Jonelle Allen Movies

Alan Fraser wrote and directed this drama about an interracial friendship. In 1992, 19-year-old Matt (Christian Campbell) leaves the Midwest for a life as an artist, moving into Black South-Central Los Angeles, where he's just about the only white face around. Complicating matters, he has no car. Visiting the local laundromat on Saturday nights, he meets single middle-aged black mother Evelyn (Jonelle Allen). With empty lives, the two soon become close friends, discussing drugs, violence and racism in their weekly laundromat meetings, interrupted when the 1992 LA riots begin. Shown at the 1998 Hollywood Film Festival and the 1998 Urbanworld Film Festival (NY). ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Additions to the cast of characters on Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman during the series' fifth year on the air include Katie Sully (played by various female members of the Calabreese family), newborn daughter of Colorado Springs' lady doctor, Michaela "Mike" Quinn (Jane Seymour), and her mountaineer husband, Byron Sully (Joe Lando), and Teresa Morales (Michelle Bonilla), who after arriving in town upon the death of her husband becomes the new schoolteacher in place of the Reverend Timothy Johnson (Geoffrey Lower) -- and briefly arouses the bigotry of certain townsfolk in the process. Recovering from her pregnancy, Dr. Mike tries to go back to work, only to find that her patients have become rather accustomed to her temporary replacement, Dr. Andrew Cook (Brandon Douglas). Elsewhere, Sully's friendship with Indian shaman Cloud Dancing (Larry Sellers) causes him to lose his job as local Indian agent; strapped for cash, Sully and Mike are rescued from penury by Sully's old pal Daniel Simon (John Schneider), a prospector who's struck it rich. Meanwhile, Mike's foster daughter Colleen (Jessica Bowman) begins attending college -- and dating the handsome Dr. Cook. Season five ends on a cliffhanger, as Dr. Mike is left alone when Sully helps Cloud Dancing jump his reservation -- and disappears in the massacre that follows. ~ All Movie Guide

There is reason aplenty to celebrate in the course of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman's third season. For one, Dr. Michaela "Mike" Quinn (Jane Seymour) and mountain man Sully (Joe Lando) have become engaged; for another, Colorado Springs finally becomes linked to the transcontinental railroad; and finally, telegraph operator Horace (Frank Collison) and his ex-saloon gal bride, Myra (Helene Udy), become parents. But the news is not so good for the local Cheyenne tribe and its spiritual leader, medicine man Cloud Dancing (Larry Sellers). Despite a trip to Washington, D.C., by Mike, Sully, and Cloud Dancing to plead for better treatment of the Cheyenne, and the appointment of Sully as local Indian agent, the entire tribe is massacred by the xenophobic General Custer (Jason Leland Adams) -- all except Cloud Dancing, who becomes a fugitive with a price on his head. In other traumatic developments, Dorothy Jennings (Barbara Babcock), owner of the town's newspaper, must undergo a mastectomy; teenage outlaw Belle Starr (Melissa Clayton) robs the local saloon; the townsfolk (except, of course, for Dr. Mike and her friends) react with hostility at the arrival of a Jewish family; and everyone is thrown into a panic when a comet streaks across the sky. Less serious but no less troublesome is the cattle drive embarked upon by Dr. Mike, her foster son Matthew (Chad Allen), and Sully when Matthew unexpectedly inherits 200 head of prime stock. Despite innumerable setbacks and tragedies, season three of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman ends on a high note, as Mike and Sully proudly march down the aisle. ~ All Movie Guide

Season two of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman introduces a new arrival in the town of Colorado Springs: Dorothy Jennings (Barbara Babcock), sister-in-law of crotchety storekeeper Loren Bray (Orson Bean). Given shelter by Dr. Michaela "Mike" Quinn (Jane Seymour) while escaping the wrath of her abusive husband, Dorothy must subsequently stand trial for her spouse's murder. In other dramatic developments, the growing affection between Dr. Mike and mystical mountain man Sully (Joe Lando) is threatened by, of all things, the ghost of Sully's late wife; Loren Bray's duplicitous buddy, town barber Jake Slicker (Jim Knobeloch), nearly incites a bloody war when he accidentally kills one of the local Cheyenne Indians; a typhus epidemic reveals a hitherto hidden government plan to commit full-scale genocide; the townsfolk react prejudicially to the arrival of a troop of black "Buffalo Soldiers"; a bitter strike at the local mine pits friend against friend; the Ku Klux Klan tries to persuade Dr. Mike's foster son Matthew (Chad Allen) to join their ranks; and Dorothy's disturbed war-veteran son puts the town on edge. On a happier note, in the two-part episode "Where the Heart Is," Dr. Mike returns to her native Boston to be with her ailing mother, a brief sojourn that culminates in a declaration of love -- and a marriage proposal -- from the heartsick Sully. This season concludes with another two-parter, wherein Dr. Mike is forced to choose between Sully and her former fiancé, David Lewis (Maxwell Caulfield) -- whom she assumed had been killed in the Civil War. ~ All Movie Guide

Kevin Rogers guest stars as David Watkins, a famed Civil War photographer. As the townsfok argue over who will be include and who will be left out of Watkins' proposed panoramic portrait of Colorado Springs, Dr. Mike (Jane Seymour) comes to realize that the photographer is suffering from diabetes -- and refuses to have it treated, even though he is rapidly losing his eyesight. Meanwhile, the dying Mrs. Bing (Rosemary Murphy) staunchly opposes the marriage between her son Horace (Frank Collinson) and Myra (Helene Udy). This was the final episode of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman's first season. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Her "romantic" experience gleaned from pulp magazines, Colleen (Erika Flores) develops a crush on Sully (Joe Lando) after he saves her life. Colleen then deliberately gets lost in the woods, hoping to be rescued again -- and nearly dies of frostbite. Meanwhile, Hank (William Shockley) foments racial animosity in town when he comes down with food poisoning and holds restaurant owner Grace (Jonelle Allen) responsible. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Barber Jake Slicker (Jim Knobeloch) goes off on a drunken binge after accidentally causing a customer to die of blood poisoning through the use of a dirty razor. Since Dr. Mike (Jane Seymour) is the one who leveled the accusation at Jake, it is up to her to get him to pull himself back together. Meanwhile, Dr. Mike's adopted children cook up a scheme to make her 35th birthday party one she will never forget. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Sully (Joe Lando) is beaten up by a band of scurrilous buffalo hunters, hired to clear the land on behalf of the incoming railroad. Though paralyzed, Sully vows to wreak vengeance against his attackers and to stem their slaughter of the local bison herds. Meanwhile, a slick con artist, posing as a railroad advance man, is busily swindling the citizens of Colorado Springs out of their hard-earned property. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Enjoying astonishing (and well-deserved) popularity at a time in TV history when dramatic programs trafficking in "family values" were few and far between, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman was also one of the last of that hardy breed known as the "TV Western." Set in Colorado Springs, CO, in the years just following the Civil War, the weekly, 60-minute series starred Jane Seymour as Michaela "Mike" Quinn, one of a handful of women doctors west of the Mississippi (or anywhere else!) during the second half of the 19th century. After the death of her father and medical partner, Dr. Mike left her hometown of Boston to set up practice in the hardscrabble village of Colorado Springs. Not surprisingly, she encountered much hostility and mistrust from the townsfolk, but gradually won them over not only because of her medical brilliance, but because she was almost unerringly "in the right" at all times. When one of her first patients, Charlotte Cooper (Diane Ladd), died of a snakebite, Dr. Mike inherited the woman's three children, who at the outset of the series ranged in age from 10 to 17. Oldest son Matthew Cooper (Chad Allen) grew up to become the town's sheriff, and later went off to study law; daughter Colleen (played by Erika Flores from 1993 to 1995, thereafter by Jessica Bowman) eventually followed Dr. Mike's footsteps by pursuing a medical career, and ultimately married her foster mother's young assistant, Dr. Andrew Cook (Brandon Douglas); and youngest Chandler boy, Brian (Shawn Toovey), got into many a scrape -- some of them near-fatal -- in the course of the series.

Also in the cast was Joe Lando as taciturn mountain man Byron Sully, who spent most of his time communing with nature (including his pet wolf) and commiserating with the local Cheyenne Indian tribe. In the early episodes, Sully was merely the man who owned the house rented by Dr. Mike and her "instant" family; later on, he and Mike fell in love, got married, and had a daughter named Katie. The huge, rotating cast of recurring characters included curmudgeonly (and, initially, downright nasty) storekeeper Loren Bray (Guy Boyd in the pilot episode, Orson Bean thereafter); Bray's sister-in-law, Dorothy Jennings (Barbara Babcock), editor of the town newspaper; Grace (Jonelle Allen), a black woman who owned the town diner; telegraph operator Horace Bing (Frank Collison) and his bride, Myra (Helene Udy), a former saloon girl; Myra's ex-boss Hank (William Shockley), owner of the local "sporting house"; Rev. Timothy Johnson (Geoffrey Lower), who functioned as the town schoolteacher until Teresa Morales (played first by Michelle Bonilla, then by Alex Meneses) took over; Loren Bray's conniving buddy, barber Jake Slicker (Jim Knobeloch); Sully's old pal, wealthy ex-prospector Daniel Simon (John Schneider); and the much-maligned Cheyenne medicine man Cloud Dancing (Larry Sellers), whose persecution at the hands of the U.S. military aroused the fire-breathing activism of pioneering feminist and humanitarian Dr. Mike.

Our heroine also fought tirelessly for the rights of blacks, Hispanics, battered wives and practically everyone else who suffered under the weight of bigotry and misunderstanding in the Old West. Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman was far and away CBS' most successful and beloved Saturday-night series throughout its five seasons on the air, and has remained an audience favorite on cable and in syndication. ~ All Movie Guide

Tony Richardson, who in his days of prominence directed the Oscar-winning Tom Jones (1963), demonstrated in 1986's Penalty Phase that the intervening years did not dim his talent in the least. Peter Strauss stars as a liberal judge, in the midst of a re-election campaign. Strauss has been under fire from his enemies for being too soft on criminals. He intends to prove otherwise while presiding over the case of a vicious mass murderer and rapist (Richard Chaves). Shortly after a guilty verdict is reached, Strauss is tipped off anonymously that the defendant right's may have been violated during interrogation. While the jury enters "the penalty phase" wherein they must decide on proper punishment, Strauss undergoes a profound moral dilemma: Should he honor the letter of the law, thereby incurring public wrath and losing all hopes for being re-elected? Scripted by former lawyer Gail Patrick Hickman, the made-for-TV Penalty Phase was originally telecast November 18, 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This macabre, whimsical, erotic, dark, seriocomic film is a complex tale about an eccentric family and the psychological and emotional maelstroms that follow them around from New England to New York to Vienna, where the Hotel New Hampshire is located. Writer-director Tony Richardson worked from the convoluted novel by John Irving that covers most universally saleable topics -- homosexuality, death, incest, abandonment, Nazis, masochism, terrorists, rape, mental instability, and anarchists. The children in the family are the main focus: John (Rob Lowe) is a womanizing high-school student with a deep-rooted desire for his own sister; Franny (Jodie Foster) is the eldest daughter, a victim of a gang rape, now morbidly fascinated by one of the rapists, and equally attracted to her brother with incestuous desire; Frank (Paul McCrane) is the younger gay brother; and Lilly (Jennifer Dundas) is the little sister who blossoms into a famous author. Associated with the family is Suzie the Bear (Nastassja Kinski) who is not secure enough to come out of her bear suit. One friend of the family, Freud (Wallace Shawn), has been blinded by the Nazis and is running the Hotel New Hampshire in Vienna when he asks everyone to come and help him out. By this time, the plot has run out of room, and the climactic endings to several unresolved relationships happen in quick succession. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide