Pacific Palisades residents might want to rent ‘The Exorcist’ before July 4. Linda Blair, child star of the classic 1973 horror film, will be riding as grand marshal in this year’s parade. Though many people may not recognize the actress who so believably played the little girl possessed by the devil, Blair will still have heads turning on the parade route. She is now a radiant and energetic humanitarian, driven more by her animal welfare work than her acting career. ‘Linda sounded like a wonderful person,’ said Arnie Wishnick, executive director of the Palisades Chamber of Commerce, who thought of asking Blair to be grand marshal after hearing that she was going to appear on Palisadian Jill Kessler’s radio show, ‘The Dog Dish.’ ‘She loves animals, especially dogs, so I thought she would be perfect,’ said Wishnick, whose yearly assignments for the parade organizing committee include finding a grand marshal. Kessler called to ask Blair, who accepted the offer and asked that Kessler ride with her. Blair will also have a booth set up along the route, representing her animal and human welfare organization, Linda Blair Worldheart Foundation (lindablairworldheart.com). ‘I look forward to greeting people at my booth and riding in the parade,’ Blair told the Palisadian-Post in a telephone interview. Her two-year-old grassroots public charitable organization campaigns to educate people about animals and helps rescue, feed, care and provide veterinary treatment for dogs and cats. ‘I was very disturbed at the number of animals that were being turned into animal rescues on a daily basis for what I felt were very poor reasons,’ said Blair, formerly the president of Pacific Coast Dog Rescue in Burbank. Some of the reasons people gave included ‘We’re moving,’ ‘I can’t be responsible,’ ‘It doesn’t fit with my lifestyle’ or ‘We don’t want it.’ Pacific Coast Dog Rescue would, in turn, offer those people training and advice. Blair’s work in animal welfare actually began in the early 1980s, when someone stole her Jack Russell terrier from her yard in Hollywood. ‘It broke my heart forever,’ she says. ‘It was the worst day of my life.’ Through that traumatic experience, she was introduced to Last Chance for Animals, which was doing a campaign on pet theft’why people’s animals are stolen and where they end up. ‘As years went on, I kept learning more difficult information on behalf of the plight of animals and I would always bring it to the public when I felt they needed to know,’ said Blair, who appeared on the live ‘330’ show with Steve Edwards and made a plea to have her dog returned, but to no avail. In 1994, Blair lost her mother to cancer and on July 4 of that year, her two canine companions died’one from a double stroke and another from autoimmune disease. ‘It was a life-changing time and I was in a deep state of depression,’ Blair said. ‘I decided to foster animals.’ After working with Pacific Coast Dog Rescue for several years, Blair decided to start her own foundation. ‘I needed to go nationwide.’ Her business partner is Heidi Huebner of Kids ‘n’ Pets, who works with children in schools to educate them about animals, while Blair runs the rescue end of Worldheart. Currently, the foundation has about 15 animals who need homes. Blair is also trying to secure a location to house her rescued animals. ‘Because of the building growth in L.A., it’s difficult to find kennel space,’ she said. ‘I’ve recently found a small property in the city that would allow people to come [see the animals] and school children to be educated on how to reduce pet overpopulation, spay and neuter, and reasons to rescue and adopt. ‘When I get a property, I will be able to also rescue felines along with dogs, but currently I rely on my own home and the compassion of foster homes to help me. I end up keeping the [animals] that no one else wants.’ This explains the barking sounds that came from her end of the phone line during the interview. Blair took a moment to talk to her dogs before coming back to the conversation. ‘I cannot tell people enough what a gift an animal is’if treated correctly,’ she said. Blair has three dogs of her own’a Staffordshire mix called Sunny (named for a ‘sunny personality’), Riley, a pit bull, and Itsy Bitsy, whom Blair described as ‘a mix with a curly tail who’s not itty bitty anymore!’ She actually grew up with cats and horses in Westport, Connecticut. ‘It was a wonderful rural community an hour from New York City, which is where I started my modeling career at 5 years of age,’ Blair said. ‘I had always planned to be a vet, and my mother taught me to save money so that I could go to school.’ However, by the time she turned 12, Blair had made over 75 commercials. ‘I still went to public school and practiced gymnastics, sailing, riding [horses] and piano’everything a little girl is lucky enough to do. Acting was just a job; I left it when I left New York.’ But the busy acting life was too much for Blair, who said she told her mother that she needed to focus on her school work. A week later, the interview for ‘The Exorcist’ came along. ‘It was a big to-do,’ she said, referring to the fact that the film was based on a popular novel of the time. ‘Pretend that ‘Star Wars’ was a novel first. This was it’the world based around this book.’ In the movie, Blair’s character, 12-year-old Regan, has to have the devil exorcised from her body. Blair said her family ‘never thought about the religious factor because I wasn’t raised Catholic. It was never a true story and still is not a true story.’ Proud of the film for its mark as a horror icon in film history (No. 3 on the American Film Institute’s list of the 100 most thrilling American films), Blair also said ‘it was the hardest job. ‘Think of a child going through the make-up [hours of preparation] and 17-below temps. No child wants to play a monster; you want to play a princess. I wanted to ride my horses.’ After earning an Oscar nomination for ‘The Exorcist,’ Blair appeared as a runaway sent to a detention center for girls in the made-for-television movie ‘Born Innocent’ and as the original dying girl in ‘Airport 1975’. She leaned towards television, appearing in ‘Sweet Hostage’ opposite Martin Sheen, followed by a major role as a young Israeli hostage in ‘Victory at Entebbe’. Blair also starred in ‘Grease’ on Broadway when she was 14. She appeared in a series of horror films in the 1980s but in recent years has focused on comedy, appearing in ‘The Blair Bitch Project’ in 1999 and the Fox Family TV series ‘S Club 7,’ as Joni (kids may recognize her from this latter role). However, she is also known for hosting the 2001 TV series ‘The Scariest Places on Earth.’ ‘I love to entertain,’ said Blair, who most recently appeared in the comedy ‘Hitter’s Anonymous’ at the 2004 Palm Beach International Film Festival. ‘I’ve been developing film projects and working towards producing for a long time, but the humanitarian side takes over and you have to make a choice.’ Blair’s choice has been to focus on her animal and human welfare work. On Tuesday, she appeared on the ‘O’Reilly Factor’ to speak against the recent ban on pit bulls in Colorado. She calls herself a ‘pit bull lover,’ who adopted her own pit bull, Riley, when he followed her home after she saw him jogging down the 405 freeway. ‘He’s a dog that would’ve been bred to fight,’ Blair said. ‘Instead, he yodels and leaps and jumps.’ Her dogs will not be riding in the Palisades Fourth of July parade with her because they’re afraid of fireworks, like many dogs. ‘Fireworks in the neighborhood are very frightening,’ said Blair, whose advice for dog owners July 4 is to ‘please make sure your dogs are registered’with two ID tags in case one falls off.’ She recommends microchipping. ‘I beg everyone to remember their animal companions on the Fourth. I’m going to go directly home after the parade and watch fireworks on television and remind my dogs that everything’s okay.’ For Palisadians who plan to rent a movie instead of watching fireworks, Blair suggests renting ‘Repossessed,’ the 1990 Bob Logan comedy she appeared in, parodying ‘The Exorcist.’
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