“Dallas” star Patrick Duffy has some fond memories of getting boozy before and after filming the hit show.
During a recent episode on Duffy’s “Step By Step” co-stars, Staci Keanan and Christine Lakin’s podcast, “Keanan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu,” the actor gave a rare interview and admitted that the cast of “Dallas” would pop a bottle of champagne before filming.
“When we started working, every morning that we would be working together on the set, we’d get a call time, usually, you know, seven, six o’clock call time. I would pull in to MGM. We’d park the cars. We’d go to [Larry Hagman’s] room. We’d open a bottle of champagne,” Duffy said.
The 80s star shared that the cast didn’t only drink before the show.
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“We could judge when the show was about to wrap for the day, how it was going, what the last couple of shots were going to be, what the setups were going to be. When we knew it was the right time, we would catch the prop guy’s eye… and then magically a styrofoam cup would appear.
“We’d have a little shot of tequila before we wrapped,” he said.
Duffy and Hagman starred in “Dallas” together. The series was on-air for 14 seasons from 1978 to 1991. The duo starred as brothers, Bobby (Duffy) and J.R. Ewing (Hagman). The cast also consisted of Jim Davis, Barbara Bel Geddes and Linda Gray.
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On the podcast, Duffy admitted that Hagman was very similar to his on-air persona and was often the instigator when it came to drinking on-set.
“When we read the script of ‘Dallas’, we all met for the very first time. Not one actor on the show had ever met any of the other actors on the show,” Duffy said.
“We entered the room, ‘Hi, how are you? Hi, how are you?’ And then Haggy came in, full cowboy, fringe, leather outfit, big hat, leather saddlebags over his shoulder. And in the saddlebags were bottles of champagne.
“I wouldn’t drink anymore after that first glass. Haggy would continue, and in the course of the day, he’d get through three or four bottles of champagne,” he continued.
“We all sat down and drank champagne before we ever started reading the pilots of ‘Dallas’ to get to know each other,” Duffy said and explained that was “the beginning of a relationship.”
This was also the beginning of Hagman and Duffy’s lifelong friendship.
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He said he “went home that day after the whole process and I told my wife, ‘I think I met my best friend today.’ That was Hagman. We were best friends from that moment on until the day he died.”
“That was my workday with Hagman for 13 years,” Duffy said. “That was the ’80s.”
Hagman was the only “Dallas” star to appear in all 357 episodes of the original series. He went on to reprise his role as J.R. Ewing in the spin-off series, “Knots Landing.”
Hagman died in November 2012 at 81 after complications from acute myeloid leukemia.
