Dallas Decoder

‘Dallas’ and Me

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 10 Comments

Me, summer 1980

My earliest memory of “Dallas” isn’t watching it – it’s wearing it.

In the summer of 1980, when I was 6, I was one of the millions of people swept up in the hysteria over J.R. Ewing’s shooting. I begged my mom to get me one of the “I Shot J.R.” t-shirts everyone seemed to be sporting – a tough request for her to fulfill since finding the shirts in kids’ sizes wasn’t easy.

Of course, she somehow got the job done – moms always do, don’t they? – and I proudly wore my shirt during our family’s outing that summer to the local amusement park, where I remember getting my share of strange looks.

I now understand why. I mean, what 6-year-old wears a shirt declaring he shot someone? For that matter, what kind of parent allows their kid to watch a show like “Dallas?” Most baffling of all: Why did I want to watch it?

I’m guessing I became a “Dallas” fan out of inertia. In its early years, the show followed two of my other childhood favorites – “The Incredible Hulk” and “The Dukes of Hazzard” – in CBS’s Friday night lineup, so the first time I encountered the Ewings, my eyes were probably so glazed over, I didn’t notice the absence of green monsters and car chases at Southfork.

I must have started paying attention to “Dallas” around the time J.R. was shot. Once I did, the show captured my imagination and never let go.

At that young age, I was too young to understand everything I saw on “Dallas,” and I suppose that’s why my parents didn’t mind me watching it. Besides, “Dallas” was one show everyone in our house could agree on. Appropriate or not, we watched together. (And as I’ve since discovered, lots of people watched the show when they were kids.)

Today, “Dallas” is like an alternate set of home movies from my childhood.

The show debuted a year before I started kindergarten and ended a year before my high school graduation, so whenever I recall moments from that 13-year span, I can’t help but associate them with what was happening to the Ewings at the time.

My older sister got married and left home a month before J.R.’s shooter was revealed. I started middle school three weeks before Bobby’s “funeral.” Bobby married his second wife April on the night my grandmother suffered a heart attack.

As I got older, I drifted away from “Dallas” – until last year, when TNT announced plans to revive the series with all-new episodes. My DVDs came off the shelf and I rekindled my love affair with the Ewings.

Now, I’m starting Dallas Decoder to relive my “Dallas” memories and maybe figure out, once and for all, why I love the show as much as I do.

This project is proving more fun than I could have dreamed. I’m discovering things about “Dallas” I never noticed before, and my husband Andrew recently began watching the show for the first time, so now I get to see it through his eyes.

Andrew recently watched the “Who Shot J.R.?” storyline play out without already knowing the shooter’s identity. Can you imagine?

Come to think of it, Andrew’s birthday is tomorrow. (He was born 365 days before “Dallas” debuted, which I’ve always considered a sign we were destined to be together.)

An “I Shot J.R.” t-shirt would make a nice birthday gift, but where could I get one on such short notice?

Mom, help!

Why do you love “Dallas”? Share your comments below and read more opinions from Dallas Decoder.

Filed Under: Opinion, Opinion Tagged With: Dallas Decoder, TNT, Who Shot J.R.?

Dallas Styles: Bobby’s Leather Jacket

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 8 Comments

‘Digger’s Daughter’

Bobby Ewing’s leather motorcross jacket isn’t as well known as J.R.’s Stetsons or Miss Ellie’s sack dresses, but it’s every bit as durable.

Patrick Duffy is sporting the snap-collared jacket when we meet Bobby in Act I, Scene I of “Dallas’s” Episode 1, “Digger’s Daughter.” The jacket, like the red convertible Bobby is driving, lets the audience know this is a cool young dude.

Bobby Ewing, Dallas, Decline and Fall of the Ewing Empire, Patrick Duffy

‘The Decline and Fall of the Ewing Empire’

The jacket is metaphorical in other ways, too. We hear Pam’s famous line in this scene (“Your folks are gonna throw me right off that ranch”) and we wonder: Are the Ewings going to tan Bobby’s actual hide when they discover he has married a Barnes?

The jacket pops up periodically after “Digger’s Daughter,” including during the sixth-season episode “Caribbean Connection,” when Bobby sneaks into a motel room to gather dirt on one of J.R.’s cronies. This is a very un-Bobby thing to do, so the leather jacket becomes the perfect prop to telegraph his rebellious streak.

Interestingly, even after Duffy leaves “Dallas,” the jacket doesn’t.

Dack Rambo seems to sport the same brown leather during the Duffy-less dream season, a subtle hint to the audience that Rambo’s character, cousin Jack Ewing, was supposed to fill Bobby’s role as “Dallas’s” resident hero.

Duffy wears a leather motorcross in “Dallas’s” final two episodes, “The Decline and Fall of the Ewing Empire” and “Conundrum,” including in the latter’s last freeze frame. The color of this jacket isn’t warm, so I’m not sure it’s the same one Duffy wore during the previous seasons.

The color change is fitting: By the time “Dallas” ends, the show has faded considerably. Why shouldn’t Bobby’s jacket do the same?

Filed Under: Dallas Styles, Dallas Styles (Classic), Features Tagged With: Caribbean Connection, Conundrum, Dack Rambo, Decline and Fall of the Ewing Empire, Digger’s Daughter, Patrick Duffy

The Art of Dallas: ‘Digger’s Daughter’

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 2 Comments

Pam (Victoria Principal) considers a romantic overture from Ray (Steve Kanaly) in this 1978 publicity shot from “Digger’s Daughter,”“Dallas’s” first episode.

Filed Under: Art of Dallas, Art of Dallas (Classic), Features Tagged With: Digger’s Daughter, Steve Kanaly, Victoria Principal

Dallas Scene of the Day: ‘… Put You Up to This, Miss Barnes?’

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 4 Comments

Dallas, Digger's Daughter, J.R. Ewing, Larry Hagman, Pam Ewing, Victoria Principal

Not-so-grand-tour

In “Digger’s Daughter,” “Dallas’s” first episode, J.R. (Larry Hagman) shows Pam (Victoria Principal) around the Southfork grounds.

J.R.: Did your brother put you up to this, Miss Barnes?

Pam looks stunned.

J.R.: Well, I don’t think that’s an unusual question to ask, Miss Barnes.

PAM: [Angrily] Mrs. Ewing. Excuse me, please.

She begins to walk away. J.R. grabs her arm. She stops.

J.R.: Perhaps it would be more appropriate to ask what sort of settlement you’d require to annul this farce.

PAM: Let go of my arm.

J.R.: I’m willing to spend some money now to avoid any inconvenience. But if you insist upon being driven away – which you surely will be – you’re going to come out of this without anything, honey.

Bobby (Patrick Duffy) approaches.

BOBBY: Hi there. What’s going on?

J.R.: Oh, just talking a little business.

BOBBY: Mama don’t like business talk with supper on the table, J.R.

J.R.: [Chuckles] Well, you know Mama. She’s so old-fashioned.

BOBBY: [To Pam] Come on, honey. Let’s go.

J.R. smiles as he watches them walk away.

Filed Under: Dallas Scenes of the Day, Dallas Scenes of the Day (Classic), Features Tagged With: Digger’s Daughter, Larry Hagman, Patrick Duffy, Victoria Principal

Critique: ‘Dallas’ Episode 1 – ‘Digger’s Daughter’

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 28 Comments

Bobby Ewing, Dallas, Digger's Daughter, Pam Ewing, Patrick Duffy, Victoria Principal

Just married

What a dark place “Dallas” is when we arrive!

“Digger’s Daughter,” the show’s first episode, was filmed in the real-life Dallas in early 1978, when the city was being walloped by its coldest-ever winter.

The result: The straightforward plot – boy marries girl, boy brings girl home, girl outwits boy’s scheming older brother – unfolds against a backdrop of deadened skies and stark landscapes, making it seem moodier and more metaphorical than the show’s producers probably intended.

For example, when Bobby and Pamela bounce up to the Southfork ranch to announce their elopement, Miss Ellie comes to the door wearing a heavy coat. It’s as if she’s warning Pam: This is a cold house, full of cold people. Enter at your own risk.

Later, J.R. stands on Southfork’s darkened front porch, stewing because he fears Bobby and Pam will soon give Jock his long-awaited first grandson. The camera pans above the porch to Bobby and Pam’s brightly lit bedroom window and we see how the couple is literally overshadowing J.R.

Also, when Ray tosses Pam into the freezing pond, is it not unlike the dangerous situation she has plunged into by marrying a Ewing?

Southfork lends itself to the atmospherics, too.

The ranch we know best – the one real-life Texans call the world’s second most famous white house – isn’t seen until “Dallas’s” second season. In “Digger’s Daughter” and the other inaugural episodes, another estate stands in for the Ewings’ homestead.

This Southfork is bigger and feels more mysterious. It sits in a sea of yellow grass, making it look a little lifeless, if not downright haunted.

Some of the performances in “Digger’s Daughter” are as unfamiliar as the setting. Victoria Principal is more relaxed here than in later seasons, and Larry Hagman’s initial outing as J.R. is more sinister than mischievous.

In this episode’s final scene, when J.R. declares he won’t underestimate Pam again, Hagman smiles – not with his mouth, but with his eyes.

It isn’t the J.R. grin we’re used to, but it still leaves us wanting more.

Grade: A

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Oh, brother

‘DIGGER’S DAUGHTER’

Season 1, Episode 1

Airdate: April 2, 1978

Audience: 15.7 million homes, ranking 18th in the weekly ratings

Writer: David Jacobs

Director: Robert Day

Synopsis: Bobby Ewing, son of a wealthy oil-and-cattle clan, marries Pamela Barnes, the daughter of his father’s enemy. Bobby’s brother J.R. tries to break up the marriage by recruiting her ex-boyfriend Ray Krebbs, the Ewings’ ranch foreman, to seduce her, but Pam turns the tables on Ray by threatening to expose his secret affair with Lucy, J.R. and Bobby’s teenage niece.

Cast: Barbara Bel Geddes (Miss Ellie Ewing), Donna Bullock (Connie), Jim Davis (Jock Ewing), Desmond Dhooge (Harvey), Patrick Duffy (Bobby Ewing), Linda Gray (Sue Ellen Ewing), Larry Hagman (J.R. Ewing), Steve Kanaly (Ray Krebbs), Ken Kercheval (Cliff Barnes), Tina Louise (Julie Grey), Victoria Principal (Pam Ewing), Bill Thurman (Phil Bradley), Charlene Tilton (Lucy Ewing), David Wayne (Digger Barnes)

“Digger’s Daughter” is available on DVD and at Amazon.com, iTunes and TNT.tv. Watch the episode and share your comments below.

Filed Under: Critique, Critiques, Critiques (Classic), Opinion Tagged With: Digger’s Daughter, Larry Hagman, Victoria Principal

Decoding ‘Dallas’

April 2, 2012 by Chris Baker 8 Comments

Between the lines

Hello, darlins!

My name is Chris and I’ve been watching “Dallas” since I was a kid. I’m starting Dallas Decoder to pay tribute to the show, explore its enduring appeal and maybe figure out why I love it as much as I do.

My goal is to critique each “Dallas” episode in the order in which they were originally broadcast and post a new review each weekday. I also plan to offer a daily transcript of a memorable “Dallas” scene, along with occasional essays about the show’s broader themes.

Other periodic posts will focus on the fashions seen on “Dallas” and the photography used to publicize the series during its original run from 1978 until 1991. There’ll also be some surprises along the way, and when TNT’s “Dallas” revival begins in June, I’ll write about the new show, too.

Please visit regularly and share your comments – and be sure to check out Dallas Decoder on Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook.

Hopefully, Dallas Decoder will become a forum for fans to gather and celebrate “Dallas,” which is as fascinating now as it was when it debuted, 34 years ago today.