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No Need for More Dallas
Mar. 15th, 2006 11:59 pmA big piece of news here in Big D is the gearing up of the Dallas movie. As a part of a long line of horrible examples that there is very little creativity at the big studios in Hollywood, yet another old television show is being remade into a major motion picture, wasting money on name stars and a bevy of writers, each hired to try to fix the script the last one punched up.
The problem is, Hollywood doesn't see that these movies are almost constantly box office failures. Last year's Bewitched was a good example. People weren't really interested in seeing a new version of Bewitched, even with Will Farell, Nicole Kidman and several other stars in it. They also failed to secure a good script, with a really odd premise that had the actors not playing the classic characters, but playing actors playing those characters. The script wasn't funny, and the actors seemed to be at a loss for what to do.
Sure, you can blame the whole trend of taking old television shows and putting them on the big screen to Star Trek, but that was a continuation to the series with the same actors, much like the X-Files movie that came later. it did show that people would pay to see small screen shows on the big screen, but still, the first Star Trek movie wasn't a big success, as it also suffered from script and direction problems. It wasn't until Star Trek II, The Wrath of Kahn where the whole thing came together, that a television show movie was truly successful.
Still, what's led to all the Starsky and Hutches, Honeymooners and Beverly Hillbillies films is the success of the Brady Bunch Movie a few years back, where new actors took on the classic roles, but they didn't update the characters, just the world that they lived in. It was clever at the time, but now so many remakes have to create some sort of twist to the movie to show that they aren't just stealing from the past. What the Brady Bunch Movie got right, in it's simple way, leads to what goes wrong in so many other films.
Now one may say, look at Battlestar Galactica on television, it's a remake with several twists, such as the female Starbuck. I agree that it's the exception to the rule that remakes are usually inferior, and the changes often seem tacked on, but in this case, it just works. Starbuck is an actor playing a part, and really, it doesn't change the character, but the real change in the series is the cylons themselves. Where the creators triumphed is where they took a property that people kind of remembered (the show only ran a season) and made it into something new and meaningful today, rather than taking a landmark show like The Monkees, and trying to create the New Monkees (truly, there was such a show) or creating a movie version of Lost in Space.
Of course there's only been a handful of properties that have made the successful transition from film to television. M*A*S*H is of course, the most successful one, and there's the current Stargate SG1, but there's been several failures, like Delta House, the Animal House show, and Starman. Of course one of Dallas' predecessors was a movie that became a popular series, the sudsy (for the 1950's) Peyton Place. Place was one of the first nighttime soap operas.
Of course Dallas will be remembered for starting the 1980's trend of opulence soaps with such well-to-do families as the Carrington and Colbys sharing the airwaves with the Ewings. I remember my family watching the series, and that it was the show on Friday nights in most households. Of course this was also in the days where there wasn't much else to see, so the three networks split the majority of the TV audience.
The show started strong, but really kicked into gear when their first season cliffhanger (a new development for television drama at the time), a shot of a gun firing, and chief baddie J.R. slumping to the floor of his Dallas hi-rise office caught audience imagination. They had plenty of time to speculate as a strike, kept the show off the air until late October. By that time there were shirts and songs and plenty of articles asking "Who Shot J.R.?"
The show kept going for 14 seasons, eventually giving us probably one of the worst television moments with the waking up of Pamela Ewing, finding her husband in the shower when he had died a season ago. If the show was hard to swallow before, now there was no credibility to it.
I can't say that I never got the appeal of the show, because I did watch it, but it wasn't exactly a favorite. Funny thing was, when my family went up to Dallas for holidays and such, you could tell that the city was enamored of the show - or at least enamored of the fame that the show brought to them. Never mind that many of the characters were adulterous and backstabbing, often loud, obnoxious people with a tendency to drink to much and then trow the glass in a fit of rage, it was all the fact that Dallas was in the spotlight. There's nothing that Dallas likes more than being important.
Of course, the original draft of the script shows the show was to have been called Houston.
So here we are again, with the pre-production of the new Dallas movie. Actors who have been asked to star in it are a veritable who's who, but seem to be choices for the poster, not for actual talent in recreating these roles. First, there's John Travolta for J.R. There's only one role that I could think of him being worse in, and that's Edna Turnblad in Hairspray. Then there's Owen Wilson as Bobby and Shirley McClaine as Miss Ellie. Of course one of the strangest casting rumors is Jennifer Lopez as Sue Ellen. Really, changing Sue Ellen to a Hispanic character isn't a bad idea (and don't forget she played a Mexican-American in Selena), but what Hispanic family would name their daughter Sue Ellen?
Really, it's another case of not needing to see these characters again - I don't think anyone's dying for a revival of Dallas - except for the city of Dallas, and being on the big screen really does no good for a series that lived on the stringing along of plots across several episodes of nighttime drama. How can you recreate the interest in the shooting of JR when you know that it will solved by the end of the film - whether the gunslinger is Kristin or someone else? How do you take a soap and have it wrap up in two hours?
Of course the biggest controversy is a budgetary one. The original Dallas TV show did a little bit of filming in Dallas, just to give it some feel, and did shoot scenes at Southfork ranch - which looks a lot smaller than it does on TV. The movie's budget may mean that it has to shoot in Florida, or Canada, and Dalasites are mad, but when it comes down to it, other places offer better incentives to film there. Texas uses to be more friendly to filmmakers in the 1990's and many films were shot here, but now, not so much. City council here is trying to find ways to give incentives and tax breaks to film here, but it may be too little, too late.
If the filmmakers were good, they'd chuck the whole thing, and start with a new story, and new characters. Perhaps Jacksonville or Vancouver wouldn't be so bad as a re-heated Dallas, no matter where it was shot. Still, as always, it's all about civic pride, not the quality of the product, so Dallas will continue to fight to see itself, no matter how bad, in Dallas.
The problem is, Hollywood doesn't see that these movies are almost constantly box office failures. Last year's Bewitched was a good example. People weren't really interested in seeing a new version of Bewitched, even with Will Farell, Nicole Kidman and several other stars in it. They also failed to secure a good script, with a really odd premise that had the actors not playing the classic characters, but playing actors playing those characters. The script wasn't funny, and the actors seemed to be at a loss for what to do.
Sure, you can blame the whole trend of taking old television shows and putting them on the big screen to Star Trek, but that was a continuation to the series with the same actors, much like the X-Files movie that came later. it did show that people would pay to see small screen shows on the big screen, but still, the first Star Trek movie wasn't a big success, as it also suffered from script and direction problems. It wasn't until Star Trek II, The Wrath of Kahn where the whole thing came together, that a television show movie was truly successful.
Still, what's led to all the Starsky and Hutches, Honeymooners and Beverly Hillbillies films is the success of the Brady Bunch Movie a few years back, where new actors took on the classic roles, but they didn't update the characters, just the world that they lived in. It was clever at the time, but now so many remakes have to create some sort of twist to the movie to show that they aren't just stealing from the past. What the Brady Bunch Movie got right, in it's simple way, leads to what goes wrong in so many other films.
Now one may say, look at Battlestar Galactica on television, it's a remake with several twists, such as the female Starbuck. I agree that it's the exception to the rule that remakes are usually inferior, and the changes often seem tacked on, but in this case, it just works. Starbuck is an actor playing a part, and really, it doesn't change the character, but the real change in the series is the cylons themselves. Where the creators triumphed is where they took a property that people kind of remembered (the show only ran a season) and made it into something new and meaningful today, rather than taking a landmark show like The Monkees, and trying to create the New Monkees (truly, there was such a show) or creating a movie version of Lost in Space.
Of course there's only been a handful of properties that have made the successful transition from film to television. M*A*S*H is of course, the most successful one, and there's the current Stargate SG1, but there's been several failures, like Delta House, the Animal House show, and Starman. Of course one of Dallas' predecessors was a movie that became a popular series, the sudsy (for the 1950's) Peyton Place. Place was one of the first nighttime soap operas.
Of course Dallas will be remembered for starting the 1980's trend of opulence soaps with such well-to-do families as the Carrington and Colbys sharing the airwaves with the Ewings. I remember my family watching the series, and that it was the show on Friday nights in most households. Of course this was also in the days where there wasn't much else to see, so the three networks split the majority of the TV audience.
The show started strong, but really kicked into gear when their first season cliffhanger (a new development for television drama at the time), a shot of a gun firing, and chief baddie J.R. slumping to the floor of his Dallas hi-rise office caught audience imagination. They had plenty of time to speculate as a strike, kept the show off the air until late October. By that time there were shirts and songs and plenty of articles asking "Who Shot J.R.?"
The show kept going for 14 seasons, eventually giving us probably one of the worst television moments with the waking up of Pamela Ewing, finding her husband in the shower when he had died a season ago. If the show was hard to swallow before, now there was no credibility to it.
I can't say that I never got the appeal of the show, because I did watch it, but it wasn't exactly a favorite. Funny thing was, when my family went up to Dallas for holidays and such, you could tell that the city was enamored of the show - or at least enamored of the fame that the show brought to them. Never mind that many of the characters were adulterous and backstabbing, often loud, obnoxious people with a tendency to drink to much and then trow the glass in a fit of rage, it was all the fact that Dallas was in the spotlight. There's nothing that Dallas likes more than being important.
Of course, the original draft of the script shows the show was to have been called Houston.
So here we are again, with the pre-production of the new Dallas movie. Actors who have been asked to star in it are a veritable who's who, but seem to be choices for the poster, not for actual talent in recreating these roles. First, there's John Travolta for J.R. There's only one role that I could think of him being worse in, and that's Edna Turnblad in Hairspray. Then there's Owen Wilson as Bobby and Shirley McClaine as Miss Ellie. Of course one of the strangest casting rumors is Jennifer Lopez as Sue Ellen. Really, changing Sue Ellen to a Hispanic character isn't a bad idea (and don't forget she played a Mexican-American in Selena), but what Hispanic family would name their daughter Sue Ellen?
Really, it's another case of not needing to see these characters again - I don't think anyone's dying for a revival of Dallas - except for the city of Dallas, and being on the big screen really does no good for a series that lived on the stringing along of plots across several episodes of nighttime drama. How can you recreate the interest in the shooting of JR when you know that it will solved by the end of the film - whether the gunslinger is Kristin or someone else? How do you take a soap and have it wrap up in two hours?
Of course the biggest controversy is a budgetary one. The original Dallas TV show did a little bit of filming in Dallas, just to give it some feel, and did shoot scenes at Southfork ranch - which looks a lot smaller than it does on TV. The movie's budget may mean that it has to shoot in Florida, or Canada, and Dalasites are mad, but when it comes down to it, other places offer better incentives to film there. Texas uses to be more friendly to filmmakers in the 1990's and many films were shot here, but now, not so much. City council here is trying to find ways to give incentives and tax breaks to film here, but it may be too little, too late.
If the filmmakers were good, they'd chuck the whole thing, and start with a new story, and new characters. Perhaps Jacksonville or Vancouver wouldn't be so bad as a re-heated Dallas, no matter where it was shot. Still, as always, it's all about civic pride, not the quality of the product, so Dallas will continue to fight to see itself, no matter how bad, in Dallas.
