Barbara Stock Talks ‘Dallas,’ Bruce Willis & the ‘Girl CHiPS’ Spinoff That Never Was (Exclusive)
Actress Barbara Stock is best known for her role as Susan Silverman on Spenser for Hire, but there’s a lot more to the actress, whose striking features helped her land numerous roles in other shows, including Liz Adams in Dallas and Nicole Devlin in Port Charles.
Stock got her first big break in the hit 1980s series CHiPS, playing Officer Paula Woods in a two-part episode titled “Ponch’s Angels” — which was a planned spin-off in the vein of Charlie’s Angels. She went on to guest-star in many top shows of the time, including The A-Team, T.J. Hooker, Fantasy Island, Remington Steele, and The Facts of Life, just to name a few.
Although she has retired from acting, she was most recently seen in the short film Terra’s Waltz, directed and written by her son, Logan Dunn. Stock recently sat down with ReMIND magazine to chat about her career and her passion for interior design!
“Ponch’s Angels” from CHiPS, tell me a little bit about that. Was that a backdoor pilot? I’m dying to know since I’m such a huge Charlie’s Angels fan!
Photo Courtesy of Barbara Stock
Yeah, it was a pilot for a spin-off from CHiPS. I had to learn to ride a motorcycle, which scared the hell out of me. But nothing happened with it, and I was really thrilled because I really didn’t want to spend 7 years having to get on a darn guard motorcycle every day. But it was my first major role — I’d had three lines on Fantasy Island or something like that before CHiPS came along.
Was the concept Charlie’s Angels meets CHiPS?
Photo Courtesy of Barbara Stock
Yeah, it was going to be a spin-off kind of girl CHiPS. Very sexist at the time. I went back last year and watched part of the episode. It was a good credit for me, and it led to other things. So, I was very happy that they trusted me. Trisha Townsend, my co-star, she had done even less work than I had. I think it might have been her first role ever.
How was it working with Ken Kercheval [Cliff Barne] in Dallas? Any great fun memories of shooting the show?
I loved working with him. He was a wonderful guy. He and his wife came to a party at my house, and we hung out together outside of it. He was the only one that I really I saw outside of work.
Photo Courtesy of Barbara Stock
I also had scenes with Larry Hagman (JR Ewing) and Patrick Duffy (Bobby Ewing). Patrick was wonderful to work with, just really down-to-Earth and friendly and outgoing. Larry told me that his wife said she thought that JR should end up with me at the end of the show. Which was quite a compliment. I remember George Kennedy (Carter McKay) just being the nicest guy and he was wonderful to work with, too. I didn’t really have too many scenes with the other women on the show, unless it was a huge group scene, but I would see them because we’d be in hair and makeup at the same time.
Was there any storyline you’d like about your character on Dallas?
My storyline, I was a model from Dallas, and I’ve gone to New York and been successful, but I had this boyfriend who was kind of a mobster. So, I ran away from him back to Dallas, but he followed me there. I got involved with Cliff [Barnes].
Any memories about your last day on Dallas?
Photo Courtesy of Barbara Stock
I should have known this. I was too stupid, I guess, to realize. One day, I had a scene where I was packing a suitcase, but it was midway through the season or something and I thought ‘where am I going?’ I didn’t think I was leaving permanently, and it turned out that was my last episode, because they had realized it was going to be the last season of the show. So, they had to wrap up all their long-running characters – they just wrote me out. I just left one day.
I was sad because I just loved it. It was my favorite show to work on, first of all because I could live at home in LA, and I just drove to work, and with a large cast like that, you might work two or three days a week. I had all the fun of being there with everybody and doing the work, and yet I could have a life, so I really love that.
You worked with legend Angela Lansbury on Murder, She Wrote. Any fun stories of Lansbury or doing the show?
MURDER, SHE WROTE, Angela Lansbury, 1984-96
I had some scenes with her, but my mother was played by Florence Henderson. I don’t know how they matched us up together, but I was thrilled. We worked together on my first professional stage show, “Bells Are Ringing,” in Los Angeles. It starred Florence Henderson and Dean Jones and I was in the chorus. So that’s how I had met her years before.
Angela was so legendary. It was just an honor to be on that show. She was just very kind and professional and that’s my experience with her.
What was your favorite project in your acting career that you did?
Wow. The thing that I’m most proud of and that I was most thrilled about was not television. I got the lead role in Nine the musical on Broadway, and it’s the only time I ever did a Broadway show and it had won the Tony Award for Best Musical. A friend took me to see it in New York, and I said, ‘Oh my God, that role [Stephine] could have been written for me.’ I had a really great song, “Unusual Way,” and in the movie, Nicole Kidman played my role.
As far as TV, Dallas was the most fun. Spenser for Hire was probably the best role that I had. I worked on Port Charles, the soap opera. That was fun. Edward Albert and I, playing ex-husband and wife, it was fun to work with him. I had worked with him before, so we knew each other.
ABC/Courtesy: Everett Collection
Moonlighting was really fun. Bruce Willis, my scenes were mostly with him. I had seen the show and had not paid all that much attention, but I thought that guy looked familiar, and it made him a star. It turns out that when I was doing Nine, the musical in New York, Melanie Griffith and I had the same manager. She was doing a film in New York and one night we got together and we went to a bar and picked up this guy who was the bartender there and we all went out together. I realized later it was Bruce Willis. He was not known except that everybody knew that he was the star of the evening, I remember. He was good at holding court – it’s a lot of fun.
How was it doing the soap opera Port Charles compared to doing just a regular series?
Well, for me it was a bit harder cause when I was working, [on a series] it’s every day and it’s long hours and, you know, they pretty much cut print. You must do a really big screw up for them to redo a scene. On Port Charles, you just have to work so quickly. So, I felt a lot more pressure. But if you can do that, you could probably do any show.
What are you up to now?
I’ve thought about it [acting], but I haven’t really made any move toward it. I haven’t acted since 2001, so it would be a big thing to come back. My son is a screenwriter, director/filmmaker and just getting started in his career. So, he’s busy writing all kinds of things and making short films. I was in one of his short films, Terra’s Waltz, a couple of years ago. Maybe I’ll show up in another one — but I’m not actively pursuing it.
Photo Courtesy of Barbara Stock
I became an interior designer. I got really distracted from acting, like in the late ’90s. My son was born in 1994, and my husband was a producer, and we both wanted to be home more with him, and we were spending 12 -16 hours on the set every day. So, we transitioned into buying and renovating homes. Then I started getting good at the design elements of it. I designed and we built 2-3 story hillside homes in Sherman Oaks, and then our partners on that asked me to redesign another house that they wanted to build, and then neighbors started coming by that job site and asking us if we would do their homes. It turned into a career, so that’s what I’ve been doing since: interior design.
Barbara doesn’t officially have a social fan presence, but she does have an eBay page where you can buy signed photos, and she also has a fun Etsy shop of vintage collectibles.
