I worked with you as an extra in five or six episodes. Legacy was a wonderful series for the Richmond film-making community and we liked you very much, both on-set and off. For years afterwards I sometimes drove into the village set area off Staples Mill Road and gazed wistfully at the wooden exteriors of the buildings until finally someone bought the property and cleared them all away.
While the show was in production, I monitored our viewership and placement in the weekly Nielsen ratings. I just couldn’t believe that a show with such a great cast, solid acting, amazing camera work and high production values could do so poorly in the ratings.
I am a loss control consultant for a high-hazard worker’s compensation insurance carrier. One Spring day in 1999 I was driving to a manufacturing plant in an industrial area in Baltimore to do a survey when the reason for the show’s poor ratings hit me like a ton of bricks. Lea Moreno and Ron Melendez’s characters gazed at each other with longing in extreme close-up from atop a billboard next to a factory. Who were they trying to appeal to in that area? There wasn’t a residence in sight, just factories and railroad tracks.
I thought about that for a while and realized the network killed the show with an ill-advised campaign that failed to appeal to their core audience. They just didn’t promote the show the way they should have.
I really liked this series!
]]>Thank you,
TL