Why Was Pat Priest Replaced as Marilyn in ‘Munster, Go Home!’?

MUNSTER, GO HOME, (front), Butch Patrick, Fred Gwynne, (back), Yvonne De Carlo, Al Lewis, Debbie Watson, 1966 with Pat Priest inset — Everett Collection

What To Know

Pat Priest was replaced by Debbie Watson as Marilyn in the 1966 film Munster, Go Home!
Priest was devastated by the decision, and efforts by her costars to reverse it were unsuccessful.
After The Munsters, Priest continued to act in films and television.

If you remember Pat Priest as Marilyn on The Munsters, you may notice a familiar face missing from Munster, Go Home! The 1966 movie brought back Fred Gwynne, Yvonne De Carlo, Al Lewis, and Butch Patrick, with Debbie Watson playing Marilyn.

Priest had taken over the role from Beverley Owen during the first season and stayed through the end of the series. She wanted to be in the movie, too, and later spoke about how much the decision to replace her hurt.

Why wasn’t Pat Priest in Munster, Go Home!?

Universal via MovieStillsDB

In a 2020 interview with Senior Voice Alaska, Priest said she was still filming the end of the television season when the producers sent someone to tell her she would not be in the movie. She was 29, and her contract was coming up for renewal.

“I think they wanted a younger actress and didn’t want to pay me more,” she said. Priest described herself as “devastated” by the decision.

She gave a similar account in an interview with HollywoodChicago.com in 2012. Priest explained that Watson was already under contract at Universal, and she believed the studio could pay Watson less.

“Maybe I’d aged in the one month we’d been off the air,” she joked. Gwynne and Lewis tried to reverse the decision, Priest said, but they were unsuccessful.

How did Pat Priest become Marilyn Munster?

Everett Collection

Priest had joined the television cast after Owen left to marry her boyfriend in New York, according to her HollywoodChicago.com interview. Owen played Marilyn in the first 13 episodes, and Priest appeared in the remaining 57.

The change happened quickly: Owen finished on a Friday, and Priest started the following Monday. Priest said in that interview that she had never met or spoken to the actress she replaced.

Her audition had taken place only days earlier, according to a 2010 Associated Press story published by the Deseret News. She recalled testing on Wednesday, getting the call on Thursday and signing her contract on Friday before reporting to work on Monday.

What did Pat Priest do after ‘The Munsters‘?

Priest later appeared opposite Elvis Presley in Easy Come, Easy Go (1967). Her television work also included Bewitched and The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

By the time of the 2010 interview, she lived in Idaho and sold antiques with her sister. She also traveled to memorabilia shows, meeting fans and signing autographs. Priest still remembered her time with the television cast fondly. “We became a family, personally as well as professionally,” she said.

Munster, Go Home! airs on Svengoolie‘s lineup on Saturday, Oct. 10, at 8/7c on MeTV.