The REAL problem with Jenna

[CryptCreeper72]

We joke a lot about Jenna on this forum (particularly about Priscilla's acting skills), but the real problem with Jenna is that she was never really a character - she was always just a plot device. Jenna existed solely to cause problems between Pam and Bobby. Once Pam was gone, Jenna really needed to go to because her entire reason for existing was gone.

Jenna never had a storyline independent from Bobby. Even her relationship with Ray revolved around Bobby's reaction.

Jenna was a one dimensional character with a single purpose.

 

[Spooky Owl!]

"Bubby........ Bubby..........Bubby..............Bubby...!"

 

[Monzo]

I recently saw Francine Tacker as Jenna in my Dallas rewatch, and I thought to myself: If she had been the permanent recast of Jenna, I probably wouldn't have been impressed. She was okay, but nothing more. I don't think even Morgan Fairchild would have kept Jenna on the show long-term, and she probably would have met a similar ending to Kristin's, given the show's reluctance to retain supporting characters in the early seasons.

 

[CryptCreeper72]

Jenna always felt "wedged in" to me.

Okay, so she was Bobby's first love. If they had brought her in AND if they had made Charly is daughter and IF she had a few storylines that were independent of Bobby and/or Pam, MAYBE the character could have worked.

 

[Matthew Blaisdel]

Jenna always felt "wedged in" to me.

But - at that time - still in a good kind of way. The character of Jenna had already been established fairly early in the shows run.
Jamie on the other hand - also "wedged in" - but in a bad kind of way. It felt completly like they just HAD to come up with some new character to keep the show going.

 

[CryptCreeper72]

But - at that time - still in a good kind of way. The character of Jenna had already been established fairly early in the shows run.
Jamie on the other hand - also "wedged in" - but in a bad kind of way. It felt completly like they just HAD to come up with some new character to keep the show going.

Agree about Jamie. Think the same thing applies to April.

I guess the difference for me is that at least Jamie and April had more than one purpose, more than one relationship. Jenna was 100 percent all about Bobby.

 

[Spooky Owl!]

I recently saw Francine Tacker as Jenna in my Dallas rewatch, and I thought to myself: If she had been the permanent recast of Jenna, I probably wouldn't have been impressed. She was okay, but nothing more. I don't think even Morgan Fairchild would have kept Jenna on the show long-term, and she probably would have met a similar ending to Kristin's, given the show's reluctance to retain supporting characters in the early seasons.

That's interesting. I thought Tacker, on the face of it, was the best actress of the three. But she wasn't, frankly, glamorous enough for what the role required.

 

[Guzzler’s Frightening Hair]

would a mere ‘wedge character’ come between two brothers like this?!

(wait, what’s a wedge character?)

 

[Monzo]

I thought Tacker, on the face of it, was the best actress of the three. But she wasn't, frankly, glamorous enough for what the role required.

Maybe my lack of love for Francine Tacker is because I think Jenna's return was too plot-driven back then. She happens to meet Bobby at the airport when Pam travels to Paris, and she'd interacted with Pam lately because she was now a fashion journalist (with what credentials?). And Charlie was in Rome because she suddenly got along so well with Naldo?!? It all seemed too contrived for me.

This is completely off-topic, but something that's been on my mind for a while: Pam flew to Paris with Mel Ferrer's character, and this minor character could have been played by any actor. It didn't need someone who was once a star, so I wonder what kind of star Mel Ferrer was at that point that he accepted such a small guest role in Dallas, which wasn't yet the hit it would be a season later?

But back to Jenna: For me, her character was ruined in the dream season when she mourned Bobby for too long. Sure, it was all just a dream, but we had to watch it, and after that, I had enough of her, regardless of whether she got pregnant or got together with Ray.

 

[Jock Ewing Fan]

Pam

 

[Spooky Owl!]

This is completely off-topic, but something that's been on my mind for a while: Pam flew to Paris with Mel Ferrer's character, and this minor character could have been played by any actor. It didn't need someone who was once a star, so I wonder what kind of star Mel Ferrer was at that point that he accepted such a small guest role in Dallas, which wasn't yet the hit it would be a season later?

Mel Ferrer was, technically, a movie star back in the day. But he wasn't a major-major star. So, by the '70s, although he was still trying to make "classy" projects, he was also doing episodic guest star appearances on the era's cop shows. So doing a small role as a mover-and-shaker on DALLAS, which was in the Top 10 even before 'WSJR?' happened, wouldn't have been outta line... People gotta work.

I mean, it's not like Brando & Streisand making a series of cameos on LOVE BOAT as a quarreling -- yet deeply in love -- married couple (which I think they only did twice).

Ferrer may be best remembered today as one of Audrey Hepburn's husbands.

But back to Jenna: For me, her character was ruined in the dream season when she mourned Bobby for too long. Sure, it was all just a dream, but we had to watch it, and after that, I had enough of her, regardless of whether she got pregnant or got together with Ray.

Yes, Victoria learned to hit that high-C after 1982, climaxing with her guttural-yet-tearless sob by Bobby's deathbed three years later.

In contrast, Presley never got above the contralto range of dulcet gasps -- so how the hell was she going to pull off a tormented emotional breakdown in the middle of the Southfork living room on her knees?? (Even in Pam's dream, she was making merciless fun of Jenna, and Jenna's bottomless "pain").

But, yeah, it didn't help the character of Jenna. With Jenna, less was more -- deliberately or otherwise.



"Oh, honey, You just try and look real purty and you'll do just fine...."

 

[Barbara Fan]

I didn't mind Priscilla Presley as Jenna and liked her relationship with Bobby in the 1st 2 years she was in the show but dream season Jenna was very needy and her acting was very iffy at times.

I think it would have been interesting if Morgan Fairchild had continued in the role as she would have been a different Jenna, Bitchy, catty and would have fought for him and got into a cat fight if required.

Francine Tacker was just plain forgettable, bland, boring, insipid, and used to think no way would Bobby have fallen for her as she wasnt even that pretty and had long lank hair! She was instantly forgettable

 

[Spooky Owl!]

I didn't mind Priscilla Presley as Jenna and liked her relationship with Bobby in the 1st 2 years she was in the show but dream season Jenna was very needy and her acting was very iffy at times.

I think it would have been interesting if Morgan Fairchild had continued in the role as she would have been a different Jenna, Bitchy, catty and would have fought for him and got into a cat fight if required.

Francine Tacker was just plain forgettable, bland, boring, insipid, and used to think no way would Bobby have fallen for her as she wasnt even that pretty and had long lank hair! She was instantly forgettable

I'm not sure Francine Tacker was more insipid than Presley. Tacker's Jenna was the only one of the three who could bitch at Pam and you believed Jenna might survive it.

Tacker was too normal-looking though to be Jenna.

Although I'd like Faichild to have done Tacker's two episodes as Jenna, Fairchild's Jenna was too catty and predatory for the later, smugger version of Bobby who existed once Priscilla came around. By then, he wouldn't have been paired with a more threatening Jenna.

 

[CryptCreeper72]

would a mere ‘wedge character’ come between two brothers like this?!

(wait, what’s a wedge character?)

That while fight was NOT believable. Ray didn't love her enough and Bobby didn't love her at all by that point.

 

[Guzzler’s Frightening Hair]

That while fight was NOT believable. Ray didn't love her enough and Bobby didn't love her at all by that point.

the only thing that makes sense is that they were really fighting over something they loved more than anything - more than Jenna, Charlie, Pam, Jock… Emeralds! Few knew, but Ray loved emeralds almost as much as Bobby did.

 

[Chris2]

I didn’t think anything of the three had much chemistry with Bobby. I didn’t believe any of them were Bobby’s childhood sweetheart.

 

[Spooky Owl!]

I didn’t think anything of the three had much chemistry with Bobby. I didn’t believe any of them were Bobby’s childhood sweetheart.

I think I agree with you.

But Priscilla seemed the most comfortable because she was the least conniving.... or maybe she was actually better at it! (Until Bobby dumped her for that Barnes woman).

 

[Guzzler’s Frightening Hair]

I think I agree with you.

But Priscilla seemed the most comfortable because she was the least conniving.... or maybe she was actually better at it! (Until Bobby dumped her for that Barnes woman).

I could kind of buy Morgan’s Jenna as someone just a few years removed from losing her parents (didn’t sound like her mother was still around) and finding out she was not wealthy, and in fact broke - a single mother with a deadbeat con man as an ex-husband and her dependable childhood sweetheart married to someone else.

It makes sense that someone in that position would turn to a Maynard Anderson “rich daddy” type and then her ex Bobby as a way to regain that lost life that was all she’d known until sometime in her 20s. She’d been manipulated and conned by Naldo, so that kind of behavior was fresh in her mind, and going after married men may have seemed like a more realistic goal than the typical “eligible bachelor” given that she was broke and had a child (but still looked like Morgan Fairchild). Hm, where was Mark Graison at this point?

Or, anyway, I could buy the way she was written in that episode more than the super put-together Tacker Jenna from just a year later.

 

[Soaplover]

To me, I think the 1986 to 1987 season was when there was potential to keep Jenna on as a recurring character due to her pregnancy with Bobby's baby and there was no need to have paired her with Ray. Pairing her with Ray was the kiss of death for her character.

Had she been unattached when Pam had her accident and vanished suddenly, I could have seen Bobby turning to Jenna for comfort because of the fact that she was still the one constant in his life outside of his family. And it would have given her daughter Charley more of a motivation to be rebellious because she would be seeing her mother getting her hopes up for Bobby knowing that he would probably break her heart like he always did.

And perhaps Jenna could have still sent Charley off to boarding school because she was acting up, and deciding to move to live closer to her daughter and start a new life free of Bobby... but promising to keep in touch with him and have him be a part of his son's life.

That's how I would have handled Jenna's arc in the final season or two.

 

[Sea - Boo! - Er]

I still say the main problem was the writing. I found Presley surprisingly impressive during my recent rewatch when she first appears. She can play tough when required. But as time goes on she becomes more clingy.