1985 - 561 min. - Feature, Color
Director Richard T. Heffron
Genre/Type Historical Epic, Drama, Romance, Epic, Made for TV
Plot Lines Civil-War, Family-interaction, Friendship
From book by Jakes, John
Set In American South, pre-U.S. Civil War
Produced by Warner Bros. TV / Wolper Productions
The expensively mounted miniseries North and South was originally telecast in six 2-hour installments between November 3 and 10, 1985. Four screenwriters--Douglas Heyes, Paul F. Edwards, Kathleen A. Shelley, Patricia Green--were called upon to fashion a workable script from John Jakes' sprawling best-seller. The story covers the two decades prior to the Civil War, beginning in 1842. Real-life historical events are filtered through the eyes of two rival clans: the Mains, a South Carolina plantation-owning family, and the Hazards, a family of Pennsylvania industrialists. While top billing goes to Kirstie Alley as "Northern Belle" Virginia Hazard, most of the footage is devoted to the fluctuating friendship between Orry Main (Patrick Swayze) and George Hazard (James Read). The huge guest-star cast includes Gene Kelly (in his TV miniseries debut), Elizabeth Taylor, Leslie-Anne Down, David Carradine, Robert Mitchum, Jean Simmons, Hal Holbrook (as Abe Lincoln) and Johnny Cash (as abolitionist John Brown). The recipient of seven Emmy nominations, the 561-minute North and South was filmed back to back with its equally lengthy sequel, North and South, Book II. -- Hal Erickson
Cast:
Kirstie Alley
Georg Stanford Brown
David Carradine
Johnny Cash
Philip Casnoff
Olivia Cole
Lesley-Anne Down
Jonathan Frakes
Genie Francis
Terri Garber
Robert Guillaume
Hal Holbrook
Gene Kelly
Robert Mitchum
James Read
Jean Simmons
David Ogden Stiers
Patrick Swayze
Inga Swenson
Elizabeth Taylor
Anthony Zerbe
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