THREE DECADES AFTER 'DALLAS,' LINDA GRAY STILL HAS LEGS

Years before she became a TV star on "Dallas," Linda Gray already had a considerable claim to fame - it's her leg that Dustin Hoffman is ogling in the poster for "The Graduate."

"I started out as a model going from one gig to another," explains Gray, who guest stars in the Hallmark Channel Mystery Movie "McBride." "That was just one of my afternoon modeling gigs - a leg shot," she recalls. "I had no idea that it was going to turn out to be what it turned out to be."

About her 11 year stint on the primetime soap, Gray remarks, "'Dallas' should have been a sitcom. We were a very funny cast. We wanted to do one like 'Airplane.' We begged them. But they said 'No, because if we do, nobody will ever take you seriously again.' And they were right." Gray was as thrilled to work with John Larroquette on "It's Murder, Madam" as he was to work with her. "There's a scene on the witness stand where it was like watching a ping pong game," she says. "He and I were at each other, back and forth. I loved it." Larroquette, title star of the murder mystery franchise, and co-president of their mutual admiration society admits, "I was smitten with Linda before ever meeting her. Being the strong, confident actor that she is - she gave everything she's got." "It's Murder, Madam" premieres Friday, March 4 (9/8 c) on Hallmark Channel.

-- HALLMARK CHANNEL --