Natalie Schafer's Gilligan's Island Contract Allegedly Had A Unique Stipulation

Natalie Schafer had been working for four decades before she was offered the role of Lovey Howell on Sherwood Schwartz's 1964 sitcom "Gilligan's Island." Schafer later admitted that she only took the gig to get a free Hawaiian vacation, convinced that the show would fail, and she would be allowed to go on to better jobs. She was dismayed to learn that the original pilot had been picked up, and was further bummed out when the series became a hit. She was in the for the long haul. Luckily, the success of "Gilligan's Island" was so unexpectedly overwhelming that it likely smoothed over any trepidation she might have had, providing the actress with one of her most recognizable roles. 

Schafer was 64 years old when she appeared on the show, but that wasn't a fact she wanted anyone to know. The actress was raised in an era when it was considered gauche to ask a woman her age, and, likewise, felt no urge to tell anyone how old she actually was. Indeed, her age might have been considered an issue when she was cast opposite Jim Backus, who was 13 years her junior. 

According to Michael Karol's 2004 book "Funny Ladies: Sitcom Queens," Shafer often gave a different birth year on official paperwork, listing her birth year as 1912, when it was, in fact, 1900. It wasn't until after Schafer passed away in 1990 that her closest friends learned her real age. Schafer was always secretive about her age and, it seems, her health: Schafer survived a bout of breast cancer and never told anyone.

And, according to the trivia page on IMDb, Schafer has certain stipulations in her "Gilligan's Island" contract that would keep her age hidden. Specifically, Shafer demanded that she be given no extreme close-ups, and be given no scenes featuring quick movements, as to ensure her age remain obscure. 

Of course, Schafer did have multiple close-ups on the show, but she likely worked with the directors and cinematographers of "Gilligan's Island" to make sure she looked the way she wanted to. And one might also notice that Schafer never once participated in the show's plentiful pratfalls and slapstick. This was likely done to hide the fact that she was 64 and didn't have the same capacity for physical comedy as her co-star Bob Denver. 

Perhaps unintentionally, the lack of pratfalls assured audiences that Lovey Howell was a more dignified character than the others. She was lost on a desert island, but she was unaccustomed to physical labor and had no survival skills, mostly because of her extreme wealth. Schafer's contractual stipulation that she do no physical comedy actually helped inform her character. Also, one can say that her careful refusal to do close-ups worked; most viewers — including this author — would never have assumed she was 12 years older than she said she was. 

Why did Schafer lie about her age? It seems this was a common practice for many years. Women often experienced prejudice based on their age — they still do — and it was especially pronounced when Schafer was young. It's likely she had been back-dating her age for many years before "Gilligan's Island," and merely continued the practice when she landed the sitcom gig in 1964. For those with grandparents born in the 1910s, you may find that your own family members had been lying about their ages all their lives, perhaps to avoid the "old maid" stigma of the time.