Jackie Collins' Hollywood Wives is a 1985 television mini-series based on the 1983 novel

Hollywood Wives

Hollywood Wives is a 1983 novel by the British author Jackie Collins. It was her ninth novel, and her most successful.Hollywood Wives tells the stories of several women in Hollywood, ranging all the way from long-time talent agents and screenwriters to vivacious screen vixens and young, innocent...

 by Jackie Collins

Jackie Collins

Jacqueline Jill "Jackie" Collins is an English novelist and former actress. She is the younger sister of actress Joan Collins. She has written 28 novels, all of which have appeared on the New York Times bestsellers list. In total, her books have sold over 400 million copies and have been...

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Hollywood Wives tells the stories of several women in Hollywood

Hollywood, Los Angeles, California

Hollywood is a famous district in Los Angeles, California, United States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym of American cinema...

, from long-time talent agents and screenwriters to vivacious screen vixens and young, innocent newcomers. The mini-series generally follows the same plot as the novel, though it does omit certain subplots and characters.

Airing in February 1985, Hollywood Wives was one of the most watched mini-series of the 1980s. The 3-part, four-and-a-half-hour production was produced by Aaron Spelling

Aaron Spelling

Aaron Spelling was an American film and television producer. As of 2009, Spelling's eponymous production company Spelling Television holds the record as the most prolific television writer, with 218 producer and executive producer credits...

, whose hit show Dynasty

Dynasty (TV series)

Dynasty is an American prime time television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 12, 1981 to May 11, 1989. It was created by Richard & Esther Shapiro and produced by Aaron Spelling, and revolved around the Carringtons, a wealthy oil family living in Denver, Colorado...

was no.1 in the ratings at the time, perhaps partly accounting for the ratings success of Hollywood Wives. Like Dynasty, costume design was by Nolan Miller

Nolan Miller

Nolan Miller is an American fashion designer and television costume designer best known for his work on the long-running 1980s series Dynasty, its spin-off series The Colbys and the 1991 miniseries Dynasty: The Reunion. He collaborated on many projects with television producers Aaron Spelling and...

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Jackie Collins herself was credited as "Creative Consultant" for the mini-series, though she later made it clear that she was not actually consulted at all during production and was less than enthusiastic about some of the casting choices.

Hollywood Wives was nominated for an Emmy Award

Emmy Award

An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...

 for "Outstanding Film Editing in a Limited Series or a Special" in 1985.

Main cast

Elaine Conti - Candice Bergen

Candice Bergen

Candice Patricia Bergen is an American actress and former fashion model.She is known for starring in two TV series, as the title character on the situation comedy Murphy Brown , for which she won five Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards; and as Shirley Schmidt on the comedy-drama Boston Legal...

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Elaine is a Detroit girl turned Hollywood hostess, desperate to stay at the top while her marriage to former screen sex symbol Ross Conti crumbles beneath her. She is driven to improve her husband's career and her own standing within Tinseltown, but struggles to keep the secret that she is also a compulsive shoplifter.

Marilee Gray - Joanna Cassidy

Joanna Cassidy

Joanna Cassidy is an American film and television actress. She is known for her role as the replicant Zhora in the Ridley Scott's film Blade Runner...

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Marilee is Elaine's close friend. A wealthy Hollywood socialite, she is the daughter of a powerful studio boss and the former wife of film director Neil Gray.

Karen Lancaster - Mary Crosby

Mary Crosby

Mary Frances Crosby is an American actress. She is most often credited as simply Mary Crosby for her performances.-Early life:...

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Karen is the daughter of superstar actor George Lancaster, whom she does not get on with. Although friends with Elaine, Karen begins making a play for Elaine's husband.

Sadie LaSalle - Angie Dickinson

Angie Dickinson

Angie Dickinson is an American actress. She has appeared in more than fifty films, including Rio Bravo, Ocean's Eleven, Dressed to Kill and Pay It Forward, and starred on television as Sergeant Suzanne "Pepper" Anderson on the 1970s crime series Police Woman.-Early life:Dickinson, the second of...

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Sadie is a Hollywood agent and star-maker who was responsible for Ross Conti's stardom in the 1950s, and is now one of the most powerful women in Hollywood.

Ross Conti - Steve Forrest.

Ross is a fading Hollywood star, now in his fifties without a viable career.

Neil Gray - Anthony Hopkins

Anthony Hopkins

Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...

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Neil is a British film director. He is a recovering alcoholic, and although he is married to talented screenwriter Montana Gray, he is also caught in a seductive web with actress Gina Germaine.

Jason Swankle - Roddy McDowall

Roddy McDowall

Roderick Andrew Anthony Jude "Roddy" McDowall was an English actor and photographer. His film roles included Cornelius and Caesar in the Planet of the Apes film series...

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Jason is a top interior designer who also runs a male escort agency which caters to lonely rich women.

Montana Gray - Stefanie Powers

Stefanie Powers

Stefanie Powers is an American actress best known for her role as Jennifer Hart in the 1980s television series Hart to Hart.-Early life:...

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Montana is Neil Gray's second wife. A talented screenwriter whose new screenplay "Final Reunion" is one of the most talked about scripts in town, she is determined to break the glass ceiling of the Hollywood studio system.

Gina Germaine - Suzanne Somers

Suzanne Somers

Suzanne Somers is an American actress, author, singer and businesswoman, known for her television roles as Chrissy Snow on Three's Company and as Carol Lambert on Step by Step....

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Gina is a successful movie star but is tired of her role as a Hollywood sex symbol and now wants to be taken seriously as an actress. She is willing to do anything to advance her career, including blackmailing movie director Neil Gray.

George Lancaster - Robert Stack

Robert Stack

Robert Stack was an American actor. In addition to acting in more than 40 films, he was the star of the 1959-1963 ABC television series The Untouchables and later served as the host of Unsolved Mysteries.-Early life:...

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George is a beloved Hollywood superstar, a contemporary of Ross Conti's but still successful and in-demand, however he has a strained relationship with his daughter Karen.

Oliver Easterne - Rod Steiger

Rod Steiger

Rodney Stephen "Rod" Steiger was an Academy Award-winning American actor known for his performances in such films as On the Waterfront, The Big Knife, Oklahoma!, The Harder They Fall, Across the Bridge, The Pawnbroker, Doctor Zhivago, In the Heat of the Night, and Waterloo as well as the...

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Oliver is a Hollywood studio boss. Arrogant and abrasive, he cares only about getting box office results rather than artistic integrity.

Buddy Hudson - Andrew Stevens

Andrew Stevens

Andrew Stevens is an American executive, film producer, director and former actor.-Early life:Andrew Stevens was born Herman Andrew Stephens in Memphis, Tennessee...

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Buddy is a young aspiring actor and former male prostitute with ambitions of stardom. Now married to Angel, he struggles to hide his past life as he attempts to make a career as an actor.

Angel Hudson - Catherine Mary Stewart

Catherine Mary Stewart

Catherine Mary Stewart is a Canadian actress. Her first notable role was as Kayla Brady on the soap opera Days of our Lives from 1981 to 1983...

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Angel is Buddy's new bride, trying to find her own way in a new town. Her beauty and innocence often makes her an easy target of the more unscrupulous residents of Hollywood.

Video/DVD

Hollywood Wives was released on a double cassette home video in the 1980s. It is due for release on DVD in Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

in November 2011.