TV/Radio & Cable Week, May 30, 1982
I didn't think ^Falcon Crest' would be a hit, Foxworth says by Jerry Buck
Robert Foxworth says he was skeptical when he was offered a role in the hew CBS prime time soap opera "Falcon Crest." First, he had starred in the movie adaptation of Joseph Wambaugh's "Black Marble," which was a box-office disappointment. Then he went on stage with Marsha Mason and Michael Learned in "Mary Stuart," another disappointment.
"They were making some changes in the pilot of 'Falcon Crest,' including some cast changes," says Foxworth, "and I got a call asking me to look at a script and meet with Earl Hamner. "I talked to Earl and he was just wonderful. I don't think he has a devious bone in his body. But being from the South myself I know how Southerners can work around you." (Hamner is one of Hollywood's best known transplated Southerners. Besides creating "Falcon Crest," he based "The Waltons" on his own family in Virginia and was its narrator.)
Foxworth, whose light brown beard shows traces of gray, says, "So with those disappointments I decided to accept. I said don't sit around here and whine about it, get to work." He smiles. "But I must say I didn't think 'Falcon Crest' would be a hit. Other people told me it would be, but I didn't believe them. I guess it was a lack of faith on my part." "Falcon Crest," paired with "Dallas," another Lorimar Productions serial on Friday nights, is one of the few hits among the shows introduced last fall. Actually, the only other is ABC's "The Fall Guy." The show is about a winegrowing family in California's Napa Valley, headed by matriarch Angie Channing, played by Jane Wyman. Foxworth plays her nephew and adversary, Chase Gioberti. He controls a choice piece of vineyard Angie would like to get her hands on. (Hamner, in jest, once cautioned against thinking of the program as '"Dallas' with grapes.") The pilot was filmed last year on location in the Napa Valley, but after that it underwent considerable retooling. Foxworth replaced another actor and Susan Sullivan replaced another actress as his wife, Maggie. Miss Wyman was also given a new look. Her gray wig and matronly wardrobe were tossed out and replaced by her own natural blonde hair and designer fashions.
"They toughened my role up," says Foxworth. "The changes are still in progress. It evolved as the writers and producers saw what I was bringing to it. I don't think the character is there yet. It's really hard to define a role of this sort. It's not a type or a character that fits into a pigeonhole." Foxworth says, "I think one important thing about my character is the almost fantasy thing of changing his life in midstream. Here's a guy in his 40s, with a good career as an airline pilot and he gives that up to start in the vineyards. As a result of that he gets involved in politics. The Napa Valley is filled with people like that. I think it enhances the character because it's a fantasy fulfillment.
"Another thing I'm trying to do more with — and this is more of a battle with the network and the producers than with Earl Hamner — is when there's a family conflict we should try to deal with it in a more naturalistic way rather than an overblown way. I think people are more drawn to that, probably in a backlash to the way other shows have overdone it." Foxworth says he has met a number of vintners in Napa, including Carl Doumani, who owns the land where the stonehouse is located. "He and his wife moved there 10 or 12 years ago to retire," he says. "It's kind of the same story as Chase. He was planning to retire, only he didn't retire. He's out working in the vineyards every day." He says, "I just hope this series goes on long enough so I can make enough money to buy some property in the Napa Valley and be a real wine-maker."
By
Paul Raven ·
