''Katherine'' (also known as ''The Radical'') is a 1975 American TV movie written and directed by Jeremy Kagan, and starring

Sissy Spacek Mary Elizabeth Spacek (; born December 25, 1949) is an American actress and singer. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, three Golden Globe Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and nominations for four Britis ...

Art Carney Arthur William Matthew Carney (November 4, 1918 – November 9, 2003) was an American actor and comedian. A recipient of an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and six Primetime Emmy Awards, he was best known for his role as Ed Norton on the si ...

and Henry Winkler. Intended to portray the time period of the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

, the title character was loosely based on

Diana Oughton Diana Oughton (January 26, 1942 – March 6, 1970) was an American member of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) Michigan Chapter and later, a member of the 1960s radical group Weather Underground. Oughton received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr ...

of the

Weather Underground The Weather Underground was a far-left militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group was organized as a faction of Students for a Democr ...

, who died in the 1970

Greenwich Village townhouse explosion The Greenwich Village townhouse explosion occurred on March 6, 1970, in New York, New York, United States. Members of the Weather Underground (Weathermen), an American leftist militant group, were making bombs in the basement of 18 West 11th S ...

when a bomb she was building accidentally exploded. Reviewers have also noted that ''Katherine'' also "borrowed from the then-current headlines involving Patty Hearst, another heiress whose exact level of voluntary involvement with the

Symbionese Liberation Army The United Federated Forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was a small, American far-left organization active between 1973 and 1975; it claimed to be a vanguard movement. The FBI and American law enforcement considered the SLA to be the ...

remained hazy in 1975. Through a series of flashbacks, the film, told in semi-documentary fashion, retraces the main characters' lives through the years 1964–1972. ''Katherine'' originally aired in a two-hour time slot on October 5, 1975, and later was syndicated in a 78-minute version.

References

External links

* 1975 television films 1975 films 1975 drama films American television films Films directed by Jeremy Kagan Weather Underground {{US-tv-drama-film-stub