Here’s What Happened to the Original Cast of ‘Charlie’s Angels’ — Their Joys, Tragedies and Triumphs

An Influence on ‘Cagney and Lacey’?

“Kate’s always taken credit for this, but apparently Spelling and Goldberg went to her and kind of proposed the idea of Avengers-type women and all of that,” says Jack Condon. “I think Kate kind of thought it would eventually be kind of a Cagney & Lacey type thing where it would be a very dramatic program showcasing women. Kate liked the idea, but she poo-pooed the name Alley Cats. She didn’t like that title and supposedly while they were going through the discussion about this show, and it almost sounds made up, Kate said that she saw a painting of three angels on Aaron’s wall. That’s where she said, ‘I don’t like Alley Cat; that sounds too gruff. Why don’t we call them angels?’ They liked that idea.”

Talking to Charlie

Mike Pingel adds, “The story is that they were in Frank Sinatra’s old bungalow and on Aaron’s desk was a speaker and Kate said, ‘He talks to them through that.’ So she had the ideas of how to create it and the idea that they talk to their boss mysteriously. I guess she had many different ideas she went in with.”

‘Harry O’ Messed Things Up for ‘Harry’s Angels’

Says Jack, “The name Alley Cats was changed to Harry’s Angels — I don’t know where they got the name Harry from, but when they pitched the idea to Fred Silverman, who was in charge of ABC at the time, Silverman liked the concept, but he wanted to change Harry to Charlie, because at the time Harry O was a network show with David Janssen and he thought the two shows with Harry in the name would be confusing. So it went from Alley Cats to Harry’s Angels to Charlie’s Angels. But a lot of people at ABC didn’t like the idea of three women at the time, because it was unheard of that three women could carry a show. But Silverman liked the idea and gave it a green light.

When it was shot, it tested poorly and people said it was ridiculous; that it wasn’t going to go anywhere. So what they ended up doing was airing it on March 21, 1976 with another TV movie of the week and they called it The ABC Double Feature, because they didn’t think it was going to fly with the audience. But, surprisingly, it was in the Top 10, I believe No. 5. They showed the pilot movie again and it had incredible numbers again and the network was so ecstatic they ordered the series for September.”

Finding a Formula

 “What really evolved as it went on is the way the producers got a formula and kept doing it,” points out Mike. “The ladies wanted to expand their characters and the producers were, like, ‘Nope, we have a formula, it’s working and we’re going to keep with it.’ Sometimes they had greats scripts, but as it went on it got dumber. Especially in the last couple of seasons, they repeated a lot of stuff. If you watch the first season, it’s kind of more serious. It was a 10 [p.m.] show and the girls were doing a little bit more … I wouldn’t say risqué, but more taboo kinds of things, such as prostitution and drugs and robberies and that kind of stuff. They did that all through the other seasons, but they weren’t as serious. The first season, the way it was written, it was more like Policewoman and more gritty. It was more tangible as far as stories were concerned. Second season also, but it started to move towards a fluffier side because it moved to a 9 [p.m.] slot and they were appealing to children at that point too. Sometimes the scripts were on point, sometimes they were having more fun focusing on the hair and the outfits.”

Ratings and Swimsuits

As Ed Robertson observes, “The series was supposed to be about three smart detectives who happened to be gorgeous. When the show premiered, it got something like a 50 share of the audience, which will never happen again. If you get a 50 share in a three-network universe, and the following week I think it got a 52 share, it was obvious the audience was growing. That is when Spelling made the calculated move to throw out any pretension or any effort of making this about smart detectives. It became the construct to get them to come up with situations where they would wear as little clothing as primetime television at 10 [p.m.] would allow them to. I don’t know if it was in her contract or not, but Kate Jackson never appeared in a swimsuit of any kind.”

Smiles Herbie, “It was just really time for it; I don’t know what the ‘70s would have been like without Charlie’s Angels.”

Please continue scrolling down for a look at the life and careers of the actresses behind Charlie’s Angels. 

Kate Jackson (Sabrina Duncan)

Born Lucy Kate Jackson on October 29, 1948, in Birmingham, Alabama, Kate took classes in speech and history of the theatre at Birmingham Southern College, though in her sophomore year she moved to New York City to study acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Her first job was as an NBC page providing tour guides at Rockefeller Center, though she found herself cast as ghost Daphne Harridge from 1970 to 1971 on the daytime horror soap opera Dark Shadows (which would lead her to play Tracy Collins in the 1971 feature film version of the show, Night of Dark Shadows). In 1972 she was on the big screen in Limbo and the TV movie Movin’ On. That same year she scored her first regular series role, Jill Danko on The Rookies, which lasted until 1976. She starred in a number of TV movies during that time, including the cult favorite Satan’s School for Girls. She starred in Charlie’s Angels from 1976-1979, though the character of Sabrina — conceptually — started off pretty differently.

‘Regal and Beautiful’

As Jack reflects, “When they wrote the characters, the role that Kate took on, Sabrina, was supposed to be extremely regal and beautiful; when she walked into a room, men would just fall at her feet because she was so beautiful. Kate, who in real life is not known for glamour, thought that would be a departure for her, so at the last minute she decided she wanted to be Sabrina Dunkin, the character that wore the furs and the beautiful outfits in the pilot. So they gave Kate’s original role, who was more scrappy and streetwise, to Jaclyn Smith and Jaclyn ended up with Kate’s ‘A’ plot, which is why she was in the whole show.”

Bringing the Seasoning to ‘Charlie’s Angels’

“Kate was a seasoned actress,” he continues, “so she brought the seasoning to the show. Some people were familiar with her, but she wasn’t yet a breakout star. For me, I was interested in Charlie’s Angels because of Kate. I liked her on The Rookies, because she was compassionate and sensitive and beautiful. But she was surrounded by men, so that made her stand out a little bit more on that show. The thing I liked about the show growing up is that Kate was the first hire and she was the star, but if you watch the show, none of them were overpowered by the others in each episode. All of them had equal time on each episode and even when Farrah became the phenomenon that she did, they didn’t focus episodes on her like they did on, say, Happy Days when they focused so much on Fonzie, or Welcome Back, Kotter where they gave John Travolta all the lines.”

Kramer vs. Kramer vs. Kate Jackson

Kate decided she’d had enough of Charlie’s Angels when she’d been hired to play the Meryl Streep role in Dustin Hoffman‘s Kramer vs. Kramer and, when the film’s production schedule got pushed back, Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg refused to adjust the show’s schedule for her. “I guess they were more afraid that she would become a big movie star and leave,” Mike observes. “Unfortunately, it backfired, because since they did not allow her to schedule the film, she eventually just left the show. I think that would have been a great breakout role for her. She is a serious actress with Dark Shadows, The Rookies and now this, Charlie’s Angels. She’d done some movies between that, but at that time TV stars really didn’t become movie stars. There was no crossover like there is today. You were a TV star and that’s what everybody saw you as, or as a movie star. It was a mutual decision. If you read the tabloids, they reported she wasn’t very nice on the set.”

Growing Frustration

Says Jack, “She was disenchanted with the show and she admits she was difficult, and her focus on the show started to wane. Remember, in the beginning she wanted to be the glamorous one, but I think in competing with Farrah and Jaclyn, she kind of went back to her old ways of flannel shirts, turtlenecks and all that. She wouldn’t dress up, she wouldn’t wear glamorous outfits. When she left and Shelley Hack came in, that’s when Aaron Spelling said, ‘We’re gonna start to do sophisticated chic with Charlie’s Angels.’ So the girls would show up at the office in more glamorous dresses and things of that nature, but because the ratings went down, they went back to the bikini route.”

Lost ‘Angel’

As to her leaving Charlie’s Angels after the third season, Kate sat down for a 1979 interview with People in which she explained, “What it comes down to is I got tired of them and they got tired of me. I’m glad I’ve been able to hang up the halo … For the first two years of the show my life was all geared to work. Even though those millions of people around the country know me and like me, they aren’t in my living room at the end of the day when I’m lonely and hassled … I don’t want to sound artsy, but an actor needs time to sit back and let a little life filter in. When you’re running on empty, you can’t go very far. Maybe I can regain some credibility as an actress.”

‘Scarecrow and Mrs. King’

Kate went on to star in Scarecrow and Mrs. King alongside Bruce Boxleitner, which ran from 1983 to 1987. She starred in numerous TV movies, the last one being 2006’s A Daughter’s Conviction; appeared in a number of features, concluding with 2004’s No Regrets, and numerous TV guest appearances, including a 2007 episode of Criminal Minds. In her personal life, Kate’s romantic relationships have included Nick Nolte and Warren Beatty. She was married to actor Andrew Stevens from 1978 to 1981; New York businessman David Greenwald from 1982 to 1984 and Utah ski lodge owner Tom Hart from 1991 to 1993. In the late 1980s, Kate waged a pair of battles with breast cancer and is a survivor.

Farrah Fawcett (Jill Munroe)

Farrah was born on February 2, 1947, in Corpus Christi, Texas. Between 1965 and 1968, she attended the University of Texas where she initially was studying microbiology before changing her major to art. During her freshman year, she was named one of the ten most beautiful coeds on campus and, as a result, her photos were sent to various agencies in Hollywood. Agent David Mirisch spent two years trying to convince her to come to Hollywood, and she finally agreed to following her junior year. No sooner did she arrive than she was signed by Screen Gems to a contract that paid her $350 a week. Farrah started to appear in television commercials, representing products like Noxema, Max Factor and Mercury Cougar cars. In 1973 she married pre-Six Million Dollar Man Lee Majors, with whom she was with until 1982.

“When she started working, her father was shocked, wondering what she was doing to make so much money a week,” Mike laughs. “I was too young to have seen them, but fans have told me that when they saw her in those commercials, they were, like, ‘Who is that girl?’ She just had the ‘it’ girl look.”

Early in Her Career

“Going into Charlie’s Angels,” points out Ed, “Farrah was coming off of David Janssen’s Harry O, where she was very good. She was 27-years-old and still learning her craft, but there was excellent chemistry between her and Janssen in particular; those scenes are fun to watch. So it’s not surprising that she got the chance to do Charlie’s Angels. She was under contract at Screen Gems and, like a lot of actors, she started with small walk-on roles with one or two lines. Then maybe they’ll put you in a movie of the week, which was sort of the career arc in the late-’60s, early-’70s. And this is in addition to the Wella Balsam commercials and the magazine ads that she did. Gradually, when they realized you had talent, they gave you more and more to do. I don’t remember how she got on Harry O, but when they moved production of that show from San Diego to L.A. in 1975, at some point they hired Farrah and she had a recurring role as David Janssen’s neighbor/girlfriend and they clicked. They clearly liked each other off camera as well as on. Anthony Zerbe told me that everyone liked her off camera. She was a very hard worker and a good actress.”

Unexpected Phenomenon

Jack notes, “Farrah Fawcett really fueled the fire of what that show was all about, and she certainly eclipsed the show as the show became big because of her. If you compare Farrah to somebody like Suzanne Somers on Three’s Company, Suzanne Somers worked hard to become an overnight sensation or a household name. She stopped at nothing. For Farrah, it’s just happened and wasn’t something she set out to do. And she wasn’t impressed by her own fame; she became iconic for just being herself, which was so funny. And of course she was well known before the show just by print ads and commercials and things of that nature as well as episodic television. And I think what helped the show, too, was of course her famous poster. What people don’t realize is that that poster was produced before Charlie’s Angeles came out. That poster sold over 12 million copies prior to the show being on. I don’t know if the poster helped the show or the show helped the poster.”

The Fonzie Factor

“Like I said,” states Herbie, “Charlie’s Angels was supposed to be Kate’s show, and then Farrah comes along and just steals the thunder. But Kate didn’t care. It’s similar to Happy Days and the fact that it was Ron Howard’s show, but Henry Winkler as Fonzie took over off and became the center of the show. Ron’s attitude was, ‘Whatever works for the show.’ So I think that was probably the feeling towards Farrah too.”

Ed states, “This has happened many times in television, where a show is designed around one actor and then, after it airs, another actor becomes the breakout star. Even though she had been building up her credentials up to that point, and even though she’d been in magazine ads and was a recognizable face, no one could have anticipated her poster and all of the craziness surrounding her. At one point that year, there was a survey of little kids — 10- or 12-year-old kids — and the No. 1 person they admired was Farrah Fawcett, because she was so visible.”

Leaving the Show

Following the first season, Farrah decided she wanted out of the series and her lawyers felt she had a right to as she hadn’t actually signed a contract with Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg. She left, although things went very legal, with the situation being settled out of court in 1979 because the judge ruled that while it was true she had not signed a contract, she did accept a paycheck every week that she was on the show. One residual result of all of this is the fact that, today, no new Charlie’s Angels merchandise can feature Farrah’s likeness without an agreement with her estate.

Coping With Success

Ed reflects, “Mike Connors, the star of Mannix, gave me a really great quote about the pros and cons of the studio system versus today. You could be pumping gas today and then six weeks later you can be a superstar, because there are so many opportunities available through various platforms. But on the other side of it, because most actors don’t have the sort of support of being a contract player, they don’t know how to handle that sudden stratospheric rise to fame. I think you can apply that in Farrah’s case, because, again, she’s 27 years old and nobody could have anticipated the public reaction and the phenomenon. You don’t plan a phenomenon; they happen organically. Things got very heady and, you know, if she were around today and this happened, maybe she would have done something differently. But you make the best decision you think you can at the time. And you really can’t blame her. You might think, ‘I may never be as much in demand as I am right now,’ so of course you want to leverage the situation to the extent that you can. Even though she was learning her craft as an actress, she probably wasn’t ready to headline a major motion picture anyway, but that didn’t stop them from throwing her out there.”

Majors Upheaval

Jack reflects on speaking to Farrah’s manager, Jay Bernstein, before he died, and says, “It was Lee Majors who wanted her to leave the show, because she was working too many hours and he didn’t think it was necessary for her to be on the set every day for the amount of money she was making. Farrah was only making, at the time, $5,000 an episode and I think Lee Majors might’ve been making $40,000 an episode for The Six Million Dollar Man. So he thought the money wasn’t worth all her time away from him. And the thing is, Farrah didn’t come to Hollywood to be a star. An agent saw her picture and said, ‘Why don’t you try your luck in modeling?’ Her logic was, ‘I’ll just come out for one year and have fun with it and see what happens.’ She was going to go back to Texas in a year if it didn’t work out. But then she signed a contract with Screen Gems right away and started appearing on I Dream of Jeannie, The Flying Nun and The Partridge Family. And then Lee Majors also happened to see her picture and wanted to have a date based on this picture, so she dated him, they were together five years and they got married.”

Expanding Her Horizons

Mike details, “Farrah went on to do three films right after Charlie’s Angels: Somebody Killed Her Husband, Sunburn and Saturn 3. All were not huge successes in America, though some were in Europe and Japan. A lot of people said there was a curse on Charlie’s Angels, and when people would leave, their careers would falter. But they all bounced back. Farrah really wanted to do great work. After that, she took a small role in Murder in Texas, a TV movie, and started to take others where she could learn and grow as an actress, and working with writers and directors who could help her. What she started looking for was something in a role that would allow her to bring something different to the screen.”

‘Charlie’s’ Who?

Or, as it would turn out, the stage, replacing Susan Sarandon in the 1983 Off-Broadway production of Extremities, about an intended rape victim who turns the tables on her attacker and takes control. This was followed a year later by the TV movie The Burning Bed, playing battered wife Francine Hughes. Two years later, it was the movie version of Extremities. More dramatic roles followed: Nazi Hunter: The Beate Klarsfeld Story, Poor Little Rich Girl, Double Exposure: The Story of Margaret Bourke-White and the miniseries Small Sacrifices.

“With something like The Burning Bed, not only did she find a role away from Charlie’s Angels, she chose a role that was completely different from what she’d done before, which gave her the opportunity to show what she could do as an actor,” enthuses Mike. “And for the public it gave, to the extent the public resented what happened with Charlie’s Angels, a chance to forgive her. You look at her arc from the mid-‘80s on, and whatever we thought of her as being a poster girl and the blonde bimbo, so to speak, on Charlie’s Angels, I think it shut people up, because she proved that she’s a good actress.”

As Times Goes By

In her private life, Farrah was in a romantic relationship (oftentimes on and off) with actor Ryan O’Neal, with whom she gave birth to their son, Redmond James Fawcett-O’Neal. Sadly, in 2006 Farrah was diagnosed with cancer. Although she underwent chemotherapy and surgery, and by February 2, 2007 (her 60^th birthday) had been diagnosed as being cancer-free, just a few months later it came back full force and she was diagnosed with stage IV cancer that had metastasized to her liver. She tried a variety of treatments (her journey to fight the illness was captured in the two-hour documentary Farrah’s Story), but unfortunately died on June 25, 2009, at the age of 62.

Jaclyn Smith (Kelly Garret)

Jacquelyn Ellen Smith was born October 26, 1945, in Houston, Texas. Although she began studying psychology and drama at Texas’ Trinity University, she ultimately decided to move to New York to study at the Balanchine School of American Ballet. Her mind changed here, too, when she realized that she could find work in print ads and television commercials as a model. Eventually she became the “Breck Girl” and, like Farrah Fawcett, became a spokesmodel for Wella Balsam shampoo. Prior to Charlie’s Angels, she had small roles in the films Goodbye, Columbus (1969), The Adventurers (1970), Bootleggers (1974) and several TV movies. There were also guest appearances on The Partridge Family, McCloud, Get Christie Love!, The Rookies and a recurring part on Switch.

Bringing the Southern Charm

“They didn’t really want another brunette, they wanted a redhead,” Mike points out. “But they saw her, she’d gone in for a reading, but what they liked about her was the chemistry between the three girls. That’s what Jaclyn brought to it; all three of them just had that chemistry. That lightning in a bottle regardless of what the producers originally had in mind. Jaclyn kicked their idea out the door with their chemistry. So they brought her on and they became a huge international success, like rock stars. She brought that more Southern charm to the threesome that made TV history. She’s the only Angel that lasted all five years.”

Robert Wagner Helped Her to ‘Switch’ Things Up

Observes Ed, “What’s funny is that even though the show was supposedly designed around Kate Jackson, Jaclyn Smith actually gets the best role in the pilot. At the time, at the age of 12, I didn’t think of her acting ability, but when I watch that pilot today, she’s very good. Jaclyn had a similar arc as Farrah did prior to Charlie’s Angels, though much of her apprenticeship was done at Universal. We mentioned how in the pilot of Charlie’s Angels the three of them are involved in a con, but Jaclyn Smith carries the ball for most of the 90-minute pilot. If you ever have an opportunity to watch Switch, the Robert Wagner and Eddie Albert show, she did the pilot of that show and several episodes, and that was a con every week. So she wasn’t always just the pretty girl distraction. She would assume whatever character in the charade that Eddie Albert and RJ were pulling off that week, so she showed that she could do that. I believe it was on Robert Wagner’s recommendation that Aaron Spelling hired Jaclyn Smith. So all three actresses were all beautiful, but they were all coming into their own as performers.”

There Till the End

“So classy, so eloquent, so refined,” Herbie says. “She was also from Texas like Farrah, but was more [the] Southern Belle type. Yet I guess for some reason she was the streetwise one; that’s how they described Kelly Garret — whatever that’s supposed to mean. But she was the only one who remained loyal, really, to Aaron Spelling. Cheryl didn’t leave either, but for the entire five years Jaclyn Smith became the central force. After Kate Jackson left, she became the leader, because she was the last original. I respected that she stayed.”

Concurs Mike, “She stayed until her contract ended and then after that moved on. The show was canceled before she was able to move on herself, which would have been an interesting thing to have the last original Angel leave and who would they have brought on? That would have shaken up the series. From there she started doing wonderful miniseries and TV movies.”

Starting Over Again

In terms of acting, Jaclyn truly became the Queen of TV Movies, starring in a wide variety of films that were well received by both the critics and the audience. She also starred in the 1989 to 1990 series Christine Chronwell, and co-starred on the third and fourth seasons of The District. But beyond acting, she had, and continues to have, enormous success marketing her brand in clothing, makeup and more. “What I admire about her,” states Ed, “is she was one of the first, if not the first celebrity, to understand the importance of branding before we even called it branding. What she did with Kmart — she’s been with them for, I think 35 years and then began branching out into makeup, home furnishings and other products. She’s a smart person who recognizes what her image means.”

Jaclyn and Kmart

“The most insane thing about Jaclyn Smith is that she did something that no one else was doing at the time,” Mike enthuses. “She did a line at Kmart and people laughed at her. I think they literally laughed at her, ‘Why would she do that at Kmart?’ She’s the last woman laughing; she’s been there over 40-plus years and that line has made billions of dollars for Kmart and went into Sears. She’s one of the smartest women in terms of marketing in that kind of product world with a clothing line, she had a mattress line, a furniture line and now has a makeup line she did with her husband. She did it all by signing a deal with Kmart that people couldn’t believe. She knew what she wanted to create, she made beautiful clothing for a price range that every woman could wear. Plus, who wouldn’t want to wear a piece of Jaclyn Smith clothing? An ‘Angel’ made that, and most of the women who do buy her clothing line remember her as the fashion icon from Charlie’s Angeles making amazing fashion for the everyday lady.”

The Customer Is Always Right

Ed elaborates, “She is very hands on with her customer base, listening to the good and the not so good, which is smart, because you learn from the not so good so that the customers keep coming back. Customer loyalty is what it’s all all about. It’s just so interesting, because, again, you go back to the way the show was originally conceived as a vehicle for Kate Jackson, because she was the most accomplished actor of the three. The fact is that the other two were just as accomplished despite the fact they didn’t have the benefit of a weekly series like Kate did where you could really learn your craft. All three of them proved to be as smart off-camera as they were on when you look at their overall bodies of work.”

Personally Speaking

Jaclyn has been married four times. First to actor Roger Davis (Dark Shadows, Alias Smith and Jones) from 1968 to 1975; then to actor Dennis Cole from 1978 to 1981, filmmaker Anthony B. Richmond from 1981 to 1989 (with whom she had two children) and cardiothoracic surgeon Brad Allen since 1997. In 2003 she battled breast cancer, but by all reports it’s gone into remission. Needless to say, Jaclyn shows no signs of slowing down.

Cheryl Ladd (Kris Munroe)

You could describe Cheryl Ladd (actually born Cheryl Jean Stoppmeimoor on July 12, 1951, in Huron, South Dakota) as someone willing to step directly into the path of a massive whirlwind. What else could explain her willingness to fill Farrah Fawcett’s spot in season 2 of Charlie’s Angels? Her career began upon moving to Hollywood and becoming the singing voice of the animated Melody on the Saturday morning cartoon series Josie and the Pussycats (which led to an album of the same name). She appeared in the films Chrome and Hot Leather (1971) and The Treasure of Jamaica Reef (1974), and on the TV series The Rookies, Alexander Zwo, Search, Harry O, Ironside, The Partridge Family, The Streets of San Francisco, Happy Days, Switch and Police Woman before becoming a part of Charlie’s Angels in its second season.

Entering the Storm

“Charlie’s Angels was the No. 1 show almost everywhere, and here you have its breakout star, the phenomenon, Farrah Fawcett leaving the series, and who were you going to get to replace her?” Mike asks rhetorically. “Aaron asked Cheryl Ladd to audition for it and she refused; she didn’t want to fill the shoes of Farrah. She’d been up for a number of roles, including the lead role in Family as the sister that Meredith Baxter ended up getting. Aaron and Leonard eventually talked her into coming in and when they sat down, she asked, ‘Could I be funny?’ and Aaron said, ‘Yes, you can be funny.’ She just didn’t want to play the seasoned detective and, at that moment, Kris Munroe, Jill’s sister, was created and it made sense to the audience.”

Jack adds, “They came up with the idea of having her come in as the rookie angel who might make a few mistakes. Aaron Spelling thought if she starts off that way, she would be considered the underdog and maybe the audience would like her. And, of course, Cheryl had great hair at the time and a big smile so she could play the part of Farrah’s sister Kris, which is how she was introduced on the show.”

Showing a Humorous Side

“Cheryl Ladd was like the person who takes over as coach of a Super Bowl-winning team the year after they won the Super Bowl,” Ed comments. “In that sort of situation, you’re always going to be thought of as the person who preceded you versus where you are. And Cheryl Ladd was another actress wo had earned her stripes before. She had a similar background to Jaclyn Smith in that regard, because she did a lot of episodic stuff, some movies of the week. And when she joined the series, she worked as hard, if not harder, than anybody else. She didn’t try to replace Farrah, she just tried to be herself. And allowing her to be more humorous worked, because that way you’re not just playing the blonde, but a different character. And because she was allowed to make mistakes, which gave her a chance to show humor.”

‘Happy Days’ Beauty Queen

Herbie remembers, “She had done an episode of Happy Days prior to Charlie’s Angels, playing a beauty queen. She had that beautiful smile, like Farrah. The casting on that show was genius. But I don’t think she and Kate Jackson got along for whatever reason. Kate was very loyal to the original trio and certainly when they made the Charlie’s Angels movie, her feeling was, ‘If me, Farrah and Jaclyn aren’t in it, how can they call it Charlie’s Angels?’ So she wasn’t too keen on that. Jaclyn made a cameo in that movie. Kate probably wanted to leave it at two and was probably upset they added someone else. It just wasn’t the same.”

Comparing Cheryl Ladd to a Monkee

“It couldn’t have been easy for her joining a successful show midstream,” surmises Ed. “And in this case, Kate, Jaclyn and Farrah became very close in much the same way the actors who played The Monkees became super close. And I think, to a degree, you can make the same parallel with the actors who started on Friends. When you shoot to the top almost overnight, it’s crazy. You find yourself doing media, your face plastered all over the place. The only people who can really understand what you’re going through are the other people who are going through it at the same time. That’s what made the original trio so close. All of a sudden, you’ve got Cheryl Ladd coming in and she has to find a way in to that and build a rapport almost immediately while replacing this very public, popular star.”

Meanwhile, in Her Personal Life…

Like her costars, upon completing her run on Charlie’s Angels, Cheryl appeared in a great many TV movies and miniseries. Additionally, she starred in the 1994-1996 series One West Waikiki and in 29 episodes of the 2003-2008 TV series Las Vegas. Between 1978 and 1982, she also enjoyed a successful recording career. She was married to actor David Ladd from 1973 to 1980, giving birth to their daughter, Jordan, in 1975; and has been married to music producer Brian Russell since 1981.

Shelley Hack (Tiffany Welles)

How appropriate that the leading model for Revlon’s Charlie perfume should become a cast member of Charlie’s Angels? Well, that’s exactly what happened with model, actress, producer and political and media adviser Shelley Hack. Born July 6, 1947, in Greenwich, Connecticut, she began modeling in the 1970s and was considered to be one of the few supermodels out there. Outside of modeling, she appeared in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall (1977) and If Ever I See You Again (1978) , and in an episode of the TV series Married: The First Year. Like Cheryl Ladd before her, Charlie’s Angels represented a whole new kind of life in the spotlight.

Rotating Angels?

“When Farrah left and then Kate left, Aaron Spelling and whoever the publicity machine was at ABC put it out as, ‘We always envisioned different Angels every year,’” says a skeptical Herbie. “Yeah, sure. So they turned it into something wonderful that they were planning on doing. Bringing Shelley in, she did a lot of commercials and was dynamite at that, but she wasn’t a strong actress. It was very clear early on that she wasn’t a good actress. Something about having black-haired Sabrina, blonde-haired Jill and brown-haired Kelly, they were different. There was a certain look and together it was a nice look. After Farrah left, at least Cheryl Ladd was the blonde replacement, but that still left the dichotomy, the right vision of the having the right look. Having two blondes, as silly as it sounds, threw things off visually. There were a lot of things that didn’t work with Shelley Hack; sweet person, beautiful woman, just not a good fit for Charlie’s Angels. There was nothing exciting about her performance.”

Not a Good Entrance

Adds Mike, “They brought her character in horribly. She had very little to do in the beginning and was more like a wallflower. Later on in the series when the writers did get their footing with her and the character, who was from the East Coast, and it just never clicked. That’s not any fault of hers. And as far as Shelley was concerned, I don’t think she realized how huge she was going to become two seconds after becoming an Angel. Cheryl had also said that prior to becoming an Angel nobody was interested in what she ate, and the next day everyone was interested. Overnight Shelley was on every magazine cover. She had been modeling for 15 years at that point, but Charlie’s Angels pushed her into a different space. Into a rock star space.”

A Missing Comaraderie

“One of the reasons that I don’t think fourth season was as successful as the previous ones,” Jack muses, “is that by then Jaclyn and Cheryl wanted more time to do other projects, so they started writing scripts where each episode would focus on one angel and the other two would kind of pop in at the beginning of the episode and the rest of it would be focused on one Angel only. And because they did that in the Shelley Hack season, the show lost the camaraderie of the three girls and it’s why, perhaps, she didn’t warm up to the audience as the previous actresses had. The other problem is that they did a two-hour season premiere set in the Caribbean, but it focused on Cheryl and not Shelley. Shelley was a backdrop, so the audience couldn’t warm up to her, in my opinion. They introduced her, but the rest of the two hours were spent trying to find some stolen treasure or something. But it was mostly Cheryl Ladd doing her thing and Shelley was just at the beach.”

The Critics Were Harsh

As Ed points out, Shelley Hack hadn’t done a lot of acting, but she was a very successful model. “And,” he says, “if you’re a model doing photo shoots, you’re taking direction and are trying to convey some sort of image, depending on what you’re selling. That’s a different type of acting, but it’s not the same as doing dialogue and being the star of a network TV series where you’ve got to do 26 shows a year. So I think she was really a fish out of water. And the critics were very hard on her. She was easy on the eyes, but they were not kind to her. But, in fairness, the show was in its fourth season. You know, the concept’s getting old and you’re doing different things to kind of goose up the ratings, so they went a different way. When you look back at it now, you kind of feel bad for her. It was not a good fit. I think she got blamed for the ratings dropping, which isn’t fair.”

The Need to Promote

“The other thing,” Jack emphasizes, “is that in the case of Cheryl Ladd, she always said, ‘I was a seven-year overnight success,’ meaning she really wanted to be a star. And when she joined Charlie’s Angels, she went on Mike Douglas and Merv Griffin and The Donny & Marie Show, a Ben Vereen special and The Tonight Show. She was funny in real life and people could relate to her. Shelley Hack I think did The Merv Griffin Show, but she didn’t do a lot of interviews, so I don’t think the audience knew who she was, if that makes sense, and I don’t think they could relate to her. And as Cheryl told me, Shelley was so consumed with trying to find the thread of the character that she didn’t really get what the show was about. I think Shelley maybe took it too seriously. They also didn’t write the character properly and didn’t give her enough to do early on.”

Life Post-‘Charlie’s Angels’

Following Charlie’s Angels, Shelley appeared in a number of features, including Martin Scorsese’s The King of Comedy, her last one being House Arrest (1996). Her last TV acting credit was in a 2007 episode of Dick Van Dyke’s Diagnosis Murder. She performed on stage several times and narrated a couple of audio books. In recent years, she’s produced a number of TV movies for the Hallmark Channel, most recently 2018’s Falling for You. She married director Harry Winer in 1990, and they have a daughter named Devon Rose.

Tanya Roberts (Julie Rogers)

The final actress to join Charlie’s Angels for its fifth and last season was Tanya Roberts. She was born Victoria Leigh Blum on October 15, 1955, in the Bronx, New York. In her late teens she found work as a fashion and cover model in New York City. She managed to score some TV ads and also stage work in the dramatic Off-Broadway productions of Picnic and Antigone. She worked as an Arthur Murray dance instructor and made her big screen debut in 1979’s Forced Entry, a horror film. In her personal life, she met psychology student Barry Roberts on a movie theatre line and, afterwards, proposed to him in a subway station. They were wed in 1974 and remained married until his death in 2006.

In 1980, she was chosen to replace Shelley Hack on Charlie’s Angels. “Tanya was a little bit like Cheryl Ladd,” suggests Jack, “in the sense that she was willing to do anything and everything to promote the show. Not that she wanted to be a huge draw, but she was so happy to be working and get a gig. She was willing to do publicity and did great bikini shots.”

Going Out in Style

“Charlie’s hottest angel,” smiles Herbie. “She was the streetwise one. She was a criminal, so they were looking for something very, very different for that to really mix things up in that fifth season and they came up with Tanya Roberts.”

Adds Jack, “Tanya really tried hard and I think the fans liked her, because she was beautiful and had stunning eyes. They also kind of went back to a little bit more of that camaraderie that was missing in the fourth season.”

The Bikini Factor

Relays Mike, “When Tanya walked on the set, Jaclyn and Cheryl both said, ‘She can wear the bikinis; we don’t want to wear them anymore. Her body puts ours to shame.’ She brought a whole different feel to the show. They brought her in as a model/kind of detective. She brought her fun Bronx to the show and was a breath of fresh air.”

“The show’s always been known for women running around in bikinis, but that didn’t happen until the fifth season when they were trying to keep the ratings going,” Jack details. “Unfortunately, it didn’t help, but nobody blamed Tanya. The show was still in the Top 30 with Shelley, but by the time Tanya came in it was the bottom five. But nobody blamed her, because they put the show on opposite Archie Bunker’s Place on Sunday nights, which is the kiss of death for television.”

The End of the Line

“This is going to be a terrible thing to say,” Ed closes, “but the only thing I remember about Tanya Roberts is that they did a number of shows in Hawaii where they had her in a bikini. It was kind of sad, because it was obvious they’d given up trying to tell good stories as often as they could. And the fact that all three of them wore bikinis again and again that season, that’s the only thing you remember about that particular year. I will say they tried to make her street smart and added some humor to that character, but the bloom was off the rose and it was not long from there. In that fifth year they put it on Sunday nights after being on Wednesdays for four years. Then it went from Sunday nights to Saturday nights. When that happens, you’re getting ready to say goodbye.”

From ‘Beastmaster’ to 007

Over the years, Tanya appeared on a number of different TV shows, enjoying a recurring role on That ’70s Show as Midge Pinciotti. On the big screen, she had prominent roles in such 1980s films as The Beastmaster, Sheena and Roger Moore’s final James Bond film, A View to a Kill.

Final Thoughts

As noted at the outset, the concept of Charlie’s Angels lives on, some incarnations more successful than others. But no matter what Hollywood comes up with, it’s unlikely that people will forget the original show that largely introduced audiences to Kate Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith, Cheryl Ladd, Shelley Hack and Tanya Roberts.

Ladies, one and all, we thank you.