One summer I was stuck at my relatives with no job – the only thing on during they day were sopas, talk shows and re-runs of detective shows on A&E like, Banacek, Columbo and MacMillan and Wife. Since you saw episodes almost every day, they’d got through the seasons pretty quickly.
McMillan and Wife starred Rock Hudson and Susan Saint James. Toward the end of one season Sally McMillan was pregant – toward the end of that season very pregnant. The next (last) season or so, the show was just called McMillan. The maid, “Mildred”, was played by Nancy Walker was replaced by “Agatha,” played by Martha Raye.
What happened to Sally McMillan? Agatha made a few comments that suggested McMillan was now a widower. I read on a website that she “died in a plane crash”. Was there ever a “death episode?” Was it ever dealt with on the show or were there only a few passing comments like Agatha’s? Did they ever actually explain her death or did the “plane crash” thing come from info given to the press rather than any exposition in the show? Was the plane crash an accident or did it involve some nefarious bad guy? Did Rock Hudson ever boo-hoo-hoo over Sally?
(IIRC correctly, Susan Saint James left the show during a contract dispute.)
I don’t remember any death episode, but I believe that Hudson and Saint James didn’t exactly hit it off. The rumour I heard was that she was annoyed by him being a closeted gay man with a public reputation for being a ladies man through roles like MacMillan. No idea how true that was.
According to Harry and Wally’s Favorite TV Shows (Harry Castleman & Walter J. Podrazik):
“After a successful five-year run, Susan Saint James, Nancy Walker, and John Schuck left the program (the latter two for their own separate series, Saint James to do movies), so it was re-written into a Rock Hudson solo vehicle. Mac becomes a widower (Sally dies in a plane crash), with a new housekeeper (Agatha, Mildred’s sister), a new dim-witted assistant (Sgt. DiMaggio), and a Sally substitute (Maggie, Mac’s secretary).”
The show only lasted for six episodes in this format due the loss of too many familiar characters.
Yep, I was always led to believe that was true. I remember reading some a quote from an interview where she basically said (in essence) that it grossed her out to kiss him on camera.
Oh well, at least I didn’t false-remember it. I was only a kid when I first saw the shows, and I didn’t understand the reason why they didn’t get on, just that they didn’t. But I paid closer attention to the kissing afterwards and noticed that there was a little wince there. Seems a little insensitive on her part with hindsight (- not his fault he was gay at a time when it would’ve wrecked his carreer to admit it).
I’ve heard this also – that she made a huge big deal about kissing a gay man. However, I didn’t have any cite (unless a quote from my hairdresser would be acceptable) so I stuck with the “official story” which was that it was a “contract dispute.” Yup. Sure.
So there was no “kill Sally” episode? I suppose that’s a good thing because it always drove me crazy believing that I’d missed some hugely significant episode.
Strangely it feels like there were more episodes of McMillan than just six, but when the series is condensed to daily re-runs on A&E, I guess the reitition can make it feel like more.
I am watching McMillan and wife on Netflix and I am not understanding how Sally is pregnant at the end of season1 and you never hear anything about the baby and then again in season 4. It makes no sense. Does anyone know why they did that?
:dubious:
Because they could. It was the 70’s, nobody gave a shit, and you didn’t have bloggers demanding explanations.
Well, you see, Rock was…how can I put this gently?..gayer than a tree full of parrots.
Darren Stevens knows the answer.
Gayer than a Fire Island pinwheel factory, he was.
Curious, because if someone was paying me to make out with a foxy lesbian, I would be highly professional in not complaining.
Wow. This has stirred some obscure memories, specifically: I remember when St. James quit and I watched the first episode without her. But I seem to remember John Schuck was still on the show because I recall him doing the clunky exposition in that first episode explaining how she was dead.
However I believe Schuck did eventually leave to do the godawful robo-cop comedy Holmes & Yoyo. And I believe Nancy Walker got a Rhoda spin-off as her mother. Both shows tanked.
Six episodes was a full season for McMillan. Four of its six seasons only had six episodes, and the other two had seven or eight. It ran in rotation with two other shows in its Sunday Mystery Movie time slot and lasted a full six seasons. It was never a weekly show. For comparison’s sake, McCloud lasted seven seasons. So did Columbo, although there were several attempts at bring it back in the 80s and 90s (with two TV movies in 2000 and 2003). None of the Wednesday Mystery Movie shows lasted anywhere near that long; their biggest success, Banacek, lasted two seasons.
McMillan only lasted one season after the departure of most of its regular cast, but in context, this wasn’t a huge failure. Six full seasons is a pretty good run for any TV show.
Anybody remember, A Cool Million, that was my favorite.
The baby is mentioned several times in Love Honor and Swindle, the last show of the 4th season. It was a boy. You never see the baby but they talk about having a baby sitter. Mac tells his mother he and Sally have a baby boy. Sally and the baby die in a plane crash and Mac is a widower at the start of the 6th season. Mildred it is explained has inherited a diner back East so her sister Agatha is now Macs housekeeper
The baby is mentioned several times in Love Honor and Swindle, the last show of the 4th season. It was a boy. You never see the baby but they talk about having a baby sitter. Mac tells his mother he and Sally have a baby boy. Sally and the baby die in a plane crash and Mac is a widower at the start of the 6th season. Mildred it is explained has inherited a diner back East so her sister Agatha is now Macs housekeeper. Susan St James left the show because she wanted more money for year 6. It had nothing to do with Hudson being gay. She said in several articles over the years she made a big mistake asking for more money instead of finishing out the last year of the show.
Which is retroactively creepy because Susan St James’ real-life son Teddy would be killed in a plane crash in 2004.
Did she ever come back as a zombie?
(Well, someone had to say it.Twice zombiefied!)
I think Sally and Mac had TWO kids. I’d have to check my DVDs, but I think she was preggers twice. Since the show rarely acknowledged the first kid, maybe the show runners thought no one would notice that the second vanished, teleported out of Sally’s womb without a trace. I think the second child was the one where Mac pretends to pick up a pregnant “stranger” Sally at a hotel bar.
Neither kid was ever seen. No only did Mac not weep after the death of his beloved wife, the girl that made a stable one-woman man out of him, nor for the death of his kid(s), he had no trouble banging a succession of beautiful model-quality women in the final season.
Maybe being a playboy/eligible bachelor was his natural state? I guess only in the pre-internet age, or maybe San Francisco, could a public figure such as the police commissioner lead such a “scandalous” lifestyle.
Maybe he decided a wife and kid was tying him down and he killed them. As a homicide investigator, he knew how to cover up the crime. The only two people who suspected were those closest to him: Mildred and Sgt Enright - so they were the next two to be killed.