For as long as I can remember, ‘Dallas,’ the most popular primetime soap in television history, has been one of my favourite shows. The very sight of Victoria Principal makes me want to rewatch the whole series.
Victoria’s renowned performance as Pamela Barnes Ewing on Dallas was a major draw for viewers, coupled with Larry Hagman’s portrayal of the ruthless oil magnate J. R. Ewing.
Victoria turned 73 today, and I guarantee you won’t believe your eyes when you see the new images of this ageless beauty.
Principal Victoria Facebook
The 73-year-old Victoria Principal has been a successful actress, novelist, producer, and skin care entrepreneur during her whole career.
Maybe it’s because Victoria moved about a much as a kid and had to learn to adjust to new environments quickly.
Japanese by birth
On January 3, 1950, Victoria Ree Principal was born in Japan.
Victoria was born in Fukuoka, Japan, where her father, a sergeant in the United States Air Force, was stationed.
Throughout Victoria’s upbringing, she and her mother were often relocated due to her father’s service in the United States Air Force. She spent her childhood in many locales, including England, Puerto Rico, Massachusetts, and Florida.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Victoria attended no less than 17 elementary schools during her life, including London’s renowned Royal Ballet School.
It’s unclear whether she had a happy or sad upbringing since accounts differ.
Daily Mail reports that mother and daughter Victoria and Ree Principal had a tumultuous relationship. Victoria’s upbringing was reportedly terrible, according to a 2009 newspaper article. Huffington Post interviewed Victoria in 2012 and asked her what she wished she had known sooner.
“I wish I had known my childhood would end,” she sobbed.
On the other hand, Victoria Principal is credited as saying:
I got a lot of breaks. The way I was brought up by my parents has prevented any notion of inequality from ever entering my mind.
Author: Jim Ellwanger / Flickr
We do know that Victoria began her job career at a very young age. She got her first employment in a television commercial when she was just five years old.
However, things looked different for Victoria when she enrolled at Miami-Dade Community College back in 1968.
A passion for helping others led her to pursue a career in medicine. Victoria probably would have been a doctor if things had gone differently.
A vehicle collision on Victoria’s Main Street
The young student’s life, however, would take a different course.
Victoria was engaged in a terrible accident only a few months before the end of her first year at college. She was gravely hurt in a vehicle accident on the way home from the library one day. Victoria had to spend a lot of time in bed in rehabilitation.
She had to redo the first year of college work since she had missed too many critical months.
Then Victoria made the decision to completely pivot her life. Instead, she uprooted to the Big Apple to pursue a career in acting.
Victoria went to Los Angeles in 1971 after spending time as an actress and model in New York and Europe. She moved out west in search of a breakthrough role in Hollywood.
The western film The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean, directed by John Huston, gave her her big break. Victoria played Roy Bean’s mistress, opposite Paul Newman’s role.
Credit: Tom Simpson / Flickr
Hollywood struggles
It was plain to see that she had some ability. Victoria’s name began to pop up more often in the Hollywood community when she was nominated for a Golden Globe for best newcomer.
The invitations to parties began coming in. I thought they loved me, but I found out I was just a hot meal ticket,” Victoria said to People.
Victoria had a hard time finding fulfilling parts after the popularity of The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. Victoria’s self-esteem suffered a serious hit with the failure of her next picture, The Naked Ape.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Because I didn’t want to injure myself, I wanted to be successful. To put it bluntly, I started to toughen up. “I became very guarded,” she told People.
Earthquake, a catastrophe film in which she featured in 1974, was a commercial success.
In 1975’s Vigilante Force, however, midway through the film Victoria realised something was very wrong. She couldn’t handle the pressure of maintaining an idealised persona, and she eventually gave up.
“I realised I was so unhappy I didn’t want to live,” Victoria said.
She left feature films to pursue a career in law. She was able to support herself as a talent agent between the years 1975 and 1977, which was a tremendous relief for Victoria. The emphasis in her life has been on her physical appearance throughout.
Since becoming an agent, she was at last valued for her contributions.
Victoria’s first exposure to the TV show Dallas was in her role as an agent. She had been approached about making a comeback to acting before, but it wasn’t until she read the screenplay for Dallas that she decided to make a permanent shift in her career goals.
A buddy had dropped over a Dallas screenplay, and I decided to read it before heading off to law school and a new career as an agent. When I was done, I realised that a big chunk of my life was finally mine.
Therefore, I informed the casting director over the phone, “I’m sending someone in.” ‘Who?’ she questioned. Just write my name down, I pleaded. It will come as a shock to you. It was a big shock when I came there, all by myself. I put in for it on my own! As Victoria put it.
Everyone knows that Victoria got the part of Pamela Barnes Ewing, and from there the show went on to great success.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Victoria anticipated that Dallas would become popular.
To to the actor, “When I went in for the role on ‘Dallas,’ I had already fallen in love with the show and with the character, so my feeling from the time I read it was that it was extremely special and that I really, really wanted to be a part of it. That’s why I love being Pam,” she said. According to what Victoria told People, it seemed like she was destined for the part.
She negotiated her own deal with CBS using her extensive understanding of the business. This meant that she could do anything she pleased as Dallas won over the globe and won the hearts of millions of viewers.
Because of this, and as you can see in retrospect, I’m the only member of the cast to have also been in commercials, films of the week and written books. I still have complete say over and ownership of my likeness. “I am not someone else’s property,” she said.
Images by Getty
Dallas, which first aired on television in 1978, is widely regarded as one of the best shows of all time. Young people nowadays would have a hard time imagining how a single soap opera like Dallas could become a worldwide phenomenon and have an impact on almost every person on the planet.
The show follows the lives of the rich and fighting Ewing family of Texas, who make their fortune in the oil and cattle-ranching sectors.
Victoria Principal, who was 28 years old when Dallas debuted, was a crucial factor in the show’s success throughout the globe. For a generation of young men, Pamela Barnes Ewing will always be remembered as the stunning wife of Bobby Ewing and sister-in-law of JR.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Victoria received two Soap Opera Digest Award and one Golden Globe nomination during her nine-year tenure on Dallas.
She has been talking about her romance with Dallas’s Larry Hagman and revealing information from the set in recent years.
It was always fun to square up against J.R., aka Larry Hagman. Larry was a really giving actor, she recalled, and he always made time to discuss how we might improve the scene with me the night before.
Principal Victoria Facebook
But she didn’t form strong bonds with any of the other actors.
While I did get phone calls, I didn’t host any actual parties. We never actually became close friends. We shared a workplace and had separate but parallel lifestyles. When I first began working on the programme, many of the regulars—including Patrick, Steve, Larry, and Linda—were already married with children. By me, that is. According to what Victoria told People, the two ways of life are drastically different.
Leaving Dallas, and why Victoria Principal
In 1987, Victoria Principal decided to leave the popular TV show.
Her choice was motivated by a number of factors.
Efforts have been made to keep Victoria Principal and Pam Ewing apart. She told the New York Times in 1987, “To stay on the show any longer would really seal my fate in the industry.”
Even though it would have made her the highest-paid actress in television history, Victoria turned down a massive deal.
Some prominent authors left after year five, and by year seven, the writing had declined, which played a significant role in my decision to leave Dallas. During the seventh year’s contract renegotiation, I let the producers know that I would only be staying for another two years.
They asked me to extend the contract, but I declined. I was really forthright. Playing Pam was a great experience for me. She had a genuine heart and was unafraid to stand up for what she thought was right. She told Entertainment Weekly, “It was such an honour to play her.”
Victoria Main’s wealth
After Dallas, Victoria might have retired, but she took charge instead, investing substantially in her own skincare firm called Principal Secret. She continued to make appearances in TV films, but her focus shifted to her skincare line, which she introduced in 1984.
More than $1.5 billion in sales have been made from this line since its inception. Victoria Principal is worth an astounding $350 million, as reported by Celebrity Net Worth.
But without Dallas’s success, none of this would have been possible.
I am still very committed to operating Principal Secret, my skincare business. In a few weeks, we will have been in operation for 27 years. Principal told TV Insider in 2018 that she will “never forget” the role Dallas played in helping her achieve her goals.
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Victoria announced her departure from the organisation a year after her interview with TV Insider.
Principal said in a statement, “I will be stepping down after 30 years in the skincare business and 28 years as the President & Founder of Principal Secret to devote myself full time to my philanthropic work through The Victoria Principal Foundation for Thoughtful Existence and my rescue work with animals.”
The actress turned philanthropist has made significant contributions via her organisation. For instance, in the wake of Hurricane Harvey in 2018, she gave the American Humane Society a whole fleet of rescue boats. She has also given $25,000 to the relief and rebuilding efforts after the 2018 California wildfires.
Private matters
Victoria earned the undeserved reputation as a “man-hunter” early in her career, despite the complete opposite being true. I think Victoria’s history of marriage and divorce is rather typical for a Hollywood actress like herself.
To her knowledge, “no one who ever dated me has ever said any unkind thing about me,” she screams. Despite the fact that Victoria told People in 1983 that she had fewer romantic partnerships than other people her age, no one believed her.
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Christopher Skinner, Victoria Principal’s first husband, was a coworker on the set of Dallas. Seven years younger, Skinner was once a budding actress.
The pair had just three short dates before getting married after meeting in 1978. The pair separated after being married for two years.
Victoria claims that her young spouse can’t handle her demanding 75-hour workweek.
Dual marriage
After her first marriage ended, Victoria began dating Andy Gibb, an English singer and songwriter. It was a public relationship, but it wasn’t without its issues.
Gibb and Victoria had great chemistry and loved each other deeply, but Victoria eventually found that Gibb’s lifestyle and addiction were too much for her to bear.
“I did everything I could to help him, but then I told him he would have to choose between me and his problem,” Victoria stated following Gibb’s death in 1998.
Victoria’s passion for Dr. Harry Glassman, a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, began in 1983. In 1985, the pair tied the wedding in Dallas.
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Many assumed that since Victoria wed a cosmetic surgeon, he “helped” her maintain her youthful appearance. Victoria denied using her husband’s services in a 2007 interview.
My face has never been tightened. A professional peel or laser treatments,” she said.
Victoria Principal and her ex-husband, paediatrician Dr. Harry Glassman, separated in December 2006, with Principal saying at the time, “We have had a loving relationship for over 20 years.”
While married to Glassman, Victoria Principal developed close to his two children from a previous relationship, Andrew and Brooke.
Her Present-Day 2022 Existence
Victoria Principal is a 71-year-old social media guru today. If her Facebook profile is any indication, she spends a lot of time rehabilitating animals on her ranch outside of Los Angeles.
Seeing this incredible woman in her current form brings me nothing but happiness and tears.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Victoria gives her 300,000 followers a glimpse into her life on the ranch with her frequent posts of images and short videos.
Her Dallas years and acting career are documented in periodic publications. She’ll look different today, but then again, so will you. In a word, that’s life.
Principal Victoria Facebook
Victoria, my darling, you are one of the most stunningly beautiful ladies I have ever seen. You radiate goodness, tenderness, power, and inspiration; you are the epitome of inner beauty.
Principal Victoria Facebook
You are deserving of the finest that life has to offer. If you believe that the way you care for and love your animals speaks volumes, please share this post on Facebook.
