I've read all Jacqueline Susann's work and the dolls were the pills NOT the girls/women. She wrote about this and said that almost everyone thinks Valley of the Dolls is really Valley of the Women but it's not.
shareI'll admit that I never knew that Jacqueline Susann refers to the pills as "dolls" in her books. I always thought she refered "dolls" as the girls/women. Guess I was wrong.
shareShe referred to the capsules as "dolls" many times in the movie. Why would she be calling the pills "women" or "girls?"
shareNeely clearly calls the pills "dolls" in the film. Sorry but its beyond me how anyone could miss that. Maybe not paying attention?
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I don't think there was much confusion about this during the book's heyday. Nor did anyone mistake Harold Robbins's THE CARPETBAGGERS for a Civil War novel. Just sayin'.
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It seems fairly obvious, from the very beginning of the movie with that dramatic intro...
shareYessir (or yes'm), I've always known the dolls were pills. Of course, I'm about 5,000 years old, and actually read the novel not too many years after it was first published.
A good friend of mine refers to pills as nothing but dolls. :)
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I've never read the book, but I figured it out while watching the movie as soon as Neely said, "I'm not crazy, I'm just hooked on dolls!"
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Anybody like me, who read the book in high school in L.A. when it first came out...
shareIn the film, Neely (Patty Duke) calls them dolls just before her "Sparkle" line...It goes by quickly so it's easily missed.
shareI think it's made very clear in both the novel and the film that "dolls" were pills, and I think most people know this.
shareI didn't know until I watched the movie. I grew up in the 70's and don't remember anyone ever referring to pills as "dolls".
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Well, there were colorful capsules all over the original cover, and the blurbs and advertisements all talked about the dolls as things that helped you sleep at night, kicked you awake in the morning, made life seem great. I think one of those lines is even quoted in the taglines here. It was pretty clear to me reading this in 1969, age twelve, that dolls were barbiturates and amphetamines. At the same time, there was the double-meaning joke about doll meaning beautiful woman, with a picture of Jacqueline on the back cover and "This is the doll who wrote Valley of the Dolls."
Specifically, the pills called dolls are the ones that put you to sleep. I even thought back then that they were called dolls because some people call barbiturates Barbies, or because you "take them to bed with you". I think now that the original dolls were Dolophine, in other words methadone, which is used not just to help drug addicts but as a pain medication and sleep aid.
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When the film came out - and caused a sensation - we new that "dolls" meant pills.
shareOne must really not be paying attention to miss the dialogue in the scene where Neely is first admitted to the hospital, where she rants & screams about the dolls ruining her life. By that far into the movie, though, one should already have figured out dolls = pills. Even I figured that out, & I never read the book.
Specifically, the pills called dolls are the ones that put you to sleep. I even thought back then that they were called dolls because some people call barbiturates Barbies, or because you "take them to bed with you".[quote] That's quite interesting, I wondered where the reference came from! [quote]I think now that the original dolls were Dolophine, in other words methadone, which is used not just to help drug addicts but as a pain medication and sleep aid.I'm not so sure about that..."dolls" may have become Neely's catch phrase for all pills in general, but specifically, it meant seconal or nembutol, downers that are similar to today's benzodiazepines (clonazepam, xanax, rivotril).
The characters in the novel called the pills "dolls" throughout the book. So anyone that read the book would've caught that. I loved the book, but thought the movie was boring. However, now I'd like to see the movie again out of curiosity.
Dini
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The book was one of the first "racy" ones I read. At age 10, I wasn't sure what "dolls" meant before reading it.
"May I bone your kipper, Mademoiselle?"
You read the book when you were ten? Was your entire childhood unsupervised?
shareI read Valley of the Dolls when I was about ten as well. I remember thinking 'dolls' was a dumb name for pills, but whatever. I also read the James Bond books about that time.
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