Dallas was huge back then and the hype and excitement that surrounded the "Who Shot J.R?" episode gripped a whole nation and was even covered on National news bulletins
At the time Hagman was negotiating a new contract so for a while it was touch and go whether J.R. would pull through or not but the makers realised that Dallas without J.R. would be like Taggart without Taggart, so he pulled through to fight dirty another day
I remember that time very well. My wife was eight months pregnant with our first child and we were living in a one bedroom flat in Cathcart. Blondie were at number 1 in the charts with "The Tide Is High", soon to be displaced by Abba with "Super Trouper" which was number 1 when my first son was born. Ayr United had narrowly missed out on reaching the Scottish League Cup Final as a result of some extremely dubious decisions which went in favour of Dundee in the Semi-Final, a pint of beer cost 35p and John Lennon was still alive. Good times. (Oh, Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister and Ronald Reagan had just become president of the U.S.A...make up your own mind about those ones)
I do not watch Eastenders or Coronation Street or the likes so in my lifetime the only other TV episode which seemed to cause such widespread excitement was when Richard Kimble finally caught up with the one-armed man in the last ever episode of "The Fugitive" in 1967
Dallas was full of excellent characters although even J.R. didn't seem to notice when his mum changed from Barbara Bel Geddes to Donna Reed for a while and then back to Barbara Bel Geddes again
At least when actor Jim Davis died they had the good grace not to replace him as Jock Ewing but instead to introduce Howard Keel as Miss Ellie's new beau. I always half-expected him to burst into "Bless your beautiful hide"
His loving wife Sue Ellen suffered much at the hands of J.R. but at least he did give her a reference as "a drunk, a tramp and an unfit mother"
His brother Bobby's wife played by Victoria Principal (most of the time) had the unfortunate distinction to be involved in probably the worst plot line ever when she awoke to find her husband in the shower at the start of Season 10. This came as a shock to most of us who had seen Bobby die at the end of season 8. This was explained away as just a dream by Pamela which left the whole of Season 9 as never having happened. I believe I gave up at that point or I may have just dreamt that I gave up. Who Knows? Who cares?
They even made a Dallas spin-off series called Knots Landing which I managed to avoid and I could not bring myself to watch the recent revamped production of Dallas currently showing on TV
Hagman also starred in the 1960s comedy series 'I Dream of Jeannie' which was remarkably similar to the 1960s comedy series 'Bewitched' but 'Bewitched' had Elizabeth Montgomery and her twitchy nose which always won me over
His fellow Dallas stars Patrick Duffy and Linda Gray were both apparently with him and his family when he died and spoke very highly of him. It seems in real life he was nothing like the scheming character he played so well on screen and he will be sadly missed
Wherever he is now he should take note of one of his own quotes as J.R.:
"Like my daddy always said: if you can't get in the front door, just go around the back"
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