Sept. 22,
1976— Charlie's Angels, the latest product from the factory of TV
writer-producer Aaron Spelling, quickly took flight in the Nielsen
ratings following its premiere on ABC.
The
series, featuring three beautiful women working for an unseen but often heard
male owner of a detective agency, only heightened the criticism that Spelling
was, according to the highbrow The New Yorker, a “schlock merchant.”
Spelling
he laughed all the way to the bank, as his fantasy detective drama began what
turned out to be five seasons in prime time.
This
current post might not be the kind of elevated fare that longtime readers of
this blog might recall from earlier items concerning, for instance, the
Metropolitan Opera’s 1966 debut at Lincoln Center, the NY Times Jayson
Blair scandal, or the death of landscape painter Thomas Moran.
But the
show, even in its earliest incarnation a half-century ago, exerts a tenacious
hold, particularly on those of a certain age. Just witness the social-media hoopla
surrounding “Angel” Jaclyn Smith’s just-published memoir, and her appearance
with former co-star Kate Jackson on The Drew Barrymore Show.
Beyond
that, the story of the show says much about manufacturing and maintaining fame, managing star egos, and an often-unacknowledged
adjunct of TV production: attorneys on speed dial to launch or defend against
lawsuits resulting from success.
Though Spelling,
the most prolific producer in TV history (according to the Guinness Book of
World Records) cheerfully acknowledged that his shows represented “mind
candy,” this series—which made stars of Smith, Jackson, and Farrah Fawcett—was
more like eye candy.
One nickname, more
scornful, quickly caught on: “Jiggle TV,” for scenes focusing on its stars’
physical assets. The opening credits, with Smith in a bikini, would hardly be
the last time that the show was associated with swimsuits.
In a
fortuitous bit of marketing synergy, a poster featuring Fawcett in a red swimsuit
went on sale right around the time the show premiered. By March 1977, five
million copies were decorating bedrooms and dorms all across the country,
making it, according to this 2020 Biography article, the
bestselling poster of all time.
A year
later, at the height of Farrahmania, an incorrect rumor circulated
where I lived in Bergen County, NJ, that the former Texas model with the
tousled blond hair was planning to live on the same street as Yankee catcher Thurman Munson in Norwood. The news was enough to lead one teenage guy I knew to vow
to camp out overnight to catch sight of her!
Fawcett
was careful to appear in a one-piece swimsuit to conceal a childhood scar on
her stomach. No such problem existed for later Angel Cheryl Ladd, who,
tired of being asked incessantly to wear a bikini on the show, finally came to
the set one day with one that left very, very little to the imagination.
In a
2016 oral history of Spelling in The Hollywood Reporter, the
actress recalled, “I got a note from Aaron that said, ‘OK, little rebel, I got
the point. And this will never happen again.’ But he didn’t mean I’d never be
in a bikini again. It was more like, don’t try that again.”
Externals
like clothes and hair absorbed much of Spelling’s attention, as they would for his
later nighttime soap operas like Dynasty, Beverly Hills 90210,
and Melrose Place. But the success of Charlie’s Angels meant that
he would be ensnared, not always successfully, in keeping his stars satisfied.
After
one season, Fawcett quit to pursue other opportunities. Spelling and partner
Leonard Goldberg filed a breach-of-contract lawsuit. (The case was settled out
of court, with the actress agreeing on six guest appearances before bowing
out.)
For her
increasing annoyance with the show’s declining script quality, lack of
compensation for suggesting the series’ name in the first place, and Spelling’s
refusal to adjust her shooting schedule to allow for outside work like the
Oscar-winning Kramer vs. Kramer, Jackson went from being nicknamed “The
Smart One” among the angelic trio to being tagged “The Difficult One.” To her
vast relief, she was gone after Season 3.
Smith
would be the only one of the original trio to last all five seasons and 115
episodes of the show. Unlike, say, M*A*S*H or Cheers, where cast
changes revitalized the series for the long haul, lineup alterations did not
have a similar effect for Charlie’s Angels. Ratings were drooping when
everyone decided to call it a day after the fifth season.
Spelling,
Goldberg, and ABC executives may have felt particular relief in moving on. In
1979, husband and wife actors Robert Wagner and Natalie Wood, silent investors
in the show but not listed as producers, sued Spelling for misappropriation of
funds, claiming that he had channeled their money towards another crime show, Starsky
and Hutch.
The
investigation dragged on for a year, until the L.A. District Attorney’s office
announced that there were “insufficient grounds to institute criminal charges.”
With that, “Angelgate” was consigned to history, though it involved
enduring questions about proving that head-scratching Hollywood bookkeeping represented
fraud rather than sloppiness.
(More than
two decades later, Wagner was back in court over the angels, this time hoping
for a share of the profits from the two Charlie’s Angels feature films. He
gained no satisfaction or money from that lawsuit, either.)
Astonishingly,
nearly decades after the show went off the air, it was revived as a multi-media
franchise, on film (Charlie's Angels, 2000; Charlie's Angels: Full
Throttle, 2003, and a 2019 reboot), TV again (a short-lived 2011 series and
an animated web series), and even a video game.
That
subsequent history underscored how much the series confounded its critics. Its appeal to male viewers was, well,
obvious. (Hint: it had nothing to do with plots!) But I was surprised to
discover that even among females, the show had its defenders.
In my high
school yearbook, for instance, several female classmates listed among their
memories “C’s A’s.” It took me a while to surmise that this referred to their
time together watching Charlie’s Angels in its original Wednesday night
slots.
Drew
Barrymore must have felt a similar affinity for the show, as she not only
starred in the two film versions of the early aughts but produced them. The
appeal of the show for her? Girl Power—a reminder in the new millennium that
Sisterhood Is Powerful.
