Los Angeles' Hollywood Museum is rolling out the red carpet for Knots Landing in honor of the classic soap opera's 40th anniversary. Beginning on Sunday, January 19, several costumes from the primetime series' fourteen-year run will be on display for the public.
The museum is kicking off the special exhibition the night before, on Saturday, January 18, with a VIP reception that will bring series stars Donna Mills (ex-Abby Ewing; ex-Madeline Reeves, General Hospital), Joan Van Ark (ex-Valene Ewing), and Michele Lee (ex-Karen MacKenzie) back together again.
Knots Landing is a CBS primetime soap opera that aired from December 27, 1979, to May 13, 1993. A spinoff of Dallas, the series was set in a fictitious coastal suburb of Los Angeles and initially centered on the lives of four married couples living in a cul-de-sac called Seaview Circle. When Dallas became a huge success, some the characters who were introduced on the Texas-based soap opera moved on to Seaview Circle.
In addition to Mills, Van Ark, and Lee, Knots Landing starred Kevin Dobson (ex-Mac MacKenzie; ex-Mickey Horton, Days of our Lives; ex-Judge Devin Owens, The Bold and the Beautiful), Ted Shackelford (ex-Gary Ewing; ex-Jeffrey Bardwell, The Young and the Restless), William Devane (ex-Greg Sumner), Nicollette Sheridan (ex-Paige Matheson), Michelle Phillips (ex-Anne Matheson), and Larry Hagman (ex-J.R. Ewing).
It also featured Peter Reckell (ex-Bo Brady, DAYS), Michael Sabatino (ex-Lawrence Alamain, DAYS; ex-J.T. Cornell, Passions; ex-Vince Russo, Guiding Light), Robin Strasser (ex-Vivian Alamain, DAYS; ex-Dorian Lord, One Life to Live), Stephen Macht (ex-Trevor Lansing, GH), Maree Cheatham (ex-Marie Horton, DAYS; ex-Mona, Passions), Marcia Cross (ex-Kate Sanders, OLTL), and Louise Sorel (Vivian Alamain, DAYS).
Donna Mills wore the shoes of Knots Landing character Abby Ewing from 1980 to 1993 and later went on to play General Hospital diva Madeline Reeves from 2014 to 2018.
Joan Van Ark first joined the soap world as Days of our Lives' Janene Whitney in 1970. She took on the role of Knots Landing's Valene Ewing in 1979 and played the character until 1993. She reprised Valene in 2013 for a short stint on Dallas. Her most recent daytime soap role is that of The Young and the Restless' Gloria Fisher, which she played from 2004 to 2005.
Michele Lee played Knots Landing character Karen MacKenzie from 1979 to 1993. She, like Mills and Van Ark, reprised her role for the 1997 miniseries Knots Landing: Back to the Cul-de-Sac.
Mills, Van Ark, and Lee recently got back together again for a Knots Landing reunion that was also in celebration of the soap's 40th birthday.
The Hollywood Museum is located in the historic Max Factor Building at 1660 N Highland Avenue, Hollywood, CA (on the corner of Highland Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard). For more information, visit the museum's official website.
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