a promo pic of Shelley
taken by her former boyfriend,
fashion photographer Steen Svensson, 1978
In 1979, Shelley was cast as Tiffany Welles in the phenomenal hit TV series Charlie's Angels. Kate Jackson, dubbed the "smart" Angel, had left the series after season 3; and Shelley was taken in to join incumbent Angels Jaclyn Smith and Cheryl Ladd to complete Charlie's heavenly trio of detectives for season 4. And Shelley came with the approval of not just the show's executive producers, Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg, but also of future co-stars Cheryl Ladd and Jaclyn Smith. "Kate Jackson was not easy to replace. She was terrific in the show - just the right image," said Spelling, "Most girls we saw were gorgeous but they didn't have the right bubble and intelligence." (For more, check out: Hollywood's New "It Girl") And Shelley definitely had that bubble and intelligence. "Shelley is a very bright young lady," said Goldberg. "The one thing that stood out was that she was totally likable," he added. Cheryl Ladd said, "Shelley seemed like a doll and we were going to have a lot of fun working together." Jaclyn Smith said, "I selected her because she was spunky and a perfect fill-in for Kate."
a writeup about Shelley
from TV Week, 1979
And Shelley was the perfect fill-in for Kate Jackson. Not only was she Supermodel gorgeous, she looked fantastic with Cheryl and Jaclyn (Check out:
Angels 1979 and
The Beautiful Women of 1980). Plus, she was an intellectual with a college degree in history from Smith College. The bright, fast-talking blonde definitely came across as an intellectual - as noticed from her interviews, both in person and in print. And the series was definitely going to benefit from this quality (the "smart"
Angel was being replaced by an equally "smart" new
Angel). But it seems, the series didn't take advantage of this early in the season. The bright, fast-talking blonde was nowhere to be seen. In fact, Shelley wasn't given much to say and do. It was only by the 10th episode of the season ("Angels in Campus") was she finally able to spread her wings - and she did very well in this episode. Subsequent episodes finally tapped into this inherent quality of Shelley's (Check out Tiffany's scenes with Harley Dexter in episode 23 "Three for the Money." Gems.) and it worked really well. Had they played up this fast-talking intellectual blonde quality of Shelley's early on (when interest in the show was at an all-time high), the season would have had a different outcome.
a promo pic of Shelley
taken by her former boyfriend,
fashion photographer Steen Svensson, 1978
