If you were a kid growing up in Texas in the late 1970s, you were probably a Dallas Cowboys fan. But they weren’t just for Texans—by the end of the decade, NFL Films deemed the Cowboys “America’s Team” during their championship season in 1978. The ’Boys had captured the attention and spirit of the country in a way not seen before by a professional sports team. The franchise took that nickname and ran with it faster than the team’s new running back, Tony Dorsett.
Performance on the field aside, there was one other major reason for the team’s popularity: the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders. For the first time, a pro sports team had sideline performers who attracted nearly as much time on camera as the players did. With their big, bouncy, Aqua Net-set hair, girl-next-door looks, and skimpy-but-not-too-revealing cowgirl outfits, the cheerleaders were a hot commodity—so hot, in fact, CBS produced a made-for-television movie based on them.
The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, starring then-28-year-old actress Jane Seymour, aired on Jan. 14, 1979, about a week before the Cowboys lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XIV—what is considered one of the greatest Super Bowl games of all time.
The plot, which is available on Prime, centers around a magazine editor (played by Bert Convy), pressured to increase circulation, who comes up with a scheme to expose “the most gorgeous girls in America” and their “phony PR.” To prove the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders are not “goodie-goodies,” he assigns an investigative journalist (Seymour) to infiltrate the squad. As Seymour’s character makes the cut and worms her way into friendships with the cheerleaders, though, she discovers there is more to the girls behind the pompoms.
The movie came in third the week it aired, behind Mork and Mindy and Laverne and Shirley, with a 33 Nielsen rating, the equivalent of 24.6 million homes watched it. According to its star, it was the highest-rated movie in television history. “It was only knocked off by the episode of ‘Who Shot J.R.?’” Seymour tells Texas Highways, referring to the Dallas Season 2 cliffhanger that caught the world by storm.
We spoke to the now-74-year-old actress about the 1979 television hit leading up to the latest season of her mystery series Harry Wild on Acorn, and the debut of the streaming service’s new show, Relative Secrets. Seymour opened up about what it was like to be a classically trained English thespian and ballet dancer suddenly immersed in the world of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.
TH: When you were filming the movie, how aware were you of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders phenomenon?
JS: Blissfully unaware. I had no idea what this phenomenon was and got a real wake-up call when we went out one night with a bunch of actual cheerleaders. The red carpet was out for the real cheerleaders. They stopped me and wouldn’t let me in to where they were.
TH: Despite being a trained dancer, did you have to go through a cheerleading boot camp?
JS: Yes. I had never done cheers. It was exhausting because you’re jumping up and down the whole time. It was quite a boot camp. I had enormous respect for them because they were in high-heel boots and very tiny shorts.
TH: What do you remember about the outfit?
JS: I remember standing on a box and whoever’s in charge of the cheerleaders came and physically cut the shorts to my actual backside. It was at that point I was like, “I thought I was a classically trained actress.” When you watch the film, you’ll see that quite often I’m covering myself up. I just didn’t get the memo. Well, I was playing the character who was infiltrating.
TH: Right, your character was a serious journalist.
JS: I think I took my actual character to heart.
TH: I recently watched the movie again and—
JS: I’m sure it’s terrible.
TH: It’s quite entertaining. And it has 4.3 stars on Amazon Prime.
JS: No way!
TH: People love it.
JS: I’ll tell you, they asked me to do Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders 2. But for way more money. Muggins said no—that’s an industry expression for an “idiot.”
TH: At the end of the movie, they let your character perform in a game. It looks like it was filmed on the stadium field.
JS: It was.
TH: But it also looks like there wasn’t a game going on and no audience.
JS: No, but in real life, after we finished filming, the actual Dallas Cowboys very sweetly invited me to be part of the squad, and I, stupid Jane Seymour, said no. And this is one of the great regrets of my life. They actually asked me to join the squad for one of the cheers or something in a real game, and I turned it down.
TH: Were you afraid of performing in front of that many people?
JS: No, I don’t know. Afterward, I saw the phenomenon. It was a wonderful introduction to another culture. In England, it would be soccer for me, it would be Chelsea Football Club.
TH: Do you ever get asked about the movie?
JS: You’re it. And I think if I’m in Dallas, they might ask me. But, no, I think you are currently it. Well done. My press agent said, “Do you really want to talk about The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders?” And I said, “Actually, in a perverse way, yes, because no one’s ever asked me about it.”
TH: In terms of the legacy, the cheerleaders continue to be hugely popular, with a new season of their reality TV show on Netflix, and they were just on a Texas tour.
JS: If I hadn’t snubbed them at the time, I’m sure I would be part of their history. But I think now that you’re setting this right, I apologize profusely for not performing when I was given this amazing opportunity.
TH: The headline of this can be, “Jane Seymour’s Biggest Regret in Life: Not Performing with the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.”
JS: One of them. There might be another regret or two in there.
