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Eb's girlfriend on Green Acres became one of the most prolific soap opera villains of the Eighties
Before she played scheming and glamorous women on daytime TV, Judith McConnell started her career as almost the exact opposite – a country girl in Hooterville.
Many household names began their careers on television. Action movie stars Clint Eastwood and Steve McQueen had their own small-screen Westerns, Rawhide and Wanted Dead or Alive, respectively. Actors like Jodie Foster and Kurt Russell started in Hollywood as child stars appearing in everything from Gunsmoke to Gilligan’s Island to many Disney TV movies.
While there is a clear line from Western shows to action movies, one classic TV performer made a total 180-degree switch in her career. She went from playing a country sweetheart to portraying many different villains soap opera fans loved to hate.
Judith McConnell was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and attended Carnegie Mellon University. At 21, she won the Miss Pennsylvania pageant, in part because of her talent performing a monologue from a play about Joan of Arc.
Two years later she received her first TV roles, appearing in the legal drama Judd for the Defense and playing an Enterprise crewmember in the Star Trek episode “Wolf in the Fold.”
Her first recurring role was in four episodes of The Beverly Hillbillies as an assistant at Mr. Drysdale’s bank. The next year, she got her biggest part to date on another one of producer Paul Henning’s shows, Green Acres.
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McConnell appeared in Hooterville as farmhand Eb Dawson’s girlfriend, Darlene, for the wacky sitcom’s final season. She was a friendly country girl who had a soft spot for goofy Eb and enjoyed the simpler things in life. A world apart from her role as Valerie Conway in As the World Turns or Miranda Bishop in Another World. She also appeared in General Hospital and One Life to Live.
McConnell clearly had years of soap opera experience before her most famous role as the scheming Sophia in over a thousand episodes of Santa Barbara. She told the Mason Valley News in 1985, “Sophia is a dynamic lady who is emerging as one of the core characters in Santa Barbara. I see her as a woman with charm and yet with a chilling determination to get things done.”
One storyline even required McConnell to don a body suit and beard to play Sophia’s disguised alter ego, Dominic.
Another Santa Barbara star, A Martinez, started his career on classic TV in shows like Adam-12 and Bonanza. The soap opera also featured Robin Wright before her breakout role in The Princess Bride.
Do you remember Judith McConnell’s time on Green Acres? Or do you only know her as Sophia Capwell?
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169 Comments
There must be an internet glitch.
There are supposed to be 170 comments and I can't receive any of
Comments.
Why does it say be the first to make a.comment when there are already
170 comments.
Butch Vanished from Happy Days without a trace
and Chachi Arcola (Scott Baio) arrives s few months later.
Pretty much says it all right there.
Danny Butch was no different than any of the other minor (recurring or not) characters on the series. They were created as a character and introduced to the storyline for a specified amount of episodes. There was no 𝙫𝙖𝙣𝙞𝙨𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜, 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙡𝙖𝙣𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙤𝙧 𝙢𝙮𝙨𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙮 involved with any character on any TV series. Actors come and go. So his video is opinion not factual.
the producers and writers
had made Spike had made
Spike a series regular like
Chachi Arcola (Scott Baio)
Al Delvecchio (Al Molinaro)
Lori Beth Allen Cunningham (Lynda Good friend) Roger Phillips (Ted McGinley) or Jenny Piccalo (Cathy Silvers).
If Spike and Chachi had been on Happy Days AT THE SAME TIME it would have been Double Trouble
For Arthur Fonzarelli AKA Fonzie (Henry Winkler)
Because Spike &Chachi
always had problems or got
In trouble and Spike and Chachi always needed Fonzie to bail them out of
trouble.
words had made Spike two
Times but I will correct my
Mistake later today.
Cable or satellite networks
show reruns of ALICE?
Remember this Funny
Song from the 1961 movie
Called West Side Story about Tony , Maria and the
Sharks and the Jets
Name of the funny song
From West Side Story.
https://www.metv.com/stories/this-happy-days-jock-became-captain-america-in-the-seventies
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As you wait someone to write songs about the other Happy Days Characters you mentioned, or the "𝗨𝗻𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗿𝗲𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗛𝗮𝗽𝗽𝘆 𝗗𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗠𝗲𝗧𝗩." You may get a "little" more interest in comments or answers to your questions pertaining to Happy Days.
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Most just scroll past posts"𝘂𝗻𝗿𝗲𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱" to Stories and Quizzes. Notice in most rooms that the flow of conversations or most comments are those that pertain to the topic.
Vanished Into Thin Air!!
TV LAND had a Happy Days
Commercial About CC:
"How many actors played
Chuck Cunningham before he disappeared?"
Shawn Butler and sung by
Federico Carayatti .
A wonderful song about
Chuck Cunningham.
I'm waiting for someone to write songs about These
Happy Days Characters:
Bag Zombroski Moose
Roger Phillips Eugene Belvin Melvin Belvin and
Spike. I love the song Do
The Fonzie which Leather sang on the Stolen Melodies episode of Happy
Days . I wish that someone
Would write songs about
Mary Ann Summers of
Gilligan's Island Cpl Chuck of Gomer Pyle USMC and
a song about Professor Roy
Hinkley.A song called "And
The Rest " would be a good
song about Professor Roy
Hinkley and Mary Ann Summers.
I wish that someone would
write a song about Cpl Chuck Boyle (Roy Stuart)
And "And The Rest " Mary
Ann Summers Dawn Wells and Professor Roy Hinkley
Russell Johnson.
Chuck Cunningham 1 Forever
Randolph Roberts
Chuck Cunningham 2
Forever
Ric Carrot
Chuck Cunningham on
Love American Style episode called Love And The Happy Days.
His TV Credits
Chuck Cunningham Forever
Rest In Peace Chuck Gavan!
Minus Newt Kiley and
Roy Trendall.
Pee Wee Herman and the
song Tequila by The Champs.
Movie called KID MILLIONS
Singing Okay Toots.
Kid Millions was filmed in
1934. Pee Wee Herman (Paul Reubens) has been
compared to both movie actors Eddie Cantor and
Joe Penner.
