Margaret Markov & THE JIMMY STEWART SHOW 1971

Another Day, Another Scholar

Original Air Date Oct. 17 1971

Filipino exploitation babe Margaret Markov attempts to seduce Jimmy Stewart !!

      A few months before heading off to the Philippines to film New World's THE HOT BOX (and later BLACK MAMA WHITE MAMA) here's the very beautiful Margaret Markov making an appearance in Jimmy Stewart's short lived early 70's TV series, which was titled (aptly enough) THE JIMMY STEWART SHOW. Playing Prof. James Howard, a science teacher at a small college, Stewart's small screen debut was highly publicized but untimely failed to connect with viewers only running for one season from 1971-72.
    Watching the series today on Warner Archives Streaming (I have vague recollections of the show as a child) it seems wanting to juggle back and forth between comedy and drama with Stewart in full "aw shucks..." mode as he gently tries to confront some of the then contemporary social issues of the day. Most of the comedy side of things is centered around his home life with Julie Adams (THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON) playing his wife along with a couple of precocious kids and M. Emmett Walsh as a fellow professor.

   Before she would shower down Pam Grier and blast her way through the sweaty Filipino jungles with machine guns & machetes, Markov here plays Joyce Gibbs -  a highly flirtatious student who seemingly will go to any lengths not to pass Prof. Howard's class, but to simply be allowed to enroll in it (!). Wearing a variety of low cut dresses along with mini-skirts & leopard-skinned hot pants she seems bound and determined to enjoy the benefits of the professor's folksy science musings, as at one point she even starts to strip down in his office (after offering him a case of beer !). The script makes it plainly obvious that Markov's end game plan is to not only flirt with the slightly befuddled Stewart, but to untimely engage in some office couch "special tutoring"

   Born in 1948 in Stockton Calif., the blonde statuesque Markov appeared in Jack Starret's RUN ANGEL RUN in 1969 and in 1971 would appear in Roger Vadim's  black comedy PRETTY MAIDS ALL IN A ROW. Traveling to the Philippines in 1972 she was in the THE HOT BOX and in 1973 would appear as a revolutionary on the run with Pam Grier in the all time classic BLACK MAMA WHITE MAMA ("Chicks in Chains...On The Run From A Prison Hell !"). In 1974 Roger Corman would transplant the women in prison thing to Ancient Rome with the result being THE ARENA that once again teamed Margaret with Pam Grier as female gladiators that are overseen by Rosalba Neri. Former actor Mark Damon (THE DEVIL'S WEDDING NIGHT) was producer on THE ARENA and he and Margaret were later married (and remain so to this day).