Mary McDonough played Erin Walton on the landmark TV show ‘The Waltons.’ She talks about her spiritual journey, how she transcended her body image issues, and why ‘The Waltons’ remains so popular
Also revealed: what she does and doesn’t have in common with her TV character Erin, what James Taylor song has inspired her over the years, and how she’d like to make a final Waltons reunion movie to have closure on the TV family’s story
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I can finally accept my mountain and where I am today, look back and learn from the people I loved and the lessons I learned traveling its many paths.”
— Mary McDonough in Lessons From The Mountain.
Mary McDonough’s Lessons From the Mountain isn’t the typical celebrity memoir.
The book is just as much an account of her decades-long spiritual journey as it is a look back at her TV and movie career — which included playing Erin Walton on the TV show The Waltons for nine seasons.
Sure, she tells plenty of behind-the-scenes stories about The Waltons that will entertain fans. Did you know that Ellen Corby (Grandma Walton) practiced yoga? Or that Elton John was a huge fan of the show and visited the Waltons set? Or that McDonough was one of the finalists for the lead role in the movie The Exorcist? There’s lots of fun information. Especially for the diehard fans — like me — go ahead, just ask me about any episode.
But at the center of the book is a spiritual search. It started when McDonough was young and disturbed by an image of God she picked up in Catholic school.
“I felt God was unyielding and unforgiving… It seemed no matter how ‘good’ I was, I would never be enough for God,” she writes.
That contributed toward her feeling inadequate. It combined with other issues such as yo-yo dieting, body image issues, and insecurity.
Life got particularly rough for McDonough after The Waltons was cancelled in 1981. In the Big Hair Big Everything era of Dallas and Dynasty, she tried to reinvent her image by getting breast implants when she was 22. Sadly, as she recounts in her book, that wasn’t necessary for the roles she did receive. And worse, she developed health problems she believes are linked to the implants.
But she developed her spirituality to help pull herself out of her slump. She made peace with the Catholicism of her youth and explored Eastern philosophy and Buddhism. She ultimately found a connection with a higher power she feels is compassionate and loving.
Inspired by some spiritual lessons from her father, she became an activist. She testified with many other women including actress Sally Kirkland before the FDA about the dangers of silicone breast implants. In recent years she’s become a life coach and runs workshops for young women to raise their self-esteem and discuss body image issues — which she outlines on her web site.
Working out a spiritual path in her book is somewhat similar to the spirituality on her famous TV show.
The Waltons was a groundbreaking show because of its combination of spirituality and religion. There was tension between John Walton’s spirituality and Olivia’s traditional Baptist religion. In several episodes that conflict had to be resolved. The best of these spiritually-themed shows contain a deep and realistic presentation of religion and spirituality we may never see again on a network TV show.
In a phone interview from her California home, McDonough talked about her career, her activism, and her spiritual path. Much like the tone of her book, she was open, funny, and reflective about her journey.
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I loved your book because it was about a spiritual journey as well as a book about your acting career. Did you have the intention from the beginning to have it be partly about a spiritual journey or did it just turn out that way?
It kind of turned out that way. As you start to write and organize things, you start at the beginning and you go through and you realize the true line.
My purpose for writing the book was to help people, so no one felt the way I did. And to shine some light on it that all of us are in this together, we’re not alone.
My spiritual journey was definitely part of those lessons that I learned. So it just became a natural unfolding to include it in the book. And how I went thorough my battle with spirituality as well as finding something that was more peaceful and more kind and loving than how I was raised.
It’s interesting that on ‘The Waltons’ spirituality needed to be worked out too. John and Grandpa could be categorized as spiritual but not religious and Olivia and Esther were traditional Baptist. And on some shows there was conflict about it they had negotiate. Did you notice that on the show at the time?
It must have had some kind of influence on me in some way. But we were always kids going to church every Sunday and behaving. So I think being a Baptist on the show and being a Catholic in real life were much more similar for me.
The Grandpa and John Walton philosophies or beliefs came to me much later in life. That there might be something other than these strict rules. And certainly for me the strict rules that I was raised with were hurtful to me and made me frightened and scared instead of there being a kind loving God. So yeah, in a way it must have been in there somewhere.
So many people know you from playing Erin Walton. In what ways were you similar to the character and in which ways were you different?
I’m very similar to her and different in a lot of ways. Obviously I played her through my growing up. So she embodied my body as I grew. But Erin is a little bit more staid than I am. I think I’m a little more kooky wacky fun.
And I noticed it when we went back to do the movies. I noticed that suddenly I had a different cadence to the way I was speaking, I stood a different way and I walked a different way. And I realized that I just had put on Erin. She’s a little slower than I am in how she speaks and thinks. And I think I’m a little more high energy level.
You were just 10 years old when you started playing Erin. Did you think of her character and what she was all about and her motivations at such a young age?
Not as a kid. We were encouraged just to be kids. And I think we were cast because of how we acted and what we looked like and how our personalities were. Erin was the sensitive one. I certainly was a sensitive one as well. So they just wanted us to be how we were.
Then as we grew into teenagers, I actually started to take acting classes and become more aware of the character and the dialect and how she was based on the story lines they had written for her.
I always thought of Erin as a seeker and I wonder if you did too. There was the episode when she graduated from high school and she wasn’t sure what she wanted to do compared to her brothers and sisters who were so certain. And she was frequently looking for the right romantic partner, trying to find her place.
I love that you say that about her. I think she was. I think part of it was she was seeking her purpose and role in life very similar to me.
Erin and I both struggled with our identities in a large family being middle daughters. And what purpose we serve in the world and within our families.
And I think she was always looking for what was going to define her because people said that she was pretty and that really was not enough.
Her vanity was something she was sort of punished for in a way. Grandma would look down on her in the beauty contest that she lost and think that was right and just. So I think she was a seeker in a lot of ways, trying to find her value.
There was an episode called ‘The Burnout’ where Erin goes through a phase of wanting to lead a religious life. And there’s a really interesting scene between you and Olivia where she tells Erin about vanity — but in this case vanity for wanting to be an ascetic martyr. Do you remember that episode?
I do. I wanted to be a nun at one point in my life. So for me I think I could relate to it in wanting to live that life. But Erin had a very different motivation for it. It was out of guilt and shame and the fire and the dress and her vanity. But seeing purpose in a simple life definitely had an influence on me.
You mention John Ritter [who played Rev. Fordwick on ‘The Waltons’] in the book. The pranks he pulled on the set were really funny. But he also seemed to be a mentor to you by getting you to start keeping a journal. What are your reflections of him and his influence on you?
He touches my heart so deeply, I miss him.
He was a touchstone for me. He was an example of someone who had high energy and was kooky and funny as all get out. And still sly and smart and deep and aware. He realized how much pain I was in when I was a kid. And he pushed me where no one else did to find out what was wrong.
I finally admitted to him that I was really sad and somewhat depressed and frustrated. He told me about journaling and I went out that night and bought a spiral notebook and started to pound my emotions and feelings and secrets into this notebook. And I kept a journal for years.
So John Ritter I attribute to really saving my life because what I put in those pages — and some of it is the book — I look back on it and I think I don’t know what would have happened to me if I didn’t write it out.
What was it about journaling that helped you grow spiritually? And do you still do it?
I do journal still. I write a lot, but I don’t journal in the same way. As a kid it was me getting out all the emotions and all of the fears and the feelings and just sadness that I had and frustration that I had growing up. It was a private place for me to just dump all of that emotion.
As I grew it became something that was more spiritual. I started to write poems and I would write when I was out on a mountaintop noticing nature when I was hiking or camping. And it became a way for me to listen to that higher part of me connected to God, the universe, however you want to put it.
And even now when I write for myself, if I’m angry or upset about something what happens is it turns into me being able to calm the emotional body part of Mary and really connect to a higher source. And by the time I finish writing, I usually have an answer, some action, and some confirmation. And I just really listen and it becomes a much more peaceful connection to who I am and the bigger me and the bigger purpose unto the world.
‘The Waltons’ and the TV show ‘Kung Fu’ were both shows with a lot of spirituality in them that made an impact on many people. It’s really interesting in your book that you mention visiting the ‘Kung Fu’ set — which was across from ‘The Waltons’ set — and of your friendship with Radames Pera [who played the young ‘grasshopper’ on the show].
I loved going to the Kung Fu set! They had this huge sound stage, one of the biggest sound stages at Warner Brothers. They had the interior of the temple in there. So they had a million candles and incense and dirt on the floor and smoke. It was so different from our Waltons sets.
And Radames was great. He actually did an episode of The Waltons [The Ceremony”]. So we became friends. We would eat in the commissary and I’d have lunch with him and his mom. He was great and fun. And the set was really interesting. I didn’t really understand anything about Eastern philosophies back then like he did. He really learned a lot about them and I didn’t really know very much until later.
A lot of people really still care about ‘The Waltons.’ Why do you think it’s endured for so long?
The show is just huge. It’s going on to second and third generations. And it resonates with people, I believe, because it is about acceptance and understanding and wrestling with that you don’t understand — things that are different than you.
It has a very democratic way of dealing with family. I think the fact that there are three generations under the same roof and that is happening again in this country where people are graduating from college and moving back home. We have the sandwich generation and families are starting to live together again.
And I think people long for a time that is a bit more simple. And The Waltons demonstrates that. It shows a sense of community that people think that we’ve lost in America and other countries as well.
And what I hear often is ‘It’s the family I never had.’ Or I hear ‘It’s just like the family I grew up with.’ Or ‘It’s just what my grandpa told me his life was like.’ So there’s relating to it on all different levels which is why I think it’s still so popular.
On my site I list what I think are the Top 10 spiritual ‘Waltons’ episodes —
I saw that!
And I have to ask you about one of them on the list called “The Baptism.” There was this fire and brimstone preacher in a church filled with sweaty people. He was scary! Do you remember that episode?
I think it reminded me so much of being at church and it was very similar to having a priest giving some rockin’ sermon (laughs). And all of my belief was fire and brimstone. What I was taught was that I was going to hell and I had to work really hard to get indulgences to bank them up so I could cash them in. And it could never be a good thing. And that I was never enough and no matter what I did it probably wasn’t going to be enough. And that God was a scary guy who was out to punish me. And that was very similar to that episode, I think.
You write in your book how you ultimately came to know God as a kind and loving source. It seems like your life really deepened when your defined your spirituality and came to those realizations.
It did. It brought an incredible sense of awareness and the idea of a kind loving God was so foreign to me. There were years of different searching. Wayne Dyer is a very big mentor to me. I’ve read all of his books. And his path has always been very important — even though I’ve never met him. I started to study Eastern philosophies and Buddhism. And that clicked and made sense to me. Instead of this religion there was this philosophy.
And then I started to study other religions and realized that a lot of the stories were exactly the same. Whether it’s the Buddha or Mohammed or Jesus, a lot of the stories started to be the same. I studied Kaballah long before it was popular in Beverly Hills.
And I realized that when you got to the essence of the religions, that all of the messaging was the same. And so it made sense to me that there was this one source. And that it could be different things to different people. And there could be different philosophies around it. But the bottom line, the simple truths ‘do unto others’ –that sort of messaging — seemed to be the same. And that was really phenomenal to me. And I thought everybody’s kind of saying the same thing, but they just want people to do it their way.
And then as I started to learn more and I learned to meditate and to pray in a different way, it was life changing for me. Because of the idea of forgiveness and there wasn’t this guy up there in this chair with his beard that was looking for me to do wrong, I could actually connect to a source where I could do what was right and what I was meant to do as right. And it did turn my life around.
And I still wrestle with it. Forgiveness is a really tough thing for me, mostly about myself. But I know it’s from my roots. And yet Catholicism is my foundation and I believe it is essentially who I am because it was very much how I was raised. I was very into rituals, and repetitions. And in one way I think it did save me from probably doing things that I shouldn’t have done because of that fear and that guilt. So I don’t completely throw it out, it’s still really my foundation. For me it’s a ‘Yes, and there’s also this.’
Did your spirituality help you through the challenges that you write about in your book?
As I was older. Not when I was a teenager in the throes of the most difficult insecurities. When I wanted to drown in a pool, I know what stopped me. I talk about it in the book — it’s this inner essence of foundation. And I thought immediately of my parents. I didn’t think of myself. I just thought oh my gosh, this will really hurt my parents. And I think that sense of compassion and thinking of other people before you was part of my spirituality because of how I was raised. That was taught to me then.
But certainly in the tough times since then the peace and understanding has come from my spirituality and what I believe. As my mother got cancer and died, losing my father at such an early age at 16, I started to grapple with it. Like what wasn’t fair about it. And when you say, gosh, there are horrible people in the world who get to stay alive, and I had a dad who was so kind and giving and so religious and so philanthropic. Why did he have to go and suffer a horrible painful death?
And I think just grappling with that and trying to come to terms with it put me in touch with there just has to be a bigger picture, there has to be a reason. And that definitely brought me full circle into the spirituality of it.
Did the activism you did come out of your spirituality? And were you inspired by the courage of the women that you write about in the book who joined you?
Absolutely. A lot of it came from my dad. My dad really molded who I was. He was an activist before I even knew it. And my mother molded who I was as a feminist — and even though she didn’t even believe in that. She’d say I’m not a feminist, I want doors opened for me. And I said Mom, you can have both (laughs).
But my mother was very independent in how she would say you go to school and you play the field; you go have a career and then you play the field. And then you travel the world and do everything that you want to do and then maybe you think about getting married.
And my dad’s philosophy was always that you have to give back. You have been given so much, almost to the point where I took it on in a guilty way that I was never enough. But he instilled that sense of understanding other people, other religions and races, and embracing them and trying to learn about them. And as far as giving back to the world, he was very much about that I could make a difference because of a voice that I may have. My dad was the one who said you have a voice because of this show, and you can make a difference. And so I got involved in a lot of charities.
So by the time I went to Washington D.C., and connected to women helping them have their voice, it all made sense because I had this bad experience. And if for no other reason and understanding it in the big picture, if I could make a difference and help people who don’t have a voice to have one, then that was worth it.
Do you still give seminars and talks to girls about body branding and self-image?
Yes! I just gave one last Friday for ten Girl Scout troops. And I do workshops on body image. I have a workshop called “Body Branding: Getting Comfortable With the Skin You’re In.” And I speak all the time about self-esteem and self-care.
The media can do such good things, but at the same time do you think the media is somewhat responsible for making women feel insecure about their bodies?
Absolutely. Have you picked up a magazine lately? (Laughs) Do you stand at the grocery store and look at those bodies that are most airbrushed? Yes, I think the media has a huge responsibility in what they put forth to young girls and the unrealistic expectations of what young men and young women are supposed to look like and smell like and taste like. There’s everything, it’s just incredible. There are perfumes and mints and gum and all kinds of things that everyone is aware of and it’s so unrealistic, it’s unattainable.
Do you think that’s changed since you were younger? Has it gotten more intense or has it always kind of been there?
I think it’s there, but I think it’s gotten worse with social media. I think there’s more pressure. It’s so instant now. And it’s so removed. You can cyberbully someone, you can post something and annihilate a person, and you have no accountability for it at all. And I think with the magazines, the younger they skew — I always talk about this — that when I was growing up, I didn’t have Juicy written across my butt. And now it’s sort of ‘That’s great! We can wear pajamas to school” (laughs).
There’s a pressure to fit in and be a certain way. And I know that my girls have felt it, and in just the same way that I felt it growing up. So I don’t think it’s changed that much.
Where are you now on your spiritual journey and in your career?
I feel really happy. I feel really content and pretty calm most of the time. I think acceptance and embracing are the two words that I would use.
I have two books that I’m working on for my publisher. They’re fiction but I wanted to make sure they were about family and women and issues and overcoming them. And as a coach, public speaker and workshop leader, I feel pretty confident about giving back and trying to help people not feel like I did.
I’m really happy in this place, and now I’m in menopause so I’m dealing with all of that. So I’m just sort of going into the Crone Stage now (laughs). I’m really embracing it and saying all right, well this is how it’s going to be. I’ll be as healthy as I can be and I’ll exercise but I can’t fight nature (laughs).
This site partly deals with pop culture that can inspire us. Have there been certain songs and movies that have inspired you over the years?
James Taylor’s song “The Secret of Life” has touched me deeply: “The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time” and “It’s OK to be afraid but don’t let that stand in your way.”
“Landslide” [by Fleetwood Mac] always is renewal for me. When I was a kid I remember Erin Moran from “Happy Days” and I listening to it over and over again. And it made so much sense to me then because I felt I had these dual lives and I had to let go of one. I changed my life for the show. Then when I was a teenager [it was] about love. Now when I listen to the song I feel it about my parents passing and I feel it about my daughter growing up — and about being a mother. Those songs are important to me in that way.
It’s a Wonderful Life still resonates with me about everybody’s purpose. And that even though we don’t know what it is, it’s there.
Lastly, are there plans for another Waltons reunion movie?
I wish! I pitched it to different networks. And Earl Hamner said that he would love to write it, and all the actors said if it’s done well we want to be in it. And no one wants it.
That’s too bad!
So yeah, we’re in the land of reality television programming.
And I know that so many people see the value in it and that every time we’ve done a special it’s gotten huge ratings. I produced two lookbacks at the show — reunion specials for INSP — and those were hugely popular and people just loved them.
But I think there’s a moment in time where we would like to do a scripted sort of closure story about what happened to everybody. And answer all those unanswered questions. But there doesn’t seem to be a lot of interest from Hollywood.
Maybe we can start a campaign of some sort, our own kind of activism.
Exactly, well you never know! Maybe the fans will do it. I know some people have talked about trying to put it together. Who knows? Other people have done things to revive shows with Kickstarter. Who knows what will happen?
While we wait to see if there’s ever another Waltons reunion movie, here’s the cast reunited for an appearance on “Good Morning America” last year: