THE LEGEND CONTINUES

Author: By Bruce McCabe, Globe Staff

Date: Sunday, April 24, 1988
Page: 2
Section: TV WEEK

He was considered by some (including himself) as the greatest American novelist. Some still say he is.

Appreciation of his work, however, often becomes obscured by the flamboyancy of his persona, a persona he cultivated at his peril.

As viewers will see while watching "Hemingway," a six-hour miniseries beginning Monday night at 8 on Channel 68 and WPIX, the New York superstation, Hemingway's legendary life contained the ingredients to overpower his art.

His 16 novels and 49 short stories are still in print, more than 25 years after his death, with worldwide sales totaling over a million copies annually. He is probably the most widely translated American author in the world. His books are the most widely read in secondary schools and colleges.

He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for his novel "The Old Man And The Sea." In 1954, the Swedish Academy awarded him the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Hemingway's writing was distinguished by its facility for placing the reader in the middle of the story, whether the locale was Africa, France, Spain, or Cuba.

His appeal lies in his ability to stimulate his readers through his romanticizing of the lasting values and virtues. He was praised for his celebration of the love of a man for a woman, woman for a man and the platonic love that can exist between men.

Hemingway's audience, however, also was captivated by the turbulent, romantic, dramatic experiences of his life.

"Hemingway" stars Stacy Keach, a Hemingwayesque figure himself, as the novelist. Featured as Hemingway's four wives are Josephine Chaplin, Marisa Berenson, Lisa Banes and Pamela Reed. Chaplin plays Hadley Richardson, Berenson plays Pauline Pfeiffer, Banes portrays Martha Gellhorn and Mary Welsh is played by Reed.

Hemingway's relationships with women are part of the legend. It is said that, in addition to his wives, he slept with only three or four other women in his life. He was, Keach said in an interview, "destroyed" in his 50s by the decision of a woman less than half his age with whom he didn't have an affair to marry a younger man.

The multi-million dollar production of "Hemingway" was filmed entirely on location in the places the novelist lived, loved, worked and fought, many of them settings for novels like "For Whom The Bell Tolls," "The Sun Also Rises," "A Farewell to Arms" and "The Old Man And The Sea" and the short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro."

The versatile Keach, a 1985 Golden Globe nominee for his work in the "Mike Hammer" series, has appeared in 19 films as well as on stage and in television. Like Hemingway, he has been married four times -- he married Malgosia Tomassi, a Polish-born actress, in June, 1986 -- and has attracted some notoriety. He spent time in prison on drug charges in England in 1985.

Keach says he researched Hemingway by following his footsteps from the
plains of Amboseli in Africa where Hemingway shot big game to the house in Ketchum, Idaho, where he shot himself over 25 years ago.

The story traces Hemingway from his origins as a voice for the "Lost Generation" in 1925 through his tempestuous romances and marriages to his various roles as everything from hunter and lover to fighter, adventurer and dreamer.

The production is based on "Ernest Hemingway -- Collected Letters 1917-1961" and Carlos Baker's widely praised biography "Ernest Hemingway: A Life Story."

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