Cathy Podewell had roles before and after Dallas, but she is best known for playing Cally Harper, a young waitress who marries J.R. Ewing (Larry Hagman) on the show.

From 1988 to 1991, she was in the main cast of the popular series as Cally, who went through some wild storylines, including lying about being pregnant after a one-night stand with J.R.

While soap opera fans will never forget Podewell as Cally, horror fans will remember her from her role in 1988’s Night of the Demons. The film, about a group of high school students who attempt a seance with disastrous results, became a cult classic.

Podewell had a few more parts after those, but she had mostly disappeared from Hollywood until very recently. Here’s what she’s been up to recently.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Podewell married Steven Glueck, a sales representative for a clothing line, in 1989. The couple is still together and has three children: two sons and a daughter. They keep their personal lives private, and Podewell took a break from working as frequently as she had before as their family grew.

Glueck, who is not an actor, appeared as Cally’s new husband after her divorce from J.R. in a Season 14 episode of Dallas.

She took a lengthy break from acting.

Podewell took on other roles during her Dallas run, including guest appearances on Growing Pains and Murder, She Wrote, and a few film roles, but she slowed down after that. She hadn’t worked in the industry since a 1993 episode of Beverly Hills, 90210 and a 1995 episode of Walker, Texas Ranger.

She explained to Cryptic Rock in 2020 that she wanted to spend more time with her family. “I’m grateful for about five years of work; I worked pretty straight and solid,” she said. “Then I had a child. My son was born in 1992, after I married in 1989.”

“I believe the last things I did were in 1991, when I was two months pregnant with my son. I keep saying I’ve been on hiatus since then. My youngest son is 16, so I’m struggling to come to terms with getting back into it. I’m not afraid of it, but it means starting over. I figure, if I can do it once, I can do it again—I’ll be playing grandmothers now.”

“Being a mom has been my passion,” Podewell continued, “and I haven’t regretted all these years of mommy dom.” While she doesn’t regret the years she took off, during which she only did a few short films, the soap star also stated that she didn’t want much more time to pass before working again.

She returned to the universe of Dallas.

Podewell (pictured above with the late Ken Kercheval, who played Cliff Barnes on Dallas) played Cally again in the 2012 Dallas revival in 2013. She appears in a memorial episode for J.R., who died of cancer—or murder, depending on your fan theory.

Her background in horror, on the other hand, brought her back to acting in a significant way. Podewell told Cryptic Rock that she was inspired to return to the game after attending a Dallas fan convention in 2019 and being approached by fans of her genre films.

She is working on some new projects.

And she returned to the game. Podewell made a comeback in the horror film Reunion From Hell in 2021. On Instagram, the actor posted a photo of herself with writer/director/producer Hayden Newman and a caption about her comeback.

“The force of YES!! I always told my kids that if they had the chance to try something new, it was better than saying no and staying at home, which was always the expected outcome “Podewell explained. “I’d said for years that after my youngest graduated from high school, I’d go back to acting.”

“Well, two weeks later, I received an email from Hayden asking if I’d read the script they’d written! It seemed revolutionary to me, so I said yes, please! I can’t believe our premiere was last weekend!!”

The Dallas star has been bitten by the bug yet again. According to her IMDB profile, she currently has five projects in various stages of planning or production.

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