Fifty years after Charlie’s Angels first put Jaclyn Smith on television screens around the world, the actress has opened up about what was happening behind the scenes — from pay disputes and shifting cast dynamics to cocaine use and an unexpected invitation to a threesome.
Smith, now 80, played Kelly Garrett alongside Farrah Fawcett and Kate Jackson when the series premiered on September 22, 1976. The show became an instant hit, turning its three leads into stars almost overnight and eventually running for five seasons until 1981. Half a century later, Smith is still surrounded by reminders of the series, from the Charlie’s Angels theme playing on the phone at the gate of her Los Angeles home to a bronze sculpture gifted to her by Fawcett.
“Who would have dreamed the afterlife of Charlie’s Angels would be like this?” Smith tells People.
Her new memoir, I Once Knew a Guy Named Charlie, goes behind the polished television image and reveals just how different things could be once the cameras stopped rolling. One of her earliest battles was over money. Jackson was offered $10,000 per episode, while Fawcett was offered $5,000 and Smith just $3,000. Smith refused to accept the gap, telling her agent she would walk unless she received the same pay as Fawcett. She eventually got a raise.
Fawcett departed after the first season to pursue more dramatic roles, leaving Jackson and Smith to adjust to a new dynamic with Cheryl Ladd, who joined as Kris Munroe. Smith says Jackson was intense and fought for what she wanted, while Ladd was more relaxed, leaving Smith feeling caught between two very different personalities.
The cast changed again when Jackson left after season three. Shelley Hack took her place before Tanya Roberts joined the series for its final run. According to Smith, Roberts was unusually open about her private life, including her open marriage to husband Barry Roberts. During a flight to Hawaii for filming, Smith says Roberts propositioned her about joining the couple for a threesome.
Smith declined, but says she admired Roberts for being so candid about her sexuality, describing her openness as “brave and self-aware”. Roberts died in 2021, aged 65.
The revelations become darker when Smith discusses the show’s final season. By then, she says, cocaine had become increasingly visible around the set. Smith retreated to her motor home as drug use became more prevalent, writing that she spent a great deal of time there towards the end of the series. She has never used cocaine herself and says she never intends to, having watched the drug change people for the worse.
Smith knew season five would be her last, but the chaos behind the scenes ultimately didn’t erase the relationships formed during the show’s original run. Her friendships with Fawcett and Jackson endured long after Charlie’s Angels disappeared from the schedule.
“After the applause, the friendship is still there,” Smith says. “That sisterhood was strong.”
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Last modified: September 9, 2026
