I have a theory on why Jessie and Calla didn't work.
1) The original concept for Beth's cousin was supposed to be a combination of India and Roxie. When casting happened for Beth's cousin, it was in mid 1984 and both MKA and Kristi Farrell read for the part. The casting people liked both actresses and decided to 86 the Beth cousin connection and create two brand new characters. India (who took on the troublemaking aspects of the original character sketch) and Roxie (who took on the spirited and working class elements of the original character sketch).
2) We also have to remember that both Calla and Jessie came on at least a month or so before Long left the show as head-writer so we never got to see the mother/daughter relationship explored in more detail nor did we get to see the Calla/Lillian sister relationship explored. If you watched the November/December 1985 episodes.. you saw Calla guilting Lillian about how she and her husband helped Lillian when she was single with a baby and how it would be nice to have that kindness returned while she seemed to rule her daughter Jessie with an iron fist in the pageant world. Rebecca Staab had just come from playing a working class girl that dressed like a Madonna wannabe and was the bad girl.. so it's possible that perhaps Jessie was going to be revealed to be that way to Beth... but the writer switch happened before that got telegraphed maybe?
Plus, from what seems to have been mentioned by the actors that played Jessie and Simon, it didn't seem as though they were supposed to be paired and that became a thing later on since both mentioned that they hardly interacted at first.. and then one day were told they were being paired.
By
Soaplovers ·
