'Dynasty,' One More Time

Cast Of '80s Prime-Time Soap Reflects; Set For Reunion Special

(CBS)  The prime-time soap opera "Dynasty" premiered 25 years ago. Fans tuned in for all the dirty business dealings and outrageous catfights.

Now, reports The Early Show national correspondent Hattie Kauffman, the oil-rich Carrington clan is reuniting for a prime-time special, "Dynasty Reunion: Catfights and Caviar."

On the set where the special was shot, Joan Collins still commanded attention, teasing the camera.

Collins played Alexis, the vixen who married so may times she was Mrs. Morrell Carrington Colby Dexter.

"Dynasty" was shot in a grand manor in northern California, outside San Mateo. It was, Kauffman noted, the back drop for the backstabbing, the high drama, and high camp.

The show was about family, money, secrets, and sex.

"A lot of the men that Alexis was with," Collins recalled to Kauffman, "she used them, purely sexually, as a lot of men do for women."

John Forsythe played billionaire tycoon Blake Carrington.

"Joan Collins was a tremendous plus to the show," he told Kauffman. "I expected that she was going to be good, but … she was a powerhouse."

Gordon Thomson portrayed the villainous, spoiled Carrington son. But forget about upstaging Alexis.

Thomson says Alexis was one of the world-class "bitches. Absolutely, but she was good at it, because she brought a lot more to it than just being a cardboard bitch."

Blake Carrington was caught between Alexis, his "ex", and his current wife, Krystle, played by Linda Evans.

Their catfights, Kauffman observes, were legendary.

"The fight scene that everybody seems to remember the most is the lily pond," Collins pointed out to Kauffman. "I think," Evans agreed, "because it was so outrageous in those days for two women to take each other down in the water. … I mean, you went under, I went under. We pulled, we pushed. They were like rats."