Lee Majors and Farrah Fawcett Were Not the "Brangelina" of the 70's

I've addressed a seventies TV hit known as "The Six Million Dollar Man" here previously, (catch it HERE), but it was more about the show than the actors in the series. 

Farrah Fawcett and then-husband Lee Majors

The lead actor in "The Six Million Dollar Man" series (Lee Majors) was already a TV veteran as an actor on a TV show called "The Big Valley", which was an American Western drama TV series which ran for four seasons on ABC from 1965-1969. That series was set in the mid-late 1800's on the fictional Barkley Ranch set in California's San Joaquin Valley (specifically in Stockton). Despite the series' popularity and the fact that it ran for four seasons, it never made the top 30 in the yearly ratings charts, although it was enough of a hit to outlive various time slot rivals during its run. 

But it was Lee Majors from that series' who went on to a much bigger career in television the next decade as "The Six Million Dollar Man". That show ran from 1974-1978 and was at or near the top of the ratings during its heyday. In fact, the show was so big that it also generated its own spinoff known as "The Bionic Woman" which was also briefly very popular around 1977. Both of those shows today run on NBC Universal's Cozi TV network (which I wrote about when it launched HERE). 

Hollywood Power Couple, Yes. But Nothing Like Brangelina.

The comparison is a bit misplaced, but some news outlets (specifically Britain's tabloid the Daily Mail) have referred to actor Lee Majors as half of a sort of "Brangelina" of the 1970's ("Brangelina" was stupid combo name given to the celebrity supercouple consisting of American actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie). The reason for the comparison is because he was married to an actress named Farrah Fawcett whose sexy image in a bathing suit was on posters in most boys' bedroom walls at the time. 

Farrah Fawcett's iconic 70's poster

 Sorry, but to my knowledge, there was never a mass movement for anyone to hang posters of Angelina Jolie in a swimsuit on their walls — she's just never been much of a fantasy for many teenage boys. Lee Majors was also not equivalent of Angelina's former husband Brad Pitt — in the case of Brangelina, Brad Pitt was the better-looking half of that former couple. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, Lee Majors married Farah Fawcett in 1973 (she was a former beauty queen from University of Texas who went to Hollywood at age 21), the same year Lee won the role of Steve Austin on "The Six Million Dollar Man". Farrah appeared on that show and Lee used his clout to try and help get her other TV roles. He said "All the lessons I had learned the hard way, I tried to use to help Farrah." The couple divorced in 1982. Still, Lee Majors and Farrah Fawcett (which she hyphenated even when she was married to Lee Majors as Farrah Fawcett-Majors, which was a pretty daring move at the time since most brides were expected to adopt the surname of their spouse at the time, showing surprising independence) were considered a Hollywood power couple of the mid-1970's.  

She landed various Hollywood guest appearances on somewhat popular broadcast TV shows at the time including "Mayberry R.F.D.", "I Dream of Jeannie", "The Flying Nun", "The Partridge Family" and "Marcus Welby, M.D."  But her her initial claim to fame (aside from her iconic poster) was a starring role on the hit Aaron Spelling TV series named "Charlie's Angels" as Jill Munroe on that show. But the couple still dealt with annoying press hounds throughout their brief marriage. Lee Majors told Closer magazine: "We couldn’t do anything," recalled Lee about the pressure they felt from the press. "The paps [paparazzi] always found out where we were." 

"Jiggle TV"

Farrah Fawcett's "Charlie's Angels" role was during a period which came to be known as "Jiggle TV". Ms. Fawcett's famous poster arguably helped her get cast in the role on "Charlie's Angels", and poster sales went hand-in-hand with ratings for the show. NBC exec Paul Klein is the person who coined the term "Jiggle Television" to criticize ABC's television production and marketing strategy under former chief Fred Silverman. The term was used to describe dramatic TV series (mostly from Aaron Spelling and former Screen Gems' top TV exec Leonard Goldberg) including "The Love Boat", "Fantasy Island", and later "Beverly Hills 90210", "Melrose Place" and others. "Jiggle TV" was seen as trashy and escapist entertainment. Programs or female performers were frequently judged by their "jiggle factor". "Jiggle TV" was also called "Tits & Ass Television" or "T&A TV" for short and in the 1970's, the amount of sex on television increased, as did its ratings. Farrah Fawcett certainly fit into that categorization. 

Farrah Fawcett herself went on the record when she told an interviewer "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." 

Fawcett Redeemed Her Acting Credentials With "The Burning Bed"

Although Farrah Fawcett was not considered a great actress when she began acting (then again, neither is Angelina Jolie), she left "Charlie's Angels" which made her a household name after just one season. And, to her credit, she really did redeem her acting credentials with a dramatic role in a made-for-TV movie which aired on NBC called "The Burning Bed" in 1984 which was very good and gained her needed respect for her ability as an actress. Over her career, she became a four-time Emmy Award nominee (although she never won), but her career came to a sudden halt when she fell sick and passed away from anal cancer in 2009 — she was just age 62 when she died (see her obituary HERE). 

Former husband Lee Majors told the UK tabloid Daily Mail: "People tell me we were the Brad [Pitt] and Angelina [Jolie] of our time. Sadly, that didn't work out too good, either." 

But in spite of their parting ways, Lee Majors (age 81 years old in 2020) looks back at his marriage to Farrah Fawcett fondly. Although their separation was mutual and was never hostile, because they had no children together, there also was not much of an ongoing relationship between the couple following their divorce. 

Majors and Fawcett stayed in touch until Farrah fell in love with Ryan O'Neal, who had been Lee's friend until O'Neil hooked up with Farrah. "They got serious and I couldn't believe it," Lee Majors previously recalled to People. So once they parted, they basically left one another's lives and went their separate ways.  

Silence fell between Lee and Farrah continued until he heard about her battle with anal cancer. However, Lee Majors is very happy that he reconnected with his ex before she died. In 2009, Lee called his ex-wife to wish her a happy 62nd birthday. 

"They had a 40-minute conversation about her life and the cancer," said an insider. "They joked and they got a little bit emotional." They even spoke about working together again — sadly it wasn't meant to be. Farrah died just four months later. She was "one of a kind," Lee said. "I was always 110% behind her and proud of her." 

See also the Closer weekly magazine coverage at: 

https://www.closerweekly.com/posts/lee-majors-gushes-late-ex-wife-farrah-fawcett-was-one-of-a-kind/

Where Are They Now? 6MDM

Until now, most of the cast reunions I've shared on "Harvest Gold Memories" have come from U.S. television networks, notably NBC and ABC (for some reason, CBS has not done many that I'm aware of). But let's face it, the world is a big place that has really been shrinking since the advent of the internet, global media conglomerates, etc. That's why some of today's post comes from Australia's Seven Network (which appears on Channel 7). Evidently, for a while, a morning show there (much like NBC's Today Show or ABC's Good Morning America here in the U.S.) had a feature they called "Where Are They Now" which ran in 2007.

For a period in the mid-to-late 1970s, ABC television scored a major ratings winner with a television show that began as a Movie of the Week based on a science fiction novel called "Cyborg" by Martin Caidin. The novel itself wasn't quite a bestseller until television came knocking, at which point, the book flew off the shelves. However, the movie and TV show were based loosely on the book, so the similarities are fairly limited.

6MDM: The Six Million Dollar Man

People cover 7/4/1977

I certainly didn't think of it back in 1977, but some American television shows were exported to Canada, Australia and elsewhere and became as popular there as they were here. One of those was the sci-fi show "The Six Million Dollar Man" which was a ratings winner for the ABC network here in the U.S. The lead actor who played Col. Steve Austin, was Lee Majors, someone best known for his prior work on the Western TV show "Gunsmoke".  Lee Majors was seen by kids of that era as THE coolest man on earth not only because he starred in this show, but also because in real-life, he was married to the hottest woman at that time, none other than Farrah Fawcett (whose bathing suit poster lined countless boys' rooms back in the day). Alas, their marriage didn't last, and neither did the ratings of "The Six Million Dollar Man". But Lee Majors' went on to star on another hit show known as "The Fall Guy" a few years later.

The 6MDM (Six Million Dollar Man) also spawned it's own spinoff, "The Bionic Woman" which was almost as popular, in part, because Gen Xer girls, like their mothers who were asserting their newfound independence with divorce in mass numbers (only to discover that being single-parent households was much tougher than they'd anticipated) liked that show.

The most popular school lunchbox in 1977

While "The Six Million Dollar Man" lacks a fansite as extensive as "The Bionic Woman" does (be sure to check out The Bionic Woman Files (www.bionicwomanfiles.com/) to see what an awesome job someone did for that show), and the most poplular school lunchbox among boys in 1977 is now a collectors item, all is not relegated to vague memories.

After spending a decade near the top of TVShowsonDVD.com's "Most Wanted" Unreleased DVD list, in late 2010, after years of bickering between the shows' producers and Universal Studios over content rights, both bionic shows were finally digitized and are now available on DVD. "The Six Million Dollar Man" had more seasons on the air, so it's release was much a bigger deal, and the entire series was released last year with some fanfare, while the 3 seasons for "The Bionic Woman" were released very quickly to retail stores with considerably less fanfare. However, after the initial full-season release, each season of "The Six Million Dollar Man" will eventually come to your local Best Buy, Target, or to Amazon.com.  Season 1 of 6MDM is already out, and Season 2 is due out in time for the 2012 holidays on November 6, 2012.

Check out the promotional video for the DVD release below, or by visiting http://youtu.be/t7fvVyYtajw:



Needless to say, this show was a big hit, especially among grade school kids. Sure, the show was campy with sound effects that one could hear kids trying to imitate all over school playgrounds, and equally campy slo-mo special effects, but that didn't stop kids from tuning in week after week. Anyway, I can't really call this post a "cast reunion" since it consists mainly of one man.

Still, as I noted at the beginning of this post, we can thank Australian TV for this "Where Are They Now?" video, which can be seen below, or at http://youtu.be/yxh5HEPbenQ:




Now that your memory has been refreshed, check out my very first posting on this blog, and be sure to view the commercial for the Mazda CX-5 there.  I'll just close with some of the awesomely cheesy sound-effects used in 6MDM.  Check them out!

Bionic Sounds:
Check out the "Bionic Sound" effect and other sound effects from 6MDM online at: http://www.soundboard.com/sb/Bionic_Man_Sounds.

6MDM Toys/Action Figures:
The Six Million Dollar Man Action Figure is among those listed at this site: http://www.toysyouhad.com/Bionicman.htm