''Tucker's Witch'' is a

comedy Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term ori ...

detective A detective is an investigator, usually a member of a law enforcement agency. They often collect information to solve crimes by talking to witnesses and informants, collecting physical evidence, or searching records in databases. This leads t ...

series that aired on CBS

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication Media (communication), medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of Transmission (telecommunications), television tra ...

from October 6 to November 10, 1982, and again sporadically from March 31 to June 9, 1983. It stars

Tim Matheson Tim Matheson (born Timothy Lewis Matthieson; December 31, 1947) is an American actor and director. Some of his best-known acting roles include the title character of the 1960s animated ''Jonny Quest'' TV series, Eric "Otter" Stratton in the 197 ...

and

Catherine Hicks Catherine Mary Hicks (born August 6, 1951) is an American actress. She played the character Annie Camden on the long-running television series '' 7th Heaven''. Other roles included Dr. Faith Coleridge on the soap opera ''Ryan's Hope'' (1976– ...

as a charming married couple, Rick and Amanda Tucker, who own and operate a private detective agency in

Laurel Canyon Laurel Canyon is a mountainous neighborhood in the Hollywood Hills region of the Santa Monica Mountains, within the Hollywood Hills West district of Los Angeles, California. The main thoroughfare of Laurel Canyon Boulevard connects the neighb ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...

. Amanda possesses

psychic A psychic is a person who claims to use extrasensory perception (ESP) to identify information hidden from the normal senses, particularly involving telepathy or clairvoyance, or who performs acts that are apparently inexplicable by natural laws, ...

powers that help the agency solve cases but sometimes lead the couple into trouble.

Pilot

The show's pilot was first filmed in early 1982 as ''The Good Witch of Laurel Canyon'' and starred

Art Hindle Arthur Hindle is a Canadian actor and director. Early life and education Hindle was born in Halifax. For 12 years, he alternated living with his divorced parents in addition to living in foster homes. He grew up in Bowmanville, and later at T ...

and

Kim Cattrall Kim Victoria Cattrall (; born 21 August 1956) is a British-Canadian actress. She is known for her role as Samantha Jones on HBO's ''Sex and the City'' (1998–2004), for which she received five Emmy Award nominations and four Golden Globe Awa ...

. In May 1982, CBS announced that the series had been picked up with that title and cast. However, Cattrall's racy scene in the 1982 film ''

Porky's ''Porky's'' is a 1981 sex comedy film written and directed by Bob Clark about the escapades of teenagers in 1954 at the fictional Angel Beach High School in Florida. The film influenced many writers in the teen film genre and spawned two sequels ...

'' reportedly caused CBS to demand her replacement. The show was retitled ''Tucker's Witch'' and the pilot was reshot with a new cast; Catherine Hicks replaced Cattrall and Tim Matheson was cast in Hindle's role (Hindle had also played a small role in ''Porky's''). The original pilot never aired, but it is now available on the

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...

-owned IMDb TV streaming service along with the show's other episodes. In a 1986 interview with the ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and pa ...

'', Hindle spoke of his and Cattrall's departures from the series:

Broadcast history

''Tucker's Witch'' aired at 10 p.m. Eastern on Wednesdays in its first run, and proved unable to compete with ABC's ''

Dynasty A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family,''Oxford English Dictionary'', "dynasty, ''n''." Oxford University Press (Oxford), 1897. usually in the context of a monarchical system, but sometimes also appearing in republics. A ...

'' and NBC's '' Quincy, M.E.''. The show was placed on hiatus after six episodes had aired; months later, it was brought back to burn off the remaining episodes. The program was switched to Thursday for the second half of its run. In later rebroadcasts on the

USA Network USA Network (simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. It was originally launched in 1977 as Mad ...

, the program was retitled ''The Good Witch of Laurel Canyon'', the series' original title. The show was produced by

Hill-Mandelker Films Leonard Hill Films was a production company that was founded in 1981 as Hill-Mandelker Films. The company mainly specialized in made-for-television-movies, producing two television series in 1987 and a feature film in 2011. The company has sinc ...

Cast

as Rick Tucker *

as Amanda Tucker *Bill Morey as Lt. Sean Fisk *

Alfre Woodard Alfre Woodard (; born November 8, 1952) is an American actress. She has received various accolades, including four Primetime Emmy Awards (tying the record for the most acting Emmys won by an African-American performer, along with Regina King) ...

as Marcia Fulbright * Barbara Barrie as Ellen Hobbes

Ratings

Episodes

The series pilot, in which Art Hindle and Kim Cattrall played Rick and Amanda, was never broadcast.

Ted Danson Edward Bridge "Ted" Danson III (born December 29, 1947) is an American actor. He achieved stardom playing the lead character Sam Malone on the NBC sitcom ''Cheers'', for which he received two Primetime Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. H ...

played an elevator killer in the premiere episode, which aired just one week after the premiere of Danson's ''

Cheers ''Cheers'' is an American sitcom television series that ran on NBC from September 30, 1982, to May 20, 1993, with a total of 275 half-hour episodes across 11 seasons. The show was produced by Charles/Burrows/Charles Productions in association w ...

''. Others ''Tucker's Witch'' guest stars included

Barry Corbin Leonard Barrie Corbin (born October 16, 1940) is an American actor. He is best known for his starring role as Maurice Minnifield on the television series ''Northern Exposure'' (1990–1995), which earned him two consecutive Primetime Emmy Award n ...

Simon Oakland Simon Oakland (August 28, 1915 – August 29, 1983) was an American actor of stage, screen, and television. During his career, Oakland performed primarily on television, appearing in over 130 series and made-for-television movies between ...

, Joe Penny and

Noble Willingham Noble Henry Willingham, Jr. (August 31, 1931 – January 17, 2004) was an American television and film actor who appeared in more than thirty films and in many television shows, including a stint opposite Chuck Norris in ''Walker, Texas Range ...

Releases

The entire series, including the unaired first pilot, is available on the

-owned IMDb TV streaming service.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tucker's Witch 1980s American drama television series 1982 American television series debuts 1983 American television series endings CBS original programming Television shows set in Los Angeles Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles Television about magic Witchcraft in television Fictional occult and psychic detectives Fictional paranormal investigators