Sister Terri is a sitcom pilot starring Pam Dawber as a former gang leader who's renounced her ways and become a nun. Coincidentally it was directed by Jerry Paris who also directed Robin Williams first episode as Mork on Happy Days.
The show itself was not picked up, but proved to be the catalyst for the casting of Mork & Mindy, as producers, Marcey Carsey, Tom Werner and Garry Marshall, all saw something in Pam Dawber that told them she would pair well with the manic new talent of Robin Williams.
Instead of creating a pilot for Mork & Mindy, the producers cut footage of Mork's first Happy Days episode together with shots of Dawber from this unsold pilot. This was done without Dawber's knowledge, and she only learned she'd been cast in the show after her agent read it in Variety.
Plot[]
Terri Morgan (Pam Dawber), formerly known as "Terri the Terror," was the leader of a gang called the Velvet Knuckles, but she gave up her sinning ways, donned a habit and began life anew as nun "Sister Theresa," hoping to be an inspiration to the kids she taught in grammar school. With her love for basketball, Terri pulled double-duty as the school's coach. Terri's superior, Mother Helen, has warned her to steer clear of gang related matters, but in the pilot, Terri intervened in a rumble between Satan's Slaves and The Frenchmen. Terri also had to contend with her younger teenage sister, Samantha, whom she was raising in an apartment near the convent, as well as her sister's boyfriend, Angel.
Cast[]
- Pam Dawber as Sister Terri
- Allyn Ann McLerie as Mother Helen
- Amy Johnson as Sister Agatha
- Robbie Lee as Samantha
- Scott Columby as Angel
- Kimberly Woodward as Jenny
- Derrel Maury as Bad Boy