Chris 2

Put me in the camp of those who thought MP significantly declined after the bombing. The aftermath was just so dumb, and Kimberly staying on the show was stupid.

Agreed 100%. I wonder what they could have done, because they tried to do the same show, just one with a giant Pam-sized hole in it.

I’ve seen others suggest that Pam’s mysterious disappearance could have powered the show for another season, though I don’t know how satisfying that would have been knowing she wouldn’t be back.  If Dallas were more of a gothic show, I would have had Pam disappear at the end of 1986-87, and 87-88 picks up six months later, with Bobby hiring a nanny for Christopher, and who tries to figure out why nobody wants to talk about the mysterious Mrs. Ewing. And the new nanny essentially plays the “outsider” role that Pam played. Maybe she eventually winds up with Bobby, too. Not sure it would have worked but I think it would have been better than what we got.

And at the same time, you introduce a new business rival for JR - maybe Sue Ellen, an idea that had been floated for the following season. Or maybe it’s someone entirely different, but whoever it was needed to be intertwined with the family beyond just JR.

Victoria has not always been a reliable narrator. For example, sometimes she says that as far as she’s concerned, Pam died in the car accident. But shortly before the finale aired, she said she would have been willing to appear and put a “coda” on the story of Pam, but didn’t want to be part of another cliffhanger. And even when they did the TNT revival, she mused publicly about a return but a year or so later released another statement saying that she would never make a “desperate reappearance.”

Some of her colleagues said in Barbara Curran’s book that she was renegotiating and I believe them.

Victoria likes to say these days that when she signed her two-year contract extension in 1985, she told them that would be her last contract. In reality, she was negotiating for another new contract in 1987. The sticking points: she wanted salary parity with Patrick Duffy (who got a big raise when he returned a year earlier) and she wanted a one-year deal (the producers wanted two). So they let her walk away. Big mistake. And the producers pissed her off by leaking to the press that they had let her go, which she forced them to correct, and they even took away her parking space.

But they were expecting her to come back, which is why Pam’s exit is so bungled. They started shooting the next season immediately after they finished Principal’s last season, trying to bank episodes in anticipation of a writers’ strike. TV Guide reported at the time that they were removing Pam from the new season’s scripts.

When Sue Ellen did her “movie” a couple of seasons later, notice how there were no clips of Pam. And when Bobby showed Pam’s lookalike a picture of Pam, it was NOT Victoria. She wouldn’t give permission for her clips or image to be used. That’s unusual for an actor - again, they must have really pissed her off.

LOL, no. After finishing up her phone sex with Bobby, Pam just throws up her hands in front of her face in a lame attempt to protect the money.

They should have ended the series with the previous scene: JR walking out of Ewing Oil and vowing to get it back.

Anyone remember Kevin Bernhardt as Frisco on GH? I thought he was terribly miscast but TPTB liked him enough to bring him back as a different character for the dull Laurelton Murders storyline.

I liked the Waleska story, but I wish it had been played out a little longer. It only took Valene an episode or two after their marriage to figure out it was a mistake. I think you could have had a season of Valene married to this guy whom her friends don’t like, and he gradually reveals himself to her.

I liked Anne. Michelle Phillips didn’t have a whole lot of range as an actress, but that character was perfect for her. I liked the rivalry between Claudia and “Annie”.

I think both were great on the show but Donna Mills gave more consistently controlled performances. I think some stronger direction would have benefitted Lee at times.

LOL - Charles?

I’m still working on season 5. Boy, Cole is an uptight, humorless, judgmental jerk. It doesn’t help that the actor playing him is pretty limited. But Cole is acting like a mini-Chase and he can’t be more than 25 or 26. And he has a lot of nerve calling Melissa a “tramp,” like he’s Tuscany Valley’s answer to the church lady.

Great scene. Donna Mills was GOLD.

2 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

The espionage story had its moments but I thought it was a very bad fit for Knots, and the  woman  - Jean Hackney or whatever her name was - was very irritating.  She felt like she was airlifted in from Falcon Crest.  

 I don't think Ben had much more of a future on the show. They were undergoing massive budget cuts, and if talents like Julie Harris and Constance McCashin were fired, I don't see him being spared if he had not decided to leave.

Your comments about Jean and Falcon Crest are spot on.

Also agree that Ben was on borrowed time when he decided to leave. He wasn’t part of the core, and they were stripping down to the core at that point.

I always thought this was a great cliffhanger, but found the resolution less than satisfying. I really wanted Valene to get revenge on Jill, beyond just terrorizing Jill with scissors in her office.

That said, I don’t know what that revenge would look like. Maybe stuffing dynamite down her throat a la Wile E Coyote.

The racetrack wasn’t build on top of only Falcon Crest land. But they had to condemn 10 or so acres of Falcon Crest vineyards for it. Angela was practically in tears as they bulldozed the vineyards and Chase vowed to never stop fighting until they were replanted. This happened in season 3.

I don’t remember seeing the racetrack after season 5.

Interesting idea for a game show. I guess this is one of the shows replacing the cancelled Match Game and Card Sharks. Too bad she’s hosting it.

Great interview. And she’s classy in the way she speaks of her colleagues. And humble. Old school Hollywood.

I do think it was deliberate. These were not worldly people. They were wealthy, but from a small town, and not part of high society. It’s not that different from the Ewings on Dallas: they didn’t travel in glamorous circles and weren’t showy with their wealth (at least not originally). They didn’t live in an enormous house with high ceilings and didn’t dress to the nines. They drove station wagons and Cabriolets and Lincolns. Now, Mark Graison on Dallas was more worldly: he clearly traveled more and played polo and was more a part of high society when compared with the Ewings.

Poor Angela, so unstylish and provincial.

I never bought the Richard/Angela retcon and thought it was patently absurd, given the actions of Jacqueline and Douglas in the earlier seasons. It was the type of lazy writing you see on daytime soaps. I expected more from the nighttime shows.

But yeah I agree that they did it because Chase was leaving and they wanted that familial connection. Which is funny because they didn’t really mention that connection between Angela and Chase after the first few seasons. And she always treated him as an outsider. In fact, I thought some of the things she pulled on him were pretty awful considering he was her nephew. But she had no love for him at all.

Yep - it is. It’s fascinating how Maggie managed to write a whole book and no one even knew about it.

I hated the Jeff Wainwright story too. I always found Edward Albert (Wainwright) to be an unappealing performer, so that doesn’t help. Neither does his mustache.

And of course, when Falcon Crest had an almost-complete change in the writing and production staff between seasons 5 and 6, the Wainwright story was the one thing the new regime kept. It also set into motion the events leading to the dissolution of Chase and Maggie’s marriage, which I also didn’t like.

My issue with him is that he wasn’t really the same Steve Frame. The old Steve Frame would have never entertained the idea of getting together with Rachel again, not after what she put him through. Then again, I don’t think the old Alice would have agreed to be Rachel’s doctor or spend time at the Corys for the holidays, and yet she did (and was again played by Jacqui Courtney). So blame the writers, not the actors.

The other thing that makes no sense about season 5 is the show going  back to the “Angela wants to drive Chase out of the valley” stories. Why? In season one, she was trying to do this because she didn’t want Chase to discover the truth about Jason’s death, and wanted to prevent him from inheriting Falcon Crest. In seasons 2-4, Chase is Angela’s partner in FC and she wants to get rid of him. But by season 5, they were no longer partners, and there was no longer the possibility that Chase would inherit FC or regain control. So what was the point of those plots? It seemed like Angela wanted to drive him out just to be nasty. It didn’t ring true. 

I’m to the point where Angela disappears for a few episodes and I have to agree. The Jordan portion of the show is kind of ridiculous. Lance is at loose ends with Babylonia gone. I’m really missing the season-long mystery arc the show had in its best seasons. I think in previous years, they sat down and plotted what where the whole season was headed (like season 2 with the Carlo Agretti murder). In this one, it feels like they’re doing that every six episodes or so.

Yep - Lorimar considered returning both Dallas and Falcon Crest to the self-contained format for the 1988-89 season. They mentioned in the press it would allow them to do stories like one where Bobby tracks down his old basketball coach to give him some bad news.

Thrilling!