Saying goodbye is hard in any situation, but to say goodbye to one of your favorite characters can sometimes feel as hard as saying goodbye to a longtime friend. There are characters that we laugh and cry with, and often when the time comes for that character to mosey onto greener pastures, it’s common for any longtime viewer to feel more than a few bittersweet emotions.
The good news is that if a character departs a show that is still ongoing, you can still hold hope that perhaps they might return, even if it’s just for a few guest appearances. Even though we had to say goodbye to sweet Barney Fife, Don Knotts was kind enough to return to The Andy Griffith Show multiple times throughout the rest of the series run to remind us just how much we missed him.
Sometimes a character’s departure feels more final, like when Jean Stapleton left Archie Bunker’s Place, and the writers decided it was time for Archie’s better half to pass away, dashing all hopes that she’d return.
While Dennis Weaver was an integral part of Gunsmoke, he made the decision to leave the series. In his autobiography, All the World’s a Stage, Weaver explained, “I felt at the time that, if I didn’t break loose, I would never play anything else the rest of my acting career…I had to break loose.” Weaver was also looking for an opportunity where he was poised to play the leading man role, which he got once he was cast in Kentucky Jones.
Unfortunately, Weaver’s new series only lasted one season before it was canceled. With Weaver’s schedule suddenly open with more free time than he had previously anticipated, it’s no wonder that some fans might have questioned whether he might return to our screens as Chester Goode. One actor, however, advised against the decision, and that was Miss Kitty herself, Amanda Blake.
In an interview with the Associated Press, Blake reasoned that in the time Weaver had been away, the show had grown into something new than what it had been before he left. She stated, “The show has progressed since Dennis left.” Blake even ventured to say, “It would be a mistake to go back.”