LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Jane Wyman: Falcon Crest
built 643 days ago
As the ex-wife of the newly-elected President Ronald Reagan, Wyman was being sought out by the media. Her publicity value did not escape Lorimar Productions's Earl Hamner and CBS. Seeking to capitalize on their success with Dallas and Knots Landing, Lorimar and CBS launched Falcon Crest in 1981 with Jane Wyman starring as a female version of Dallas's ruthless and manipulative J.R. Ewing. For nine seasons, she portrayed Angela Channing, the powerful matriarch of a wealthy, wine-making family. Wyman had made a successful return to series television, but in a role quite different from earlier work.
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Wyman's career enjoyed a resurgence when she was cast as the scheming Californian vintner and matriarch Angela Channing in the primetime soap opera Falcon Crest, which ran from 1981 to 1990. The series was created by Earl Hamner, who had created the hit series The Waltons a decade earlier. Ex-husband Ronald Reagan apparently encouraged Wyman to take the role, after actress Barbara Stanwyck had turned it down. In its first season, Falcon Crest was a ratings hit, behind Dallas but initially ahead of rival soap Dynasty. The show ... starred familiar actors Robert Foxworth and Susan Sullivan, plus unfamiliar actor Lorenzo Lamas.
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After Falcon Crest, Wyman only acted once more, playing Jane Seymour's screen mother in a 1993 episode of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Following this, she retired from acting permanently. Wyman had starred in 83 movies, two successful TV series, and was nominated for an Academy Award four times, winning once.
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Wyman's film career started in the 1930s and stretched from the "Gold Diggers of 1937" to 1969's "How to Commit Marriage," co-starring Bob Hope and Jackie Gleason. From 1981 to 1990 she played Angela Channing, a Napa Valley vintner who maintained her grip with a steely will on CBS' "Falcon Crest."
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Wyman's career enjoyed a resurgence when she was cast as the scheming Californian vintner and matriarch Angela Channing in The Vintage Years, which was retooled for the primetime soap opera Falcon Crest, which ran from 1981 to 1990. The series was created by Earl Hamner, who had created the hit series The Waltons a decade earlier. Ex-husband Ronald Reagan apparently encouraged Wyman to take the role,
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While Reagan was president in the 1980s, Ms. Wyman played wine country matriarch Angela Channing on the prime-time CBS soap opera "Falcon Crest." She forbade reporters to ask about her former husband. She said she thought she had long proved herself as an actress and celebrity in her own right and walked away from those who asked about subjects she considered off-limits.
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