Top TV/Movie Witches (Oct 27, 2007)

AOL posted a Top 18 list of the most bewitching characters on TV at this site: http://television.aol.com/photos/tv-witches?deeplink_level0=0

Prepare to be spellbound by our account of the sweetest, meanest, best and worst witches ever seen on TV. From animated to old school, from toddlers to teenagers, we've used our magic potion to uncover these 18 top TV witches.

Here's a partial list:

16. Witch Hazel of "Looney Tunes".

15. Amanda Tucker of "Tucker's Witch" played by Catherine Hicks.

13. Endora of "Passions" played by Nicole Cox. The character name is taken from the "Bewitched" series.

12. Paige Matthews of "Charmed" played by Rose McGowan.
11. Tabitha Stephens of "Bewitched" as a toddler and "Tabitha" as an adult, the latter played by Lisa Hartman.
9. Prue Halliwell of "Charmed" played by Shannen Doherty, who was rumored to have started the Witch Creek fire near Julian, but our sources are often unreliable.
8. Endora, which nowdays sounds like an old 90s e-mail software program, of "Bewitched" played by the late Agnes Moorehead.
7. Phoebe Halliwell of "Charmed" played by Alyssa Milano, who was seen on Thursday nights episode of "My Name is Earl."
6. Tabitha of "Passions" played by Juliet Mills. Here's an odd sense of creativity. In the early 70s, both "Bewitched" and "Nanny and the Professor" aired on ABC, the latter played by Mills. Tabitha as a name for her character on "Passions" might have been a tribute to both shows at once.
5. Sabrina Spellman of "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" played by Melissa Joan Hart, who played the part from the age of 20 until 27 when the series ended.
4. Grandmama Addams of "The Addams Family" played by Blossom Rock.
3. Piper Halliwell of "Charmed" played by Holly Marie Combs.
2. Willow Rosenberg of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" played by Alyson Hanningham.
1. Samantha Stephens of "Bewitched" played by the late Elizabeth Montgomery.

A few thoughts on this:

I like Alyssa, I also like Melissa, but I wonder on what basis were they ranked? Who ranked them? How come Melissa rates higher than Alyssa? (editor disclosure: I run fan sections for both of them.) But I am fond for the memories of watching the late Elizabeth Montgomery in the original run of Bewitched from 1964-72 as she was just as incredible then as Alyssa and some of the others are today.

But most people missed Lisa Hartman's brief run of the spinoff show Tabitha in the late 70s. Wonder if that will ever be on DVD.

I'm also wondering how Shannen Doherty couldn't make the top 10. More amazing than this: how come the two aunts from "Sabrina", Carloine Rhea and Beth Broderick, playing sisters Hilda and Zelda Spellman, didn't make the top 18? I thought these two were among the funniest witch players on television. They mentioned a lot of TV movie witch characters that haven't been seen since they were once one-time movie airings. Why were they qualified to be on the list?

I'm not sure of the other TV witches in the list as I'm not familiar with the ones outside of the TV series characters. I like the witch in the Bugs Bunny cartoon, but then again, why is that on the list if the character doesn't have a regular series of her own?

Another omission: Witchiepoo, played by Billie Hayes on "H.R. Pufinstuf." She was hilarious in the series. She also played Weenie the Genie on "Lidsville."

I find it funny that Juliet Mills's witch character on Passions is the same first name as Samantha Stevens's daughter Tabitha. Alyssa's "Who's the Boss" character Samantha is also the same first name as, yup, Elizabeth Montgomery's character. Wonder if the writers were big "Bewitched" fans.

And another fact the AOL article left out: Juliet Mills also played a witch in her "Nanny and the Professor" series as Nanny Phoebe Figalilly. Aha! Alyssa Milano took another TV witch name, this time, for "Charmed!" From Wikipedia: "Figalilly was apparently psychic, and had regular flashes of what was often more than intuition (she frequently knew who was ringing the doorbell before the bell even rang)."

So you could say that Alyssa Milano played two characters whose first names were the same as those played by Montgomery and Mills respectively. Coincidence?

And what about genies? Are they in a sense witches too? If so, then Barbara Eden of "I Dream of Jeannie" (as Jeannie) would qualify. She also played Great Aunt Irma in three episodes of "Sabrina".

Which brings me to "Sabrina" again. Plenty of actors played a witch character on the show, but not just in this incarnation. There was also the cartoon spinoff of that live-action revival called "Sabrina the Animated Series" in 1999, and the original cartoon spinoff from the Archies cartoon series of 1969. One of the names that comes up is Emily Hart, who guested as Amanda on the live-action series and starred in her own 1999 cartoon series. In the 1969 version, Jane Webb voiced Sabrina, Hilda, and Zelda Spellman, so she could have qualified. And coincidentally, Jennifer Darling voiced a character Amy in that cartoon. In "Clarissa Explains It All", Melissa played Clarissa Darling. Yikes!

And I forgot one more notable witch: Patty Halliwell of "Charmed" played by Finola Hughes. She played the late mother of the four sisters in the series on occasion.

So which witch is which nowadays?

Happy Halloween.

THIS JUST IN...Disney Channel debuted a new series "Wizards of Waverly Place." Get this, it features three teenage witches! Good grief!