Desert Sun, Number 194, 17 March 1984
Koch plans horse series in Kentucky
By DAVID McCORMICK Associated Press Writer
HENDERSON, Ky. (AP) Kentucky millionaire horse breeder and plantation owner Wilson Calhoun so far is just a character in the mind of Hollywood producer Howard W. Koch. But if Koch is successful, Calhoun will be the hero of an ABC television series called “Kentucky” which he describes as a cross between CBS’ steamy soap, “Dallas,” and NBC’s frontier saga, “Centennial.” The producer for Paramount studios has received the go-ahead from ABC to draft a script for a two-hour pilot show that could air this fall. Filming would begin this summer if the script is approved. And, depending on the audience response, a regular series could be on the air by next January.
“What it basically is is a modern story with flashbacks,” Koch said in a telephone interview from his Hollywood office. “It’s the saga of the Calhoun family from the time of Daniel Boone right up to the present,” Calhoun, Koch said, is a 60-year-old, twicewidowed, fifth-generation native of the Bluegrass State. He manages his 3,000-acre estate near Lexington between big financial dealings that take him to New York, Chicago and occasionally to an exotic foreign country. He has two sons and a daughter and the plot will get rather tangled, Koch said. “It’s a high-rolling set. It’s about power and how power works and how power corrupts. “He faces a world of trials and tribulation just like everybody else, but in Kentucky, which is different from everyplace else.”
The idea is just fine with Lynda Jalbert, director of the Kentucky Film Office. “What it will do for tourism is just really a coup for Kentucky, kind of like what ‘Dallas’ has done for Dallas and South Fork,” she said. “They have hundreds of people daily to visit South Fork,” the Texas ranch where the television series’ Ewing family is shown heading its international oil empire. The film office was created in 1976 to attract movie and television producers to Kentucky. Since then, major pictures filmed in the state include “Coal Miner’s Daughter" and “Stripes.” “We just finished shooting another one with the working title of “River Rats,’” Ms. Jalbert said. “It should be out before very long.” Kentucky’s varied geography makes it a fine film location, she said. “The only things we don’t have are deserts or beaches Otherwise, we have everything in the way of locations I think any producer could possibly want.”
The pilot is being written by the husband-wife team of Stephen and Elinor Karpf, who wrote the movie "Love Story” and the script for the daytime TV soap opera “Capital.” Koch said the publishing firm of Simon and Schuster has agreed in principle to publish a novel this summer also with the working title “Kentucky” based on the pilot script Asked to assess the chances his idea has for becoming a TV series, Koch said “It’s a crap game. I’d say right now it’s about 50-50.” Certainly, the networks are interested in the bigfamily sagas, with their feuds and double-dealing. Among this season’s most popular programs are “Dallas,” “Dynasty,” about the oil-rich Carrington family in Denver and “Falcon Crest,” set in the lush northern California wine valleys. If producers could squeeze intrigue out of the wine industry, they certainly can make hay with the horse-breeding business
By
Paul Raven ·
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