Elizabeth Montgomery:

Constant supporting actress and guest star work in the '50s and early '60s.

Bewitched -- She deserved the Emmy for her work in the first season. There's lots of hidden (screen) gems, like Samantha's understanding and empathy for human behavior. I'm thinking specifically of the episode where Darrin's dad has a midlife crisis.

Password player extraordinare.

Queen of the TV movies for the rest of her life.

Suzanne Somers, to go from Three's Company, then the Flop "She's the Sheriff" not sure about others

Finally got a hit again with "Step By Step"

3 hours ago, P.J. said:

I LOVED How The West Was Won, with Arness and Bruce Boxleitner and Fionnula Flannigan. It had started off as a mini-series (or a two part tv movie with Eva Marie Saint as James' sister-in-law) and then followed him as he took the family west to escape the Civil Warl

"How the West Was Won" was a massive, massive success here, of the kind you don't see now. And it has been re-run on several occasions. It was first a tv-movie with Richard Kiley as James Arness' brother Tim who died and, as you said, Eva Marie Saint as Kiley's wife Kate. Then came a mini-series where for some reason the two sons (played by Bruce Boxleitner and William Kirby Cullen) had changed names from Seth and Jed to Luke and Josh. This was followed by a regular series, without Eva Marie Saint but adding Fionnula Flanagan as her sister Molly Culhane.

3 hours ago, Vee said:

I was so excited for Hurt joining the show but Season 2 was Damages' least successful year as a result.

Remember when William Hurt made that out-of-nowhere guest appearance as a shrink on "The King of Queens"? William Hurt on a sitcom was weird enough, but I'm still trying to figure out why "King of Queens" and not, say, "Frasier" or even "Seinfeld". (This might've happened around the same time that Gary Oldman popped up on "Friends," suggesting to me that many, high-profile dramatic actors were dipping their toes in the sitcom waters to see whether they could have any longevity in the genre).

IIRC, "Sling Blade" was the moment when the industry, at least, sat up and took notice of John Ritter as more than just the dude from "Three's Company" who "fell funny." It's just a shame that that film didn't translate into more "serious" gigs for him. I feel like he was primed and ready for a lead on a really good, really dark drama series, like how Bryan Cranston went from "Malcolm in the Middle" to "Breaking Bad."

3 hours ago, Vee said:

I never even knew about New York News til today.

You didn't miss much, lol!

12 hours ago, DRW50 said:

We could count Kirstie Alley on Veronica's Closet, although I don't know if the show was ever actually well-liked.

VC was one of those "hammock shows" that did fine as long as it stayed on Thursday nights between "Friends" and "Seinfeld." Once NBC switched their time slot, however, they were as good as finished.

4 hours ago, Vee said:

(Last Chance Tuesdays is funny though. I'm sure that was the case for Bonnie Hunt.)

Lord, when I think of all the times that various people, including Carsey/Werner and David Letterman, tried and tried and tried again to make Bonnie Hunt happen....

I, myself, am not crazy about her for the same reason I'm not crazy about a lot of Second City and Groundlings alumni who came in the wake of SNL's original cast. To me, they always give off this vibe that says, "We're the smartest, funniest people here; and if you don't laugh at our jokes, it's not because they're too bizarre or mean-spirited, it's because you're a !@#$%^&*]in' plebeian who wouldn't comedy if it bit you!"

Edited 2 hours ago2 hr by Khan

Michael Landon has to hold some kind of record for going 3-for-3 with hit shows over a 30-year period (1959-1989). He was only completely off-screen for the 1973-1974 season, and when you add up his three hits, he appeared in over 700 hours of primetime television. I can’t imagine anyone else comes close, besides James Aeneas with 633 episodes of Gunsmoke.

Lucille Ball managed to maintain a level of success post "I Love Lucy" with "The Lucy Show" and "Here's Lucy". But the massively panned "Life With Lucy" was a horrible way to cap off her career and she never got over it. The supporting cast was crappy and the writing was so antiquated.

Carroll O'Connor did well for himself after Archie Bunker by playing a dramatic role in "In The Heat of the Night".

"Step by Step" was a decent gig for Suzanne Somers and Patrick Duffy who had previously made names for themselves on long running, iconic shows.

Kim Fields found success after "The Facts of Life" with "Living Single" which had the similar four friends living in the same space format.

Sherman Hemsley landed in "Amen" only a year after "The Jeffersons" ended, but his co-star Marla Gibbs landed "227" just months after "The Jeffersons" ended. Isabel Sanford was the only Emmy winner out of the bunch, but her only endeavor was a week long tryout syndicated sitcom called "Isabel's Honeymoon Hotel".

1 hour ago, dragonflies said:

Suzanne Somers, to go from Three's Company, then the Flop "She's the Sheriff" not sure about others

Finally got a hit again with "Step By Step"

It's funny how Suzanne herself skips over "She's the Sheriff" in her Television Academy interview, as if the only things she did between "Three's Company" and "Step by Step" were her tacky Vegas shows, lol.

12 minutes ago, All My Shadows said:

Michael Landon has to hold some kind of record for going 3-for-3 with hit shows over a 30-year period (1959-1989). He was only completely off-screen for the 1973-1974 season, and when you add up his three hits, he appeared in over 700 hours of primetime television. I can’t imagine anyone else comes close, besides James Aeneas with 633 episodes of Gunsmoke.

I wonder, too, whether "Us" would've been another hit for Landon (and his first on a network other than NBC) had his cancer diagnosis not curtailed everything. Say what you will about the mawkishness of "Little House on the Prairie" and "Highway to Heaven," but Landon seemed to know better than a lot of others what people wanted to see every week on TV.

13 minutes ago, ReddFoxx said:

Lucille Ball managed to maintain a level of success post "I Love Lucy" with "The Lucy Show" and "Here's Lucy". But the massively panned "Life With Lucy" was a horrible way to cap off her career and she never got over it. The supporting cast was crappy and the writing was so antiquated.

In a way, however, I think Lucy herself (and maybe Aaron Spelling, who produced "Life with Lucy" for her) might have been to blame. It's one thing to be loyal toward those who helped you in the past, but the TV landscape had changed so much from the time "Here's Lucy" went off the air to when "Life with Lucy" would premiere. IIRC, her head-writers, Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Davis, had just finished working on "Alice," and their writing and producing style on that show felt old-hat even back then! Lucy really needed more modern writer/producers who could update her form of slapstick comedy for the '80's.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by Khan

18 minutes ago, ReddFoxx said:

his co-star Marla Gibbs landed "227" just months after "The Jeffersons" ended

I think I read or heard somewhere that Gibbs was actually developing "227" while still working on "The Jeffersons," with the understanding that it would launch after "The Jeffersons" had wrapped for good. But that was because everyone was expecting "Jeffersons" to get another season followed by a proper series finale. So, when CBS actually cancelled "The Jeffersons" WITHOUT allowing them their finale, it was a shock, of course, but luckily, Gibbs had "227" ready to go for NBC, so it just launched a year or so ahead of schedule. Of course, I might have that wrong, lol.

28 minutes ago, Khan said:

In a way, however, I think Lucy herself (and maybe Aaron Spelling, who produced "Life with Lucy" for her) might have been to blame. It's one thing to be loyal toward those who helped you in the past, but the TV landscape had changed so much from the time "Here's Lucy" went off the air to when "Life with Lucy" would premiere. IIRC, her head-writers, Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Davis, had just finished working on "Alice," and their writing and producing style on that show felt old-hat even back then! Lucy really needed more modern writer/producers who could update Lucy's form of slapstick comedy for the '80's.

She was definitely to blame because she wanted Carroll and Davis on board as well wanting Gale Gordon as her co-star (who demanded pay for 22 episodes even if the show wasn't given such an order). She also brought in her old crew members one of which was a sound man who was hard of hearing. That was sitcom material in itself.

33 minutes ago, Khan said:

I think I read or heard somewhere that Gibbs was actually developing "227" while still working on "The Jeffersons," with the understanding that it would launch after "The Jeffersons" had wrapped for good. But that was because everyone was expecting "Jeffersons" to get another season followed by a proper series finale. So, when CBS actually cancelled "The Jeffersons" WITHOUT allowing them their finale, it was a shock, of course, but luckily, Gibbs had "227" ready to go for NBC, so it just launched a year or so ahead of schedule. Of course, I might have that wrong, lol.

That sounds accurate. "227" came on the air so quickly that it had to have been at least in the planning stages while Marla was still on "The Jeffersons". Marla is one of the more shrewd actresses out there because she was right back on "The Jeffersons" when "Checking In" didn't last so I assume she had a strong contract.

Someone else that comes to mind with hit and miss is Delta Burke. She had a self-titled sitcom with "Delta" that didn't last and later on "Women Of The House" where she revived Suzanne Sugarbaker after patching things up with the Bloodworths.

Redd Foxx tried to revive Fred Sanford with "Sanford" and then had the very short lived "Redd Foxx Show". "The Royal Family" might have gone somewhere had he not passed away because I believe it did get attention because he worked so well with Della Reese, who much like LaWanda Page had the chops to match him and not be dwarfed, Jackie was added to the show to try and save it but to no.avail.

Jackee bounced back with "Sister, Sister" and is one of the only successful primetime stars who came back to daytime.

Edited 53 minutes ago53 min by ReddFoxx

Linda Lavin after the success of Alice had some decent tv movies in the 80s/90s... but her choice in tv series post Alice weren't exactly good choices.

Room For Two (a mother/daughter comedy with a than unknown Patricia Heaton) in the early 90s. Bad timeslot did the show in, but it was kind of a cute show.

Conrad Bloom in the late 90s where she was an interfering mother from hell.

Sean Saves the World in the early 2010s where she was the best part of that show... but lousy writing did it in.

9JKL - I don't remember this 1 season wonder

B- Positive - She was only in the 2nd season... but I don't remember it.

Mid Century Modern - I actually thought she was the weak part on this.. and she passed away during production so who knows it it would be have been successful.