special" 9 hours long second Uncut DVD/Blue Ray, containing a whole different movie, the OTHER SHAMPOO!That could be interesting,too,actually, to see all that material, that was certainly shot, and, never made it to the screen! lol
In any case, this was well worth it!
Cheers!