This article is about the television show. For the game, see Return to Eden (game) Return to Eden was the second game in the Silicon Dreams Trilogy, a series of text adventure games featuring the player in the character of Kim Kimberly. ...

Return to Eden was a Australian miniseries starring Rebecca Gilling, James Reyne (who was also a singer with pop band Australian Crawl), Wendy Hughes and James Smillie. It aired on the Nine Network in 1983. Rebecca Gilling is an Australian actress who came to prominence with an appearance in the film version of the controversial soap opera Number 96, followed by roles in television in Glenview High and The Young Doctors. ... James Reyne was born in Nigeria. ... James Smillie is a British-born actor, who emigrated to Australia at a young age. ... The Nine Network is an Australian television network, available in major markets across Australia. ... 1983 (MCMLXXXIII) is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Synopsis

Stephanie Harper (Gilling), a dull, Plain Jane heiress, gets married to a handsome but evil tennis pro, Greg Marsden (Reyne), who promptly begins an affair with Stephanie’s best friend Jilly Stewart (Hughes), and together they plot to murder Stephanie and lay claim to her fortune. Greg pushes Stephanie into a crocodile-infested river, and watches as she is apparently mauled to death. But Stephanie survives and is found washed up on a beach. She meets Dr. Dan Marshall (Smillie), a brilliant plastic surgeon who turns his talents into repairing her face and body. After the bandages are removed, Stephanie is transformed into a beautiful woman. Using the alias Tara Welles, Stephanie returns to Sydney and becomes a glamorous supermodel, whilst intending to exact vengeance on Greg and Jilly, and take back what is rightfully hers, particularly her beloved house “Eden”. Hence the title – Return To Eden.

TV Series

Such was the enormous success of the original mini-series that Return To Eden was reformatted into a regular series in 1986. The series premiered 11 February 1986 and had a run of 22 one-hour episodes. The events of the series took place seven years after the mini-series. The opening episode featured Jilly's release from prison and on-going storylines dealt with her and Stephanie's on-going enmity, and Stephanie's continued attempts to keep control of the family company, Harper Mining Ltd. Rebecca Gilling and James Smillie returned to reprise their roles from the original mini-series, whilst Peta Toppano took over the role of Jilly, playing her as a manic, petulant, scheming superbitch. In the series it was revealed that Jilly was actually Stephanie's half-sister. The newly introduced lead character Jake Sanders was ultimately revealed to be the brother of the late Greg Marsden. 1986 (MCMLXXXVI) is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Peta Toppano is a London-born actress who found success in Australian television, as part of the original casts of both The Young Doctors (playing Dr. Gail Henderson) and Prisoner (playing Karen Travers). ...

Cast

• Stephanie Harper - (Rebecca Gilling)
• Dr. Dan Marshall - (James Smillie)
• Jilly Stewart - (Peta Toppano)
• Jake Sanders - (Daniel Abineri)
• Cassie Jones - (Megan Williams)
• Dennis Harper - (Peter Cousens)
• Sarah Harper - (Nicki Paull)
• Tom McMaster - (Warren Blondell)
• Angelo Vitale - (Angelo D'Angelo)
• Bill McMaster - (Peter Gwynne)
• Johnno Ryan - (Keith Aberdein)
• Dave Welles - (Bill Kerr)
• Philip Stewart - (John Lee)
• Sheik Ahmal - (Robin Ramsay)
• Olive Down - (Suzanne Roylance)
• Joanna Randall - (Olivia Hamnett)
• Rena McMaster - (Wendy Playfair)

Rebecca Gilling is an Australian actress who came to prominence with an appearance in the film version of the controversial soap opera Number 96, followed by roles in television in Glenview High and The Young Doctors. ... James Smillie is a British-born actor, who emigrated to Australia at a young age. ... Peta Toppano is a London-born actress who found success in Australian television, as part of the original casts of both The Young Doctors (playing Dr. Gail Henderson) and Prisoner (playing Karen Travers). ... Megan Williams was an Australian actress and singer, best known for her role as Alice Sullivan in the television drama The Sullivans. ... Bill Kerr (born 1922) is an actor. ... Olivia Hamnett (d. ...

Series ending

The final episode screened in Australia ended on a cliffhanger in anticipation of a second season. Closing scenes featured Dennis being knocked unconscious by an unseen assailant. Meanwhile, upstairs at Stephanie's mansion while a party went on down stairs, Jilly pulled a gun on Stephanie in yet another attempt to murder her. As Jake attempted to wrest the gun from Jilly it fired, fatally wounding Jake, and he careened into the hallway and down the stairs to die in view of the shocked party guests. Jilly slipped the gun into Stephanie's hands and as they ran out to check on Jake she announced to the assembled guests that Stephanie had shot Jake.

Unfortunately the ratings had not proved high enough to justify a renewal so this cliffhanger was never resolved for Australian audiences. The actors playing Stephanie, Jilly and Dennis were later brought back to film a hasty conclusion to the various unresolved story threads. Dennis' abductor, revealed as his half-brother and Stephanie's long-lost son Chris (Graham Harvey) quickly abandoned his plan to hold Dennis to ransom when he learned Stephanie had been arrested for Jake's murder. Chris had in fact been following Stephanie so had witnessed the shooting incident, and what's more had photographs that proved what had happened. He quickly cleared Stephanie who was released while Jilly was arrested for murder. This new ending was never seen in Australia and only included in the version of the last episode that was sold internationally.

Analysis

The 1986 series of Return To Eden was obviously intended as an Antipodean answer to the glamorous "supersoaps" Dallas and Dynasty , with the requisite ostentatious fashions, boardroom struggles, bedroom romps and utterly outrageous storylines. At one point in the series Stephanie has to fake her own death yet again, this time coming back disguised as an Arab princess! It is fair to argue that Return To Eden successfully delivered all the stock soap pleasures with the Australian setting giving the show a certain ironic distance. Dallas was a long-running primetime television soap opera about the Ewings, a wealthy Texas oil family. ... Dynasty was an American primetime television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 1981 to May 1989. ...

See also

• List of Australian television series

This is a list of Australian television series and television programs. ...

External links

• Return to Eden (1983 miniseries) at the Internet Movie Database
• Return to Eden (1986 series) at the Internet Movie Database
• Classic Aussie Soaps: Return To Eden