| Charlie's Angels | |
|---|---|
Main title card |
|
| Format | Crime drama |
| Created by | Ivan Goff Ben Roberts |
| Starring | Farrah Fawcett-Majors (seasons 1; 3–4) Kate Jackson (seasons 1–3) Jaclyn Smith (seasons 1–5) Cheryl Ladd (seasons 2–5) Shelley Hack (season 4) Tanya Roberts (season 5) David Doyle (seasons 1–5) |
| Theme music composer | Jack Elliott Allyn Ferguson |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 5 |
| No. of episodes | 110 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Aaron Spelling Leonard Goldberg |
| Running time | 48-50 minutes |
| Production company(s) | Spelling/Goldberg Productions |
| Distributor | Sony Pictures Television |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | ABC |
| Picture format | 4:3 SDTV 16:9 HDTV |
| Audio format | Monaural |
| Original run | September 22, 1976 – June 24, 1981 |
Charlie's Angels is an American crime drama television series about three women who work for a private investigation agency, and is one of the first shows to showcase women in roles traditionally reserved for men. The series stars Kate Jackson (seasons 1–3); Farrah Fawcett-Majors (season 1; 3–4); Jaclyn Smith (seasons 1–5); Cheryl Ladd (seasons 2–5); Shelley Hack (season 4); Tanya Roberts (season 5); David Doyle (seasons 1–5); and, John Forsythe (voice; seasons 1–5). The series was broadcast in the USA on the ABC Television Network from 1976 to 1981 and was one of the most successful series of the 1970s. Charlie's Angels was created by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts and produced by Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg.
In pre-production, the original proposed title for the show was The Alley Cats. Kate Jackson did not have to audition and was immediately selected for one of the roles during the early pre-production stages. She had proven very popular with viewers in another police television drama, The Rookies. Not quite excited by the name of the show, Jackson relayed to producers that the leads should be called "angels" instead of "alley cats". Jackson then came up with the idea that the identity of their boss should remain a mystery, both to the characters and the viewers, and that they should receive their cases over a speakerphone or squawk box. Producers incorporated these ideas into the show, which proved to be very popular. The Angels' boss was originally to be named Harry, but the title Harry's Angels was dropped from consideration as not to conflict with another television series, Harry O.[1] Producers came up with the name Charlie. Jackson was initially cast as Kelly Garrett, but was more attracted to the role of Sabrina Duncan, and her request to switch roles was granted. Thus, the early part of the pilot focuses heavily on Jaclyn Smith as Kelly Garrett (the role Jackson originally had) as the casting change had been made too late to make further rewrites.
Farrah Fawcett was the next actress to be selected for a role after Jackson. Fawcett, too, did not have to audition. She had done small acting parts up to this point such as commercials and sitcom appearances. A producer of Charlie's Angels saw the actress in a small role in the film Logan's Run and wanted her to be one of the female leads in the show. A casting call was then put out for the final lead role, and Jaclyn Smith was chosen from among hundreds of actresses. Smith had done limited acting as well up to that point, having appeared in several commercials.
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Three women, the Angels (originally Kate Jackson, Farrah Fawcett-Majors, and Jaclyn Smith), graduated from the Los Angeles police academy only to be assigned such duties as handling switchboards and directing traffic. They quit and were hired to work for the Charles Townsend Agency as private investigators. Their boss, Charlie (voiced by John Forsythe), is never seen full face. (In a few episodes the viewer sees the back of his head and his arms, and he is often surrounded by beautiful women.) Charlie assigns cases to the Angels and his liaison, Bosley (David Doyle), via a speaker phone. Fawcett-Majors and Jackson eventually left the series during its run. Fawcett-Majors was replaced by Cheryl Ladd as Kris Munroe, Jill's sister and a former police officer from San Francisco. Jackson was replaced by Shelley Hack as Tiffany Welles, a former police officer from Boston. In the final season, Tanya Roberts replaced Hack as Julie Rogers, a former model. Jaclyn Smith was the only original female cast member to remain with the series during its entire five-year run.
Like other American TV crime shows of the 1970s, Charlie's Angels was generally formatted in the way of a procedural drama. Most episodes followed a regular structure whereby a crime is committed, the Angels are given the case details by Charlie and Bosley at the Townsend office and the trio go undercover (usually involving something skimpy for Kelly and Jill (later Kris)). Towards the end of the episode one of them is uncovered and it is a race against time for the others to rescue their friend before they meet some horrible fate. Inevitably, the final scene would be back at the Townsend office with Charlie offering his congratulations for a job well done.
| Main cast | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Actress/Actor | Character | Seasons | Year | No. of Episodes | Notes |
| Kate Jackson | Sabrina Duncan | 1–3 | 1976–1979 | 69 episodes | Charlie's Angels was created in her favor, and many of her ideas were incorporated into the series. She was given the choice of which role she wanted to play, and she chose Sabrina Duncan. |
| Farrah Fawcett | Jill Munroe | 1; 3–4 | 1976–1977; 1978–1980 (recurring) | 29 episodes | Billed as: Farrah Fawcett-Majors (1976-1977; 1978-1979); billed as: Farrah Fawcett (1979-1980). She left after season one, but returned as a recurring character during seasons 3 and 4 due to contractual obligations. |
| Jaclyn Smith | Kelly Garrett | 1–5 | 1976–1981 | 110 episodes | She was the only "Angel" to remain with the series during its entire five-year run. |
| Cheryl Ladd | Kris Munroe | 2–5 | 1977–1981 | 87 episodes | Replaced the highly popular Farrah Fawcett-Majors (Jill Munroe), as Jill's younger sister, Kris Munroe, a police graduate from San Francisco. Ladd had the second-longest stint on the series (four seasons) after Smith (five seasons). |
| Shelley Hack | Tiffany Welles | 4 | 1979–1980 | 25 episodes | Replaced Kate Jackson (Sabrina Duncan), playing classy Tiffany Welles, a police graduate from Boston. |
| Tanya Roberts | Julie Rogers | 5 | 1980–1981 | 16 episodes | Replaced Shelley Hack (Tiffany Welles) in the fifth and final season, playing a street-wise model who had changed her ways. When she joins forces with the Angels to solve the murder of her parole officer, they are impressed enough to offer her a job while she works on her private investigator license. |
| David Doyle | John Bosley | 1–5 | 1976–1981 | 110 episodes | He works for Charlie and, along with Charlie, provides the Angels with their assignment. On occasion he assists the Angels, and unlike them, he routinely sees and works with Charlie. |
| John Forsythe (voice) | Charles "Charlie" Townsend | 1–5 | 1976–1981 | 109 episodes | The owner of the detective agency and the Angels' and Bosley's boss, he was never seen full-face in any episode. His role is primarily the voice over a speakerphone. |
Charlie's Angels played host to a number of well-known faces during its five seasons. Some of those individuals were long-established stars of film and television; others would find considerable fame and recognition many years after appearing in the program. Notable appearances of celebrities (whether famous then or later) include those of:
The series proved a runaway hit in the (1976–1977) ratings, finishing at number 5 for the season and a great deal of attention was centered on the three leads (Jackson would later comment that this first few months was like being in the eye of a storm). Suddenly all three lead actresses were propelled into big time stardom with Fawcett proving hugely popular, so much so that she was branded a phenomenon. However, the situation off screen was not so happy. The long working hours on set, combined with numerous calls for photo shoots, wardrobe fittings, and promotional interviews, were taking their toll on the trio. Jackson was especially unhappy as she felt the quality of scripts was declining and the format was now more "cop story of the week" rather than classy undercover drama, which had been the intention with the pilot film.
ABC attempted to create a spin-off for Charlie's Angels in 1980 called Toni's Boys. The show was essentially a gender reversal of Charlie's Angels, and starred Barbara Stanwyck as Antonia "Toni" Blake, a wealthy widow and friend of Charlie's who ran a detective agency. The agency was staffed by three good looking male detectives who took direction from Toni, and solved crimes in a manner similar to the Angels. The show aired as a backdoor pilot during the fourth season of Charlie's Angels, but was not picked up as a regular series for the following season.
Although there was a crossover with Vega$, a pilot episode had already aired, so it was not strictly a spin-off.
The show became known as "Jiggle TV" and "T&A TV" (or "Tits & Ass Television") by critics who believed that the show had no intelligence or substance and that the scantily or provocatively dressed Angels—generally as part of their undercover character—e.g., roller derby girl, beauty pageant contestant, maid, female prisoner, or just bikini-clad—did so to showcase the figures and/or sexuality of the actresses as a sole means of attracting viewers. Farrah Fawcett-Majors once attributed the show's success to this fact: "When the show was number three, I figured it was our acting. When it got to be number one, I decided it could only be because none of us wears a bra."[3]
Seasonal rankings (based on average total viewers per episode) of Charlie's Angels on ABC.
Note: Each U.S. network television season starts in late September and ends in late May, which coincides with the completion of May sweeps. All times listed are North American Eastern Time.
| Season | Time slot | Premiere | Finale | TV Season | Season Rank |
Households (millions) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wednesday 10:00 P.M. | September 22, 1976 | May 4, 1977 | 1976–1977 | #5 | 18.4[4] |
| 2 | Wednesday 9:00 P.M. | September 14, 1977 | May 10, 1978 | 1977–1978 | #4∞ | 17.8[5] |
| 3 | September 13, 1978 | May 16, 1979 | 1978–1979 | #12 | 18.2[6] | |
| 4 | September 12, 1979 | May 7, 1980 | 1979–1980 | #20 | 15.9[7] | |
| 5 | Sunday 8:00 P.M. (November 30, 1980 – January 11, 1981) Saturday 8:00 P.M. (January 24, 1981 – February 28, 1981) Wednesday 8:00 P.M. (June 3, 1981 – June 24, 1981) |
November 30, 1980 | June 24, 1981 | 1980–1981 | #47 | — |
∞ Denotes tie in year-end rank.
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has released Seasons 1–4 of Charlie's Angels on DVD in Regions 1.
| Season | Ep # | Release dates | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Region 1 | Region 2 | Region 4 | |||
| 1 | 23 | May 27, 2003 | June 23, 2003 | September 29, 2010[8] | Includes 90-minute pilot tele-film |
| 2 | 24 | April 6, 2004 | February 19, 2007 | January 13, 2011[9] | The two-hour episodes "Angels in Paradise" and "Angels on Ice" appear as syndicated versions |
| 3 | 22 | July 4, 2006 | April 20, 2009 | March 2, 2011[10] | The two-hour episodes "Angels in Vegas" and "Terror on Skis" appear as syndicated versions |
| 4 | 25 | July 21, 2009 | TBA | TBA | The two-hour episode "Love Boat Angels" appears as the syndicated version |
| 5 | 16 | TBA | TBA | TBA | Season 5 episodes were released for download solely though iTunes on September 20, 2011 |
Note: Episode count is based on the format in which episodes originally aired. Two-hour episodes are counted as one episode.
As of September 2011 all five seasons of the show can be purchased in the USA on iTunes, and some episodes of the show can be streamed for free in the US on IMDB, Hulu, with Minisodes and full episodes available on Crackle. The show previously aired in syndication on various network affiliates and on TV Land and ION. Following the death of Farrah Fawcett in June 2009, WGN America aired a week of marathons of the show. As of 2009 the series is still available for syndication to local television stations in the United States. It is currently airing on UNIVERSAL HD digital cable channel twice daily with a few marathons weekly.
The series has inspired many remakes and reinterpretations throughout the years and in different countries. It has also been featured in various other media.
Four women were selected to be in a show called Angels '88, which was to serve as an updated version of the show. The show was later named Angels '89 after production delays, but the project was abandoned before notice was taken.[11] From 1998–1999, Telemundo and Sony produced a show called Ángeles.[12] The weekly hour format did not catch on with Hispanic viewers, who are accustomed to watching telenovelas nightly and the series was soon canceled. In 2002, a German version of Charlie's Angels, Wilde Engel,[13] was produced by the German channel RTL. The show was known as Anges de choc in French-speaking countries, and as Three Wild Angels in English-speaking ones.
In 2004, a television movie entitled Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Charlie's Angels aired on NBC.
In November 2009, ABC announced that it was considering a television revival of Charlie's Angels, with Josh Friedman handling both writing and executive producing duties, and Drew Barrymore and Leonard Goldberg sharing co-production duties. [14][15] On May 13, 2011, ABC announced a 13-episode order for the series.[16][17] However, after only four episodes, ABC canceled the Charlie's Angels reboot.[18]
The series inspired two feature films from Flower Films production company: Charlie's Angels (2000) and Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003), with John Forsythe returning to voice Charlie. Whereas most movie remakes of 1970s TV shows, like Starsky and Hutch, are actually remakes, the Charlie's Angels films are set in a different time and thus closer to a film revival. The mythology goes that whenever an Angel leaves, she is replaced so there are always three. The second film had more nods to the TV series than the first film, with Jaclyn Smith making a brief cameo as Kelly Garrett.
The series has also inspired more shows and films, including:
In July 2003, three Charlie's Angels games were released on three different gaming platforms: Nintendo GameCube, PlayStation 2, and the mobile phone. The versions released on both the GameCube and PlayStation 2 were virtually the same, each given the same title: Charlie's Angels. The version released for the mobile phone was fundamentally toned down to fit the technical restrictions of the platform, and was titled Charlie's Angels: Road Cyclone.
In April 2008, Ojom announced a new Charlie's Angels mobile phone game entitled Charlie's Angels: Hellfire. The game is now available on operator portals across Europe.
During the show's run, a countless variety of collectible items were produced, including two versions of dolls, boardgames, several posters, several sets of trading cards, notebooks, a lunchbox & thermos, Charlie's Angels van, children's beauty products and even record albums.
Even though it was not directly part of the show, Farrah Fawcett also released a poster of her sporting a red bathing suit that became the biggest selling poster in history with 12 million copies sold. This poster also helped the burgeoning popularity of the series.
Two British comic strip versions were produced. The first appeared in the Polystyle publication Target in April 1978, drawn by John Canning. Target was a sister title to the long-running TV Comic aimed at older children and featuring TV action and crime shows of the day. Proving unpopular, it folded in August and merged back into TV Comic where Canning's Angels strip continued until October 1979. The second strip was printed in Junior TV Times Look-in, debuting in November 1979 (as soon as Polystyle's deal expired), written by Angus Allan and drawn by Jim Baikie and Bill Titcombe.
In the on-line comic Erfworld, one side in The Battle for Gobwin Knob hires three glowing, flying female combatants from an unseen "Charlie". One is blond and two are dark-haired. They first appear in silhouette in page 42 of the comic[24] and in the final frame of page 69,[25] after dispensing with some "Dwagons" of the opposing side, once again take up the iconic pose of Charlie's Angels. They are referred to as "Charlie's Archons". In Gnosticism, an archon occupies a role similar to the angels of the Old Testament.
Angel's "Proper" Charlies was a British comic strip published in the weekly Jackpot. It first appeared in 1979, drawn by Trevor Metcalfe. Angel was a beautiful teenage girl who was worshiped by three not-so-very-mature boys called the Charlies. Angel's beauty hid a conniving mind, in that she took advantage of the love-struck trio in order to get her own way, such as slipping into parties and concerts and attracting the attention of more suitable boyfriends, while the Charlies ended up bruised and battered as a result of their efforts to impress her (in vain).[26]
Brelan de dames (Three Ladies of a Kind), a Belgian comic strip by artist Renaud Denauw and writer Jean-Luc Vernal, was also about a trio of action women, though in this case they came from various countries and racial backgrounds and, after a short stint in the secret service, became independent operators. Again, one is blond and the others are dark-haired. Their adventures were published in the 1980s in Tintin magazine.[27]
In the Sonic the Hedgehog comics, Issue #152 has a reference to "Charlie's Angels" called "Sonic's Angels".
This is a chronological list of appearances that two or more Angels have made together in support of Charlie's Angels.
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