Confusion over Sheree J Wilson's exit

[Pamela Barnes]

It has been stated that Len Katzman killed off Sheree because they knew it was the final series. So when she went on materity leave there wouldnt be a show to come back to.

But in contrast to this others have stated they were preparing for another season and even promotional materiel was produced by a 14th season.

If that is indeed the case it seems a very odd decision to make to kill off the character of April in a series that was now lacking any regular characters.

[jej2252]

Very strange indeed. I've always read that CBS cancelled the show shortly before they wrapped up filming season 13 (DVD14) and only Katzman and a selected few knew they weren't being picked for another season.

Saying that if they had been another season, what do you think it would have been like? Do you think they would have tried rehiring former cast members?

I always thought April's exit was a little far fetched and Jordan Lee's involvement ludicrous.

Then again the show was just a big farce by that point!!!! (I will still buy hat season as I feel guilty pleasure watching it as it is so bad!!!!)

[Barbara Fan]

I always remember a good year in advance of the final series Lorimar announced it would be the last, one day I'll dig out the 1990 cuttings and scan them!!

Also some reports stated that SJW was pregnant / had baby and wanted to spend time with baby and wanted out.

[Pamela Barnes]

BF thats what I recall, that it was before that season airred it was announced.

So I was confused by recent interviews regarding a 14th season.

What would of been left for the next series? I can't imagine old cast members returning because they really didnt have the money, the reason people like Linda and Steve were axed in the first place.

By the end of season 13 were we not just left with Bobby, Cliff, JR and Michelle?

Phyliss had quit, Sly was going off to a new life. I don't really understand as it felt like the end.

[ProdicalSon]

It actually wasn't announced formally (at least here in the U.S) until right around the airing of episode 350, in March of 1991. I remember reading it in the paper just before the cattle drive episode.

[JR Ewing Fan]

It might not have formally been canceled but everyone knew that it was the end. I knew by the fall of 1990. All you had to do was look at the ratings. I don't understand why some of the cast actually thought their would be another season. They should have gotten those former cast members to come in and do a propper final instead of the one they got.

[Barbara Fan]

Final season of Dallas was relegated to a dismal slot at 3pm on a sunday, even the BBC had given up on it and it was once their jewel in the crown and ratings winner show.

Im sure Larry would still do it to this day given half a chance and $$$$$

They couldnt afford the cast any more hence the reason so many were let go, but that was their downfall

Dallas was and IS BBG, HK, LG, LH, VP, PD, KK, SK, SH, CT - they were the heart and soul of Dallas, they were the people I wanted to see, the people I cared about on screen and off, not young actors / actresses who couldnt act for toffee, bland blondies amd others who you wondered how they got their acting card!!! It was awful and it ws embarassing and i didnt really know many people who still watched it, they had given up long ago!

Patrick, Larry and Ken werent enough for me and not enough to save it, Ive often said, I watched out of loyalty only, I lived in the hope it would get better, it never did! I have never watched it ever again, I have little recollection of what happened or who the fake imposters living at SF were.

It was time to end, no BBG, VP, SH, LG and co - it sucked and was time to stop. But the plug was pulled by Lorimar before its final year.

[ProdicalSon]

I'll track down the article announcing cancellation (since I was crazy enough to save every article), just so we can get a date of "formal" announcement. A late decision during the final season is also supported by Deborah Rennard saying that she learned the show had been canceled while in her dressing room on the set of "Days of Our Lives".

Now this doesn't mean that the higher ups didn't have some idea. But I'm off to do research and I'll get back to file a report.

[Ray&Donna]

By the end of season 13 were we not just left with Bobby, Cliff, JR and Michelle?

Phyliss had quit, Sly was going off to a new life. I don't really understand as it felt like the end.

I agree. There's a pervasive sense (based on interviews) from everyone who worked on the show in the later years as though they thought it was still rated #1 and would go on forever. There's no indication at all from the penultimate episode (AKA the last one to take place outside of JR's head) that the show could go any further. Even Christopher and John Ross were schlepped off to England!

I imagine season 14 would have focused on J.R., Bobby, and Cliff passing Michelle around like a chew toy. In the season finale, we would have found out which geriatric was the father of her child.

And Danone Simpson would be in the main credits.

[garry]

According to Dallas producer Howard Lakin, everyone knew the 1990-91 Season would be the last. The writing was on the wall so to speak.

[Vanessa]

I had read somewhere that a season 14 would focus on the McKay's. Carter brought back Rose, and Tracy would also return. This time, Tracy and Bobby really would have wed, and given Christopher a sister.

We'd also have learned more about Rose and her background. Her ex-husband would show up and a feud would break out between him and Carter.

JR would travel to bring James back, and we'd learn more about Debra Lynn. Michelle would be pregnant with James' baby, creating dramatic conflict between her and Debra Lynn.

Unfortunately, this never came to pass as the show was cancelled.

[Ray&Donna]

According to Dallas producer Howard Lakin, everyone knew the 1990-91 Season would be the last. The writing was on the wall so to speak.

Yes, the writing was definitely on the wall when he crossed FALCON CREST off his scripts, called them DALLAS and replaced the "Angela" next to the lines of dialogue with "J.R."

[Ray&Donna]

I had read somewhere that a season 14 would focus on the McKay's. Carter brought back Rose, and Tracy would also return. This time, Tracy and Bobby really would have wed, and given Christopher a sister.

We'd also have learned more about Rose and her background. Her ex-husband would show up and a feud would break out between him and Carter.

JR would travel to bring James back, and we'd learn more about Debra Lynn. Michelle would be pregnant with James' baby, creating dramatic conflict between her and Debra Lynn.

Unfortunately, this never came to pass as the show was cancelled.

Wow. This sounds even worse than what I suggested.

[garry]

Yes, the writing was definitely on the wall when he crossed FALCON CREST off his scripts, called them DALLAS and replaced the "Angela" next to the lines of dialogue with "J.R."

Well they both did wear a hair piece but I think that's where the similarity ended.

[Barbara Fan]

I had read somewhere that a season 14 would focus on the McKay's. Carter brought back Rose, and Tracy would also return. This time, Tracy and Bobby really would have wed, and given Christopher a sister.

We'd also have learned more about Rose and her background. Her ex-husband would show up and a feud would break out between him and Carter.

JR would travel to bring James back, and we'd learn more about Debra Lynn. Michelle would be pregnant with James' baby, creating dramatic conflict between her and Debra Lynn.

Unfortunately, this never came to pass as the show was cancelled.

I would disagree and say Fortunately!! JUST NOT DALLAS!!!!

I always thought thank goodness for video!! as soon as a crappy s13 one was shown I used to rush upstairs and dig out a s1-6 or 8 to remind me of the glory days of Dallas.

CBS officially cancelled Dallas April 91 - a definite end to a once great show

[garry]

I always thought thank goodness for video!! as soon as a crappy s13 one was shown I used to rush upstairs and dig out a s1-6 or 8 to remind me of the glory days of Dallas.

Season 7 was also part of the Dallas Glory Days and was the second highest rated season in the UK next to Season 3 (80-81)

Can't think why you didn't dig out those episodes.

[CarlD]

It actually wasn't announced formally (at least here in the U.S) until right around the airing of episode 350, in March of 1991. I remember reading it in the paper just before the cattle drive episode.

Remember it this way too, it was officially announced then.

With the ratings the way they were, no one should have been too surprised though.

I always heard Sheree J. Wilson left the show to be with her new baby, but still had to do the few flashback scenes to fullfill her contract.

[ProdicalSon]

Not to mention that despite the writing being on the wall, Leonard Katzman couldn't 100% for certain tell Victoria Principal that the finale was indeed the last episode ever. Thus she didn't return.

I'd certainly also like to think that if they knew for certain before the season that it would be the last, that they would have brought back former cast members to wrap things up. I'd also like to think that they would have convinced Barbara Bel Geddes to delay her return to the quiet of the northeast for no more than one year so she could have either wrapped up Miss Ellie's story or been there at the end.

On a related note, I do remember now reading before the season that Dallas was coming back for "what would likely be its final season", but not definitive final season.

Like I said earlier, I'm going to dig out all the old articles. It will certainly be a nice trip down memory lane.

[garry]

I'd also like to think that they would have convinced Barbara Bel Geddes to delay her return to the quiet of the northeast for no more than one year so she could have either wrapped up Miss Ellie's story or been there at the end.

Bel Geddes was only offered to appear in four episodes of the final season (same as Howard Keel). She felt insulted by the offer considering she was with the show from the beginning and quit.

Reports in the media in 1990 said she felt stabbed in the back by Larry Hagman, who was co-executive producer at the time. I'm not sure if she ever spoke to Hagman again after that.

[Pamela Barnes]

In February of 91 there was no official announcement. Just speculation:

"Dallas'' is pulling out all the stops for its season-ending cliffhanger (and probable finale.) A ``Who's Who'' of former cast members is back for this week's filming of the two-hour episode, to air in May. Among them: Linda Gray (J.R. Ewing's long-suffering ex, Sue Ellen); Mary Crosby (Sue Ellen's sister, Kristen, who plugged J.R. in 1980), and Steve Kanaly.

Then it was announced April 1991

CBS officially pulled the trigger on Dallas Wednesday, announcing an end to the long-running series that once had the world asking "Who Shot J.R.?' A two-hour final broadcast, scheduled for 8 p.m. May 3

Then in May

After 13 years and 356 episodes of infidelity, scheming and double-dealing, CBS 's longtime hit series "Dallas" turned its much-awaited finale into yet another finagle.

"Dallas" managed to spend two hours on Friday night leading its characters, along with the viewers, millions of whom watched the series for the first time in years, out onto what the show's producers promised would be one last cliff, from which there would be no return.

No dangling grip on the cliff's edge this time, they had vowed, just a tidy terminal plunge for the show's spectacularly protracted story line.

But J. R. Ewing never did play fair. First he took the crowd of old friends through another one of the show's now infamous dream sequences; then he left them a last cliffside ledge to hang from.

"Dallas" ended its run on Friday night with an off-screen gunshot, a rush to a bedroom and a stunned character saying, "Oh, no!" at a sight viewers never saw.

A tag line was left unsaid: "Not again!"

Bobby Ewing, the long abused brother of J. R., was the last face on the screen, reacting in shock to something in his brother's room. Perhaps J. R shot himself this time; that was the general idea. But he may have only been winged again, or he may have only shot a hole in his favorite cardigan. Viewers will never know. The show apparently wanted to leave itself an out should there be a clamor sometime for J. R. to rise again. Even though the show's ratings soared Friday, it's doubtful there will be any such clamor. The series had faded so badly over the last several seasons that CBS did not even want to broadcast the series again this year but was compelled to do so in its contract.

After having averaging only a 10.8 rating and 19 percent share of the audience in its 10 P.M. time period this season, the show almost doubled those numbers in its overnight ratings for its flimflam finale. On Friday, "Dallas" scored a 21 rating and 34 share in the nation's largest 24 television markets. Each rating point is equal to 931,000 homes, and the share is the percentage of homes watching a program at any given time.

David F. Poltrack, CBS's senior vice president of research, said yesterday that the results were even better than expected. "We were hoping for a share in the high 20's," he said. "When the national rating comes in Monday, this may be high enough for 'Dallas' to go out as the No. 1 show again."

"Dallas" was No. 1 for three seasons in the early 1980's. Mr. Poltrack said the high ratings meant the show was "going out in style." What Could Have Been

The style it chose was a takeoff on the famous here's-life-without-you gimmick of the film classic "It's a Wonderful Life." Joel Grey, playing a devil (of course) instead of an angel, led J. R. though scenes in the lives of some of the characters of "Dallas," letting him contemplate what their fate would have been if he had never lived.

The show indicated that almost everyone would have been either silly or miserable in some unremarkable way, with the exception of J. R's oldest whipping boy, Cliff Barnes, who would have apparently turned out to be Vice President Dan Quayle with a ludicrously bad golf swing.

This tour through a what-if side of "Dallas" roused almost no reaction in J. R. (Larry Hagman). He was so moved at how much he had influenced people's lives for better or worse that he decided to kill himself anyway. Maybe.