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Linda Gray is remembering the “awkward” kissing scenes between her and Larry Hagman on the set of Dallas — and how the late actor would play practical jokes when it came time to lock lips.
Hagman played J.R. Ewing on Dallas for 14 seasons before he died in 2012 at the age of 81. Gray, now 84, played Sue Ellen Ewing, the long-suffering wife of Hagman’s character.
On a recent episode of the That’s Classic podcast, Gray recounted how the love scenes between the two weren’t her costar’s favorite.
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“Larry didn’t like intimate… he didn’t like the kissing scenes,” she said. “He didn’t like that. Not that he didn’t like them, but he just felt, you know, it was awkward.”
So in an effort to make them more lighthearted, Hagman would often play jokes on his on-screen wife.
“He would do things like eat an onion before a kissing scene with me,” Gray said. “Like, ‘Oh, great, Larry. Thanks.’ ”
She continued: “And then he would eat peanut butter … and I had to keep straight,” she added.
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Gray added that she was sometimes a prankster on set, too, sharing one anecdote of an on-screen kiss with actor Christopher Atkins
“It might have been Larry who came up with this idea: ‘When you kiss Chris Atkins, why don’t you put numbing cream on your mouth?’ ” she recalled. “I remember… I thought, ‘That’s not nice.’ That was the Linda coming out. But Sue Ellen went, ‘Why not?’ ”
“The whole crew was in on it,” she added.
She continued: “And then the kiss came, and I kissed him, and then the whole crew was kind of standing there not moving when the scene was over and done. … We’re all watching him, and he was like ‘Wow, my lips…’ Oh, poor Chris. I felt terrible, because I was in on it, and it was, ‘You’re gonna have to think like you’re at the dentist.’ “
Gray starred as Sue Ellen Ewing on the drama for over a decade on CBS. She reprised the role for the show’s 2012 reboot on TNT.
