50 Fun Facts About Knots Landing

Which Dallas character is the daughter of Gary and Valene Ewing, yet never moved to Knots Landing with them?

Lucy was expected to join her parents on the cul-de-sac, but the network kept actress Charlene Tilton on the parent show to keep the two series separate. She made a single guest visit in the first season.

Which future film star played Joshua Rush, Valene's half-brother who becomes a televangelist on Knots Landing?

Alec Baldwin played Joshua from 1984 to 1985, years before his film fame. The character turns violent toward his wife and dies in a fall from a rooftop.

Which future Best Actress Oscar winner played television producer Debbie Porter in season 13 of Knots Landing?

Halle Berry's Debbie has a brief romance with widowed lawyer Frank Williams before he leaves town. Her Academy Award, for Monster's Ball, came about a decade later.

Dallas undid Bobby Ewing's death by revealing a whole season as what, a twist Knots Landing never acknowledged?

A dream explained everything away on the parent show, but Valene had already named her baby son after the late Bobby, so the spin-off simply never mentioned him again.

Marc Cherry described which hit series as a cross between Knots Landing, American Beauty and Twin Peaks?

Desperate Housewives is not the only descendant of the show: Phil Redmond said his Liverpool cul-de-sac soap Brookside was partly influenced by it too.

On which night of the week did Knots Landing air for nearly its entire run, usually at 10 p.m.?

Thursday at 10 p.m. was its home for almost all 14 seasons, with only brief moves to an hour earlier to make room for other dramas.

Which 1960s pop singer joined Knots Landing in 1987 as Anne Matheson, the scheming mother of Paige?

Michelle Phillips of the Mamas & the Papas was still in the cast for the 1993 finale, though a planned affair between Anne and Mack was scrapped after Karen's actress objected.

Which future teen idol played Abby Cunningham's young son on Knots Landing for three seasons in the late 1980s?

Brian Austin Green left in 1989, just before Beverly Hills, 90210 made him famous, and came back for the 1997 reunion miniseries.

Which singer-actress played both murdered rock singer Ciji Dunne and her look-alike Cathy Geary on Knots Landing?

Lisa Hartman returned a season after Ciji's murder as Cathy, a double hired by Abby to keep Gary too distracted to notice her crooked business deals.

Which Dallas villain, the older brother of Gary, drove Valene out of Texas years before Knots Landing began?

J. R. Ewing also handed Gary business deals designed to fail, and he turned up in five Knots Landing episodes to make trouble on the cul-de-sac.

Which actress played Paige Matheson, who arrives on Knots Landing claiming to be Mack MacKenzie's long-lost daughter?

Nicollette Sheridan joined in 1986 and stayed to the end, with Paige surviving a faked death, a shooting and a long on-off romance with Greg Sumner.

Which actress played scheming Abby Cunningham, who returns in the Knots Landing finale to buy back her old house?

Donna Mills won three Soap Opera Digest awards as a villainess, yet she talked the writers out of having Abby kidnap Valene's babies on purpose, fearing viewers would never forgive her.

Which star of Knots Landing was the only performer in all 344 episodes, playing Karen Fairgate MacKenzie?

Michele Lee was the one regular who still appeared every week in the cost-cutting final season, when only 19 episodes were made.

Which actress first played Valene Ewing on Dallas, then led Knots Landing for thirteen of its fourteen seasons?

Joan Van Ark left in 1992 but came back for the last two episodes, in which the supposedly dead Valene turns up alive.

Which actor took over as Gary Ewing when David Ackroyd, who first played him on Dallas, could not join Knots Landing?

Ted Shackelford went on to play Gary for all 14 seasons, and he and his screen wife pitched the love triangle of Gary, Valene and Abby to the producers themselves.

Which actor joined Knots Landing in 1982 as Mack MacKenzie, the crusading lawyer who marries the widowed Karen?

Kevin Dobson was already familiar as Detective Bobby Crocker, the protege of Telly Savalas on Kojak, and he stayed with the soap until it ended in 1993.

Which actor spent ten years on Knots Landing as Greg Sumner, the ambitious politician turned corporate titan?

William Devane rewrote most of his own dialogue as Greg, to the point where a co-star said most people on the set were probably frightened of him.

Which Broadway legend, winner of five Tony Awards, played Valene's mother Lilimae Clements on Knots Landing?

Julie Harris had known her screen daughter for decades: she once advised her, then a 15-year-old student reporter, to apply to drama school at Yale.

Which Oscar-nominated co-star of Marilyn Monroe played Sid Fairgate in the first two seasons of Knots Landing?

Don Murray earned his nomination for Bus Stop in 1956. Sid was written out when the brakes of his car were sabotaged and it plunged off a cliff.

Which writer created both Dallas and Knots Landing, having pitched the cul-de-sac drama to the network first?

David Jacobs saw his suburban idea turned down in 1977 as not saga-like enough, so he wrote Dallas instead, then reworked the earlier pitch as its spin-off.

Which lifelong struggle of Gary Ewing resurfaces in the first-season finale of Knots Landing, endangering his marriage?

Alcoholism had driven Gary from his family in Texas years earlier, and the relapse brings fresh trouble, including an affair with the wife of a friend from his recovery group.

Sid Fairgate, first husband of Karen on Knots Landing, owned what kind of business, where Gary took a sales job?

A car dealership it was: Knots Landing Motors sold Fords and Mercurys, and after Sid's death Karen took over as its head and promptly fired Abby.

Valene Ewing of Knots Landing publishes which novel, a thinly veiled exposé of her oil-rich in-laws from Dallas?

Capricorn Crude makes Valene a published author just as her marriage collapses, and Abby mails chapters of it to one of Gary's brothers in Texas to stir up trouble.

Who is revealed on Knots Landing as the killer of singer Ciji Dunne, after Gary Ewing is jailed for the crime?

Chip Roberts, the publicist who had got Ciji pregnant, was really a fugitive named Tony Fenice. He dies falling onto a pitchfork after glimpsing her double.

Told her twins were stillborn, Valene flees Knots Landing for which state, working as a waitress under another name?

Tennessee is where Valene lives as Verna Ellers, a character from one of her own books, and she even gets engaged there before Gary tracks her down.

Which lover of Gary Ewing forces Valene at gunpoint to swallow sleeping pills in a Knots Landing season finale?

Jill Bennett later tries to frame Gary by tying herself up in the trunk of his car, a scheme that goes fatally wrong when she dies inside it.

Abby leaves Knots Landing in 1989 to take a trade envoy post in which country, a job Greg Sumner wanted?

Japan kept Abby off screen for four years, and when she returns in the finale Greg halts her takeover bid by threatening to expose her dealings there.

Laura Avery Sumner leaves Knots Landing to die alone of which illness, after network cost cuts ended the role?

A brain tumor took Laura off screen in 1987, leaving Greg with a baby daughter, Meg, whom the grieving father asks Karen and Mack to adopt.

Knots Landing newcomers Frank and Pat Williams are hiding which secret, revealed after Karen and Mack grow suspicious?

Witness protection had given the family a new surname, and Mack later uses a dead family's dental records to convince an extortionist that they have died.

Gary Ewing fled which Texas ranch, the family home on Dallas, years before settling in Knots Landing?

Southfork was left behind for good after Gary and Valene's second wedding, when his mother bought the couple a newly built house in California as a wedding present.

Knots Landing is set in a fictitious coastal suburb of which city, where four couples share a cul-de-sac?

Los Angeles is real enough, but the houses used on screen stand about 20 miles from the coast, and the early title sequences were edited to make the street look closer to the beach.

What is the name of the Knots Landing cul-de-sac where the Ewings, Fairgates, Averys and Wards are neighbours?

Seaview Circle was really a suburban street called Crystalaire Place, and the cast went back to it in 1997 to film the reunion miniseries.

On Knots Landing, the stress of daughter Diana marrying a fugitive leads Karen into an addiction to what?

Painkillers on prescription take hold of Karen in the fifth season, and only once she has recovered do she and Diana reconcile.

Which production company made Knots Landing, Dallas and Falcon Crest, giving it three top-ten shows in 1984–85?

Lorimar owed part of that peak to the stolen-twins storyline, which lifted Knots Landing into the annual top ten for the only time in its run.

Which Hollywood legend, once married to Frank Sinatra, guest-starred on Knots Landing as Ruth, mother of Greg Sumner?

Ava Gardner arrives after the death of Greg's father, and her Ruth warms to Abby, a fellow schemer, while loathing his girlfriend Laura.

Which future Melrose Place star played Victoria Broyard, who warns Paige about her boyfriend Pierce on Knots Landing?

Marcia Cross's Victoria tells Paige that Pierce killed a previous girlfriend. Paige refuses to believe it, and he later shoots and kidnaps her.

Alan Ball said Knots Landing inspired which HBO drama of his, set in a very different family business?

Six Feet Under was, in Ball's own phrase, Knots Landing set in a funeral home, trading the cul-de-sac for a family of undertakers.

Three leading ladies of Knots Landing reunited in 2025 to launch which project, titled We're Knot Done Yet?

A podcast it is: the women who played Karen, Valene and Abby rewatch the show together and trade behind-the-scenes stories from four decades of friendship.

Abby and Karen inherit land at which California spot on Knots Landing, where Abby secretly plans a resort?

Lotus Point becomes a resort run by Abby, Karen and Gary. Years later Abby finds oil beneath it, tries to cheat her partners out of it and ends up giving the land away as a public park.

Greg Sumner resigns from which elected office on Knots Landing, wrongly expecting to inherit a tycoon's land?

US senator was a post Greg won with endorsements from Mack, Karen and Abby. The tycoon, Paul Galveston, proves to be his father, yet leaves the land to Gary.

Crystalaire Place, the real street used as the Knots Landing cul-de-sac, is in which inland neighbourhood?

Granada Hills sits well inland, so the sweeping coastal shots seen in the credits from 1981 to 1987 were filmed elsewhere, at Palos Verdes Estates.

Which 1973 Ingmar Bergman television drama helped inspire Knots Landing, alongside the 1957 film No Down Payment?

Scenes from a Marriage dissects a single couple as they come apart, and the soap spread the same scrutiny across four couples living on one street.

From 1987, the Knots Landing opening titles panned slowly across an abstract painting in the style of which artist?

Jackson Pollock's splattered canvases were the model for designer Sandy Dvore, whose titles first showed the cast in black-and-white oval cameos.

Gary Ewing is left bankrupt on Knots Landing after investing in a scheme to generate electricity from what?

Ocean tides were the promise of Tidal Energy, the venture of Joseph Barringer, and its failure sends Gary back to live with Valene on the cul-de-sac.

Which sinister organisation does Mack investigate on Knots Landing, leading to an assassin's bullet hitting Karen?

Wolfbridge Group leader Mark St. Clare wanted Gary dead, but his gunman shot Karen by mistake. St. Clare is later killed by Greg Sumner while holding Abby hostage on a boat.

Gary Ewing blows up which Knots Landing development after finding a secret espionage base being built beneath it?

Empire Valley came to Gary in the will of the millionaire Paul Galveston, whose own company and its partners were secretly building the underground operation.

Which British star of Cabaret and Logan's Run played Charles Scott, an old flame Abby briefly marries on Knots Landing?

Michael York's Charles had designs on a marina development, and once Abby uncovered his motives she annulled the marriage and kept millions of his dollars.

Which composer wrote the theme music for both Dallas and Knots Landing, the latter lasting all 14 seasons?

Jerrold Immel got his break in television scoring on Gunsmoke, and the cues he co-wrote for the Knots Landing pilot were still being heard in the final season.

Which Canadian actor, later Captain Pike in Star Trek, played Paige's murderous boyfriend Pierce on Knots Landing?

Bruce Greenwood's Pierce shoots Paige while aiming at Greg, then holds her hostage on his yacht until Mack and Greg come to the rescue.

On Knots Landing, Abby hides the body of Peter Hollister under what at her resort, believing her daughter killed him?

A cement foundation was poured over the grave the next day, but weeks later Karen reports a crack in it and the whole slab has to be pulled up and redone.