1956 Hit Film Classic, Nominated for 4 Oscars, Had Its Shocking Ending Changed
In 1956, moviegoers flocked to see The Bad Seed. Based on Williams March's novel of the same name, the psychological horror thriller starred Nancy Kelly, Henry Jones, Eileen Heckart, and child actress Patty McCormack. The movie followed the story of Rhoda Penmark (McCormack), an eight-year-old hiding a dark secret about her involvement in the murder of a classmate.
The Bad Seed was a box office hit. It was nominated for four Academy Awards, including a Best Supporting Actress nomination for McCormack. Heckart and McCormack were also nominated for Golden Globe Awards for their roles, with Heckart winning Best Supporting Actress.
McCormack played the sweet-faced but evil protagonist in both the 1954 stage and 1956 film versions of The Bad Seed. But the endings to the two productions were very different.
The novel and stage version ended with Kelly's Christine Penmark poisoning her killer daughter and taking her own life, but the film version hit a roadblock when that ending was presented.
"In the play, the mother shoots herself and dies, while Rhoda survives her mother's attempt to poison her," McCormack, now 80, told the Abbeville Meridional in 2016, per MeTV. "So no one was left alive who knew what Rhoda really did. But they changed that for the movie because the Motion Picture Production Code of the 1950s wouldn't permit movie criminals to go unpunished."
An alternate ending
According to Turner Classic Movies, when director Billy Wilder wanted to make The Bad Seed independently, he was stopped by the Production Code Administration's (Hays Code) censorship rule, which banned movies "dealing with criminal activities, in which minors participate, or to which minors are related."
Warner Bros. director Mervyn LeRoy worked around the problem with an alternate ending-SPOILER ALERT- that showed little Rhoda being karmically punished for her crimes by being struck by a bolt of lightning. LeRoy also incorporated a cheeky curtain call at the film's end. After the cast was introduced and took bows, Kelly put McCormack over her knee and spanked her.
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McCormack tried to separate herself from the character
For decades, McCormack tried to distance herself from her pigtailed Bad Seed character.
Speaking on the It Happened in Hollywood podcast in September 2025, the actress admitted, "Back then, there was that awful, awful thing of being a one-hit wonder. … So I did my best to separate myself from that role and reputation."
Over time, she grew to appreciate her performance-and her evil character. "[Broadway] director [Reginald Denham] was the one who really guided my performance," she recalled. "He told me that no matter what, I was always right. If you think about that when you watch it next time, you can see I have no patience for any of the adults' opinions when they don't coincide with my own. I didn't focus on the gore. I focused on being selfish and kind of chilly."
"My character went against the grain of what was expected," The Bad Seed star added. "She's a rebel in sheep's clothing, because she dresses really nice and pretty. … Rhoda had a lot of stuff for a seemingly delicate little girl."
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This story was originally published May 5, 2026 at 5:53 AM.