Falcon Crest Trivia
By the second season, the show became more serialized and abandoned the self-contained episode format of the first season. When the show first premiered, Creator Earl Hamner, Jr. stated that he did not want the show to become another soap opera like Dallas (1978), however, by its second season, that is exactly what the show became.
Jane Wyman's iron grip over the show was allegedly as ruthless as Angela Channing's over the valley. Former co-stars Mel Ferrer, Celeste Holm, and Simon MacCorkindale have claimed in the press that Wyman drove them off the show. Most notorious, however, was Wyman's bitter feud with Lana Turner. The two women allegedly hated each other so much they never spoke off set, and scenes between their characters were filmed separately and spliced together in editing. After Turner's character was killed off in the second season, she talked to the press of how Wyman's ugly behavior was due to the fact that Wyman could not accept that her ex-husband Ronald Reagan was then President of the United States.
The producers considered killing off Chase at the end of season two, as Robert Foxworth was not happy with his role (he had complained about the series drifting away from the original vineyard concept). He was convinced to stay, after he was offered the chance to direct some of the show's episodes.
Shortly before the earthquake cliffhanger, Peter Stavros received an unpleasant phone call in the season finale. The phone call was to set up a storyline for the next season in which Peter's brother would drop into the valley to wage war on the Channings. Anthony Quinn was considered for the role, but the story was scrapped when negotiations with the star failed, and the phone scene turned out to be meaningless.
The pilot filmed for this show was titled "The Vintage Years". In it, Angela (Jane Wyman in a gray wig) has two children: the alcoholic Dorcas (Abby Dalton) and Richard Channing (Michael Swan). Richard is a Vietnam vet who fights for a place in his mother's good favor. Although there is no Emma, there was a subplot of a mysterious woman locked in the attic crying for her mother. In this version, the roles of Chase and Maggie were played by Clu Gulager and Samantha Eggar.
A staunch Catholic, Jane Wyman scrapped a proposed lesbian storyline that was to involve Jane Badler's character Meredith Baxter and the character of Erin Jones. Meredith and Erin were re-written to be sisters instead.
Jane Wyman allegedly had a running feud with Robert Foxworth, to the point where they measured each other's dressing room trailers just to make sure they were equal in size. When Foxworth became a director for the show, Wyman demanded CBS add a clause to her contract making her a director, although she never directed any episodes.
At the beginning of the ninth season of this show, despite health problems, Jane Wymanwas allegedly so displeased with the direction the writers and new producers were taking the show, in that she refused to play the scenes. She asked that they release her from her contract, but the producers refused. A compromise was reached in which they wrote her character out as being in a coma. At the end of the series, when it was determined that CBS was cancelling it, Wyman returned for the final three episodes.
The writers had planned a storyline for season seven, that would have seen Angela's long lost daughter come to Tuscany Valley in order to wage war with Angela over control of the winery. The producers wanted Angie Dickinson for the role. However, when contract negotiations between the producers and Dickinson broke down, the planned lost daughter storyline was changed, and Richard Channing's character was instead made Angela's long lost child.
Ginger Rogers unsuccessfully pursued the role of Maggie's mother Charlotte Pershing, but producers thought she was too old.
Long before the show started, Jane Wyman had known Lorenzo Lamas since he was a baby, as she was friends with his family and with his parents, Fernando Lamas and Arlene Dahl. His father worked with her on Jane Wyman Presents The Fireside Theatre (1955).
The producers tried to lure Richard Burton into a special guest appearance in the third season as Jean-Pierre Charbone, one of Jacqueline Perrault's former husbands. One of the rumors had him being offered two and a half million dollars for a five-minute cameo.
The role of Francesca Gioberti was initially offered to Sophia Loren. The producers of the show tried to lure her with promises of a fantastic wardrobe and a dynamic character that would rival Alexis Colby from Dynasty (1981), but contract negotiations with Loren broke down and the part was then offered to Gina Lollobrigida. Ironically, Loren was Aaron Spelling's first choice for the character of Alexis in Dynasty, but was passed over because she was requesting too much money, thus allowing the role to go to Joan Collins.
Falcon Crest was located in the fictitious Tuscany Valley, which was the Napa Valley in Northern California. The series was filmed at the Spring Mountain Winery in St. Helena.
Kim Novak's dual role character in the sixth season was a tribute to her famous dual role in Vertigo (1958). The scene her character has with Richard Channing at Fort Point near the Golden Gate Bridge was deliberately set there as an inside nod to a famous scene she had with James Stewart decades earlier on the same spot.
Kim Novak played Kit Marlowe, which was the pseudonym that Harry Cohn, CEO of Columbia Studios, suggested she should change her name to when she was a young starlet. Novak supplied the writers other inside jokes when they were naming Kit's aliases: Kit's real name is Susan Cameron, the name of Novak's agent during her time on the set. Another alias, Madeleine McKittrick, was a combination of the first name of one of her characters in Vertigo (1958), and the McKittrick hotel on Eddy Street in San Francisco, where Vertigo (1958)'s Maddy lived.
The character of Terry's ex-husband Joel McCarthy (Parker Stevenson) was originally slated to be a serial rapist who terrorized the women of the Tuscany Valley. Terry's sister Maggie was supposed to be his major victim. The story was scrapped.
Barbara Stanwyck was considered for the role of Angela Channing but turned it down, hence, the role was given to Jane Wyman, a best friend of Stanwyck's.
The role of Lorraine Prescott was initially offered to Ally Sheedy.
The initial choice for the role of Roland Saunders was Robert Mitchum.
Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Louis Jourdan, and Gregory Peck were all considered for the role of Peter Stavros.
William R. Moses was the first choice for Lance Cumson, who lost the role to Lorenzo Lamas. Moses instead got the role of Cole Gioberti.
Jane Wyman and Lorenzo Lamas were the only actress and actor that were part of the main cast through out the entire series. Lorenzo Lamas was the only actor who appeared in all two hundred twenty-seven episodes. Jane Wyman appeared in nearly every episode, omit three, prior to the final season (due to temporary health conditions), and then sixteen more episodes during the ninth and final season. That gave Wyman a total of two hundred eight appearances during two hundred twenty-seven episodes, which in turn means that David Selby beat Wyman by one episode, even though Selby didn't appear until the start of the second season, as he was present in all two hundred nine episodes from season two through nine. Chao Li Chi wasn't a part of the main cast during the first six seasons, but still only missed seven episodes up until season seven. For the last three seasons, Chi was promoted to the main cast, with the exception of seven episodes during season nine, where he was temporarily denoted from the main cast, which gives him the third highest episode count as part of the cast, at two hundred fourteen episodes. But Chi was, in turn, absent from another twenty-six credited episodes during the final three seasons, lowering his actual appearances to one hundred eighty-eight episodes, which in turn means that not only David Selby, but also Susan Sullivan passes by Chi in number of appearances, as Sullivan was present during all of the series first two hundred seven episodes, until she left the main cast, and the show. Clocking in at one hundred eighty-eight appearances, Chi beats Margaret Ladd by five episodes, as Ladd appeared in one hundred eighty-three episodes out of the one hundred ninety-three, in which she was part of the cast. (Note: Jane Wyman, Lorenzo Lamas, William R. Moses, Jamie Rose, Abby Dalton, and Chao Li Chi each has one added episode count to their total number of credits in the IMDb database, as they were also present in the unaired pilot.
The character of Dan Fixx was originally named Ben Quick, but Brett Cullen hated the name so much, he asked to change it.
The character of Angela was supposed to have a stroke. It never materialized as Jane Wyman objected.
Jane Wyman threatened to quit when Lorimar wanted to save money by shooting at their new studio, after purchasing the original MGM lot, in Culver City, California, instead of continuing to film at CBS Studio Center in Studio City, California.
Richard Channing's middle name is Denault, after his stepfather Henri Denault. The character was named in honor of the former staff member of Lorimar named: Edward O. Denault.
Marion McCargo Bell, the real-life mother of William R. Moses, played the character of Harriet Roberts, the mother of Jordan Roberts (Morgan Fairchild). In 1980, Bell unsuccessfully auditioned for the role of Maggie Gioberti, but the producers thought she was too old to play the part. In 1984, she auditioned for the role of Maggie's mother Charlotte Pershing, but this time the producers thought she was too young.
Sela Ward turned down the part of Terry Hartford in favor of a role on Emerald Point N.A.S. (1983).
Before the show started, Ana Alicia, David Selby, and family friend Lorenzo Lamas were all avid Jane Wyman fans.
Clu Gulager and Samantha Eggar, who played Chase and Maggie in the pilot, "The Vintage Years", weren't rehired, so Robert Foxworth and Susan Sullivan took over their roles.
When Flamingo Road (1980) was cancelled, David Selby got the role of Richard Channing, at the beginning of the second season, mainly because of his friendship with Earl Hamner, Jr., and he was also under contract with Lorimar.
Many of Jane Wyman's friends appear on the show: Cesar Romero, Eve Arden, Eddie Albert, Anne Jeffreys, Rod Taylor and Chao Li Chi.
Launched the acting career of Lorenzo Lamas.
On the series finale, Jane Wyman wrote the monologue which her character delivers in the final scene, for real, where the many characters have passed through the show, throughout the entire run.
The show premiered on Friday, December 4, 1981, on CBS at 10:00 PM EST/9:00 PM PST, and remained in the timeslot, for almost the entire run, after Dallas (1978), except midway through the final season on Thursday, 9:00 PM EST/8:00 PM EST, which aired before Knots Landing (1979).
At the end of the eighth season, Susan Sullivan was fired by the show's new regime for money reasons, at the same time, she left because of creative differences, a decision that was understood simply, after what the new writers and producers had done to the show in the season 8. She would guest star in 2 episodes, at the beginning of the ninth and final season.
In season 2, Margaret Ladd was pregnant and was featured in short scenes with her stomach hidden behind books, bushes, flowers, among other things. Her pregnancy was also the reason for her being absent in parts of the same season.
Off-camera, Jane Wyman had frequently been disgusted with Lorenzo Lamas, who donned tattoos on his arm, as he was wearing them.
In an episode of season 6, a clip of the movie, The Blue Veil (1951), that starred Jane Wyman was used as a flashback scene when Angela reminisces about being told in the hospital that her newborn son had died. There is a scene where Emma is standing before a crowd of people at the spa claiming that Angela is a child stealer. The photo of Angela that Emma has on her poster is the photo of the same actress that appeared on the cover of her 1985 autobiography.
Midway throughout season 6, William R. Moses had left the show, because he was very unhappy with storyline suggestions, yet, both Moses and the producers agreed on a compromised. He returned for 2 more episodes, the following season.
At the beginning of the seventh season, due to the largest number of rotating guests on the show, and of budget constraints, 5 of the 10 main stars didn't appear in several episodes of this season (Brett Cullen, Margaret Ladd, John Callahan, Dana Sparks and Dana Sparks).
Lorenzo Lamas was bungling his line, so it was Jane Wyman's call for him not to battle against drug abuse.
When Jane Wyman was absent for 2 episodes, in the middle of the fifth season, due to her recovery from abdominal surgery, the producers would have the character of Angela to disappear, after learning she was being arrested for attempting to hijack her nephew's wine shipment.
Spoilers
The trivia item below may give away important plot points.
After the character Melissa Agretti was killed off in 1988, Ana Alicia was still under contract, and came back some months later as Melissa's look-a-like "Samantha Ross".