Dallas Character J.R.'s daughter

[Rove]

Didn't Cidre say "We would not know the mother or would have never known of her had we watched the original." I think she wanted the mother to be nobody we saw on the original show and that the mother was probably dead now or away or something. I thought I read an article where she said that.

That's correct. Cynthia stated the mother was no one we knew (that is no connection to Lorimar Dallas) and she was long dead. Beggars the question how this long lost daughter was going to be explained on TNT Dallas. How did she become aware she was a Ewing? Was she informed of her parentage from a dying grandfather or grandmother? Perhaps this long lost daughter of JR was raised by an evil step-father and he blurted out during a heated argument she was a Ewing.

Of course we'll never know.

 

[Rove]

and the most important moment occurred in the scene when J.R. picks up the picture of her child

Just out of curiosity I popped the DVD in and watched this episode. You've nailed it regarding the possibility of JR being the father of that girl. The way Leanne reacts to JR inquiring about the child tells me there was a story.

Now if we had faith The House of Cidre had watched Lorimar Dallas in its entirety we could be confident a story could be developed just from this scene.

Side note; How I miss Sue Ellen's (porn music) theme.

 

[Justine]

Just out of curiosity I popped the DVD in and watched this episode. You've nailed it regarding the possibility of JR being the father of that girl. The way Leanne reacts to JR inquiring about the child tells me there was a story.

Now if we had faith The House of Cidre had watched Lorimar Dallas in its entirety we could be confident a story could be developed just from this scene.

Side note; How I miss Sue Ellen's (porn music) theme.

Thank you. Leanne reacted way too shifty in that scene.

 

[Rove]

Thank you. Leanne reacted way too shifty in that scene.

Agreed. Call Girl was written as though the writers could call upon this episode at a later time. JR picking up the photo of the little girl and enquiring about her wasn't really required when we think about how the story was unfolding. We learn the little girl is around 4 years of age and JR, tellingly, asks who the father is. Interesting how he immediately goes there which tells us they've had history. Later in the episode Leanne phones her mother and asks she has Sarah ready. So now we know the name of the daughter.

Whether the writers of TNT Dallas had watched this episode and thought we could use this little plot to introduce a long lost daughter of JR Ewing is another thing. My gut feeling informs me they wouldn't have since Cynthia had already announced the mother of this daughter was dead and not part of Lorimar Dallas.

More importantly this shows how crucial it is to watch a series in its entirety and know every little detail if you're going to be called upon to produce a continuation.

 

[Seaviewer]

the mother was no one we knew (that is no connection to Lorimar Dallas) and she was long dead.

I have to wonder what the point of that would even be. Either you tie it into an existing character or you create a new one. This would be like creating a new character and killing them off immediately. Cidre must have seen some benefit in the girl being an orphan but I suppose we'll never know what.

 

[TJames03]

Julie never would have kept the child secret. She would have done anything to break up JR and Sue Ellen. However, if she were waiting for the right time to tell JR and was killed before she could do it, that’s more plausible......

 

[Rove]

Either you tie it into an existing character

Thanks to Justine's eagle-eye any future story involving JR's daughter only needs to revisit Call Girl. The story background is already there and her name is Sarah. Whether the new showrunner would like to keep Leanne alive or not is their decision. Personally I'd like to keep her alive and seek out Veronica Hamel to reprise her role. Watching Sue Ellen and Leanne clash would be a delight.

 

[stevew]

For me Kristen thought she had a miscarriage. JR stole the baby and raised her as his own away from the family - sounds like HL Hunt in whom LH based JR. He named his girl Eleanor “Ellie” and left her one hell of a trust fund. Imagine that entitled girl and the things she’d know. On top of it she’d want family and who are her brothers? Both Christopher and John Ross. They’d all be blood relatives - Shepard mostly in Christopher’s case.

 

[Jabari Lamar]

For me Kristen thought she had a miscarriage. JR stole the baby and raised her as his own away from the family -

That actually does sound like something J.R. could have done. He cared enough about the idea of not wanting one his children to be born in prison to a convinct that he agreed to cover for Kristen and not press charges. So I imagine he'd also not want Kristen raising his child at all. So when he banished her to L.A. he had people following her, and when she was in the hospital about to give birth, he paid off the doctors and nurses to have then steal the baby right after birth and tell Kristen it was stillborn (back then, I think most women were still giving birth while under anesthetic, as opposed to "natural childbirth", so they could have pulled that off while Kristen was unconscious), and since he knew he couldn't explain a new child to his parents, he had the baby raised in secret.

Of course that would have knocked out the Christopher storyline, and how Bobby got him originally believing he was J.R.'s, but they could have still just had Bobby and Pam adopt a baby the normal way.

sounds like HL Hunt in whom LH based JR.

Well in Hunt's case, I think he just went ahead and married some other woman who didn't know whom he really was, and kept them all secret for awhile. If they hadn't written out the reuinion movies, they could have gone that route with J.R. Remember the 5 years he spent in Paris in between the series finale and J.R. Returns? Say during that time he met and fell in love with some French woman. Maybe it was just short and volatile (because J.R. was still mostly focused on his long-range plan to eventually return to Dallas and get Ewing Oil back), and they ended up divorcing just before J.R. returned to Dallas, and the ex-wife discovered soon after that she was pregnant, and gave birth to a daughter (which J.R. would occasionally fly back to visit, but never told his family back home). Timing it right, that daughter would have been just recently turned 18 at around the time Dallas Season 3 was ending, thus eligible to recieve whatever inheritence J.R. left for her (maybe some stock or land-rights now worth billions). And that's what made John Ross interested in tracking her down.

 

[Rove]

And that's what made John Ross interested in tracking her down.

I think I need a history lesson here. Remind me again how John Ross discovered he had a sister? I understand Bum was involved.

 

[Jabari Lamar]

I think I need a history lesson here. Remind me again how John Ross discovered he had a sister? I understand Bum was involved.

It was in some secret files that Harris had on J.R., which Emma stole from him and gave to John Ross. John Ross then passed the info on to Bum (who didn't know about it, and seemed shocked by whatever it was in that file) so that Bum could track her down for him.

I think I remember Cidre saying that they actually filmed a scene where John Ross goes to Morocco and finds this sister, and they show him introducing himself to her but all we see of her is her hand, as they shake hands, and that was to be the cliffhanger. But then they decided that Season 4 would jump ahead and 6 months, and they decided to cut that scene, so that John Ross wouldn't meet her until the next season starts.

 

[Rove]

It was in some secret files that Harris had on J.R.

How the hell would Harris know anything about J.R.'s past? J.R. was good at keeping secrets, that was his power...or something to that effect according to Pam. Maybe when Mitch Pileggi played an uncredited character in early Lorimar Dallas, Jenna (as played by Priscilla Presley) spilled some juicy secrets while delivering beers. Perhaps when Mitch returned and shared conversations with JR while both were locked up in the sanitarium it really was Harris impersonating someone else and he learned of JR's secret daughter while JR was high as a kite.

TNT Dallas was just plain stupid with its plots sometimes.

 

[Jabari Lamar]

How the hell would Harris know anything about J.R.'s past?

Presumably he hired some really good detectives to look into the Ewing's past for any dirt that he could use against them, when they began to feud (same way J.R. began digging into Harris' past, at Bobby's request). It's not that implausible.

 

[darkshadows38]

no it's not i don't think on how many women that JR slept with there are prolly 30 or 40 of them that he didn't know about at all. i've not seen the later years yet but it makes sense if JR is so good at finding the dirt and going really deep kinda like how he was able to find out about Cliff's ex GF who died going back to season 2 not that really needed a lot of digging anyways but still he found out. the question more so about JR's kids and or anything like that, it's more so Cliff's Daughter on did he forget that he had that disease i have no idea how to spell it?by the way it was written he was terrified his kids would have it. yet they give him a daughter the writers i mean, anyways i started to say that if JR can get dirt that deep with such ease than why can't anyone else who has the money do the same?

 

[Pamela_E]

Did they include the original ending on the DVD extras?

I watched the original episode before the ratings panic set in and they added in the explosion.

John Ross walks into a bar in Morroco and the female bartender, wearing loads of gold bangles, standing behind the bar shakes his hand. He tells her he needs her, Jr's daughter.

End of episode.

You don't see her face, so no idea how old she is meant to be.

 

[Kenny Coyote]

Did they include the original ending on the DVD extras?

I watched the original episode before the ratings panic set in and they added in the explosion.

John Ross walks into a bar in Morroco and the female bartender, wearing loads of gold bangles, standing behind the bar shakes his hand. He tells her he needs her, Jr's daughter.

End of episode.

You don't see her face, so no idea how old she is meant to be.

That's cool. How did you get to watch the original episode?

I don't know why CC wouldn't want to avail herself of the history of Dallas and use any of of these possibilities that have been suggested in this thread:

Leeanne Rees

Julie Grey

Serena

When you have that much history available to you, why wouldn't you use it?

Sienna Miller has a good look for the role. I dig the hippy vibe.

 

[stevew]

That actually does sound like something J.R. could have done. He cared enough about the idea of not wanting one his children to be born in prison to a convinct that he agreed to cover for Kristen and not press charges. So I imagine he'd also not want Kristen raising his child at all. So when he banished her to L.A. he had people following her, and when she was in the hospital about to give birth, he paid off the doctors and nurses to have then steal the baby right after birth and tell Kristen it was stillborn (back then, I think most women were still giving birth while under anesthetic, as opposed to "natural childbirth", so they could have pulled that off while Kristen was unconscious), and since he knew he couldn't explain a new child to his parents, he had the baby raised in secret.

Of course that would have knocked out the Christopher storyline, and how Bobby got him originally believing he was J.R.'s, but they could have still just had Bobby and Pam adopt a baby the normal way.



Well in Hunt's case, I think he just went ahead and married some other woman who didn't know whom he really was, and kept them all secret for awhile. If they hadn't written out the reuinion movies, they could have gone that route with J.R. Remember the 5 years he spent in Paris in between the series finale and J.R. Returns? Say during that time he met and fell in love with some French woman. Maybe it was just short and volatile (because J.R. was still mostly focused on his long-range plan to eventually return to Dallas and get Ewing Oil back), and they ended up divorcing just before J.R. returned to Dallas, and the ex-wife discovered soon after that she was pregnant, and gave birth to a daughter (which J.R. would occasionally fly back to visit, but never told his family back home). Timing it right, that daughter would have been just recently turned 18 at around the time Dallas Season 3 was ending, thus eligible to recieve whatever inheritence J.R. left for her (maybe some stock or land-rights now worth billions). And that's what made John Ross interested in tracking her down.

I don’t think it would knock out the Christoper story line. JR could have know that second baby was not his from the start and went along pretending it might be to put the screws to Bobby. If course it grieves out to be someone else’s and Bobby ends up having to deal with that mess. I do think it would have fit and through her we’d have three siblings in a weird JR messed up kinda way.

 

[Pamela_E]

That's cool. How did you get to watch the original episode?

I don't know why CC wouldn't want to avail herself of the history of Dallas and use any of of these possibilities that have been suggested in this thread:

Leeanne Rees

Julie Grey

Serena

When you have that much history available to you, why wouldn't you use it?

Sienna Miller has a good look for the role. I dig the hippy vibe.

It was on their marketing site we had access to. It was in all the assets that were embargoed at the time. It might be on a PC somewhere if I can find it.

I don't think they had fully fleshed out her backstory, so regardless of what CC said at the time it was all up in the air.

As they realised the original fan base had abandoned them and tried to get them back at the end when the show was cancelled, they may well have shifted their thinking if the show came back.

 

[Karin Schill]

Did they include the original ending on the DVD extras?

It's been a while since I watched the extras on the DVDs but from what I recall, no that scene were not among the extras.

I think the best extras were on season 2 since it included the Paley Center special with the cast.

I don't mind that they didn't include the JR's daughters scene among the extras. What I do mind however is that they didn't include the scene where JR/SE danced at the BBQ in season one and the Gary & Val scene from season two among the extras. They should have realized that those scenes were stuff that original fans of the show would have loved to watch so it makes no sense not to give us what we wanted.

 

[Pamela_E]

It's been a while since I watched the extras on the DVDs but from what I recall, no that scene were not among the extras.

I think the best extras were on season 2 since it included the Paley Center special with the cast.

I don't mind that they didn't include the JR's daughters scene among the extras. What I do mind however is that they didn't include the scene where JR/SE danced at the BBQ in season one and the Gary & Val scene from season two among the extras. They should have realized that those scenes were stuff that original fans of the show would have loved to watch so it makes no sense not to give us what we wanted.

I can't remember half of it now, seems so long ago. They got into a bit of a mess trying to appease fans of the original, create their own vision and attract a new audience. It started off ok but it felt like they lost faith in Jesse Metcalffe's version of Christopher so dropped the whole cousins at war aspect.

But there were moments of brilliance and a lot of padding.

I would like to have seen what they did with a long lost daughter.

It's a shame Warner were so short sighted and didn't allow a similar deal to new Dynasty, which is basically being kept alive by Netflix.

Perhaps one day we will see a reboot of Dallas. It wouldn't surprise me.