The second half of the upcoming season of DALLAS had to be rewritten after Larry Hagman died in November. TV Guide Magazine reveals just how J.R. Ewing will be written out. [SPOILER ALERT]At a time when the cast and crew should have been celebrating the revived soap's success on TNT — Season 1 averaged 4.5 million viewers and was the top new cable drama of the year among adults 18-49 — instead they were reeling from the shock of Hagman's death. Then the show's writing staff, headed by exec producer Cynthia Cidre, went into overdrive reworking the second half of the season.Among the mourners who will return for J.R.'s funeral are Cliff Barnes (Ken Kercheval), Gary and Lucy Ewing (Ted Shackelford and Charlene Tilton), Ray Krebbs (Steve Kanaly), Mandy Winger (Deborah Shelton) and Cally Harper Ewing (Cathy Podewell).
The result: a multi-episode "Who Killed J.R.?" mystery that Cidre hopes will rival 1980's wildly popular "Who Shot J.R.?" storyline.
"We all felt having J.R. die of natural causes would have been completely inappropriate, not only to the character, but also to Larry Hagman," says Cidre, who received an OK for the plotline from Duffy as well as Hagman's son, Preston.
We Love Soaps will be on the set of DALLAS later this week. Look for reports here and on our social networks.
What do you think about a "Who Killed J.R.?" mystery?
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