Daily Inspiration Quote by Joan Van Ark

“Knots” lands like a half-sentence because it is one: a fan shorthand that assumes you already feel the gravity of Knots Landing, a show that ran long enough for time itself to become a character. Joan Van Ark isn’t selling a plot engine here; she’s quietly insisting that the point was endurance. That’s a telling choice from an actor whose most famous work depended on slow accrual rather than splashy twists.

The intent is both modest and corrective. In an era when soapiness is used as a punchline, Van Ark reframes the series as a long-form study of how people tangle and re-tangle over years: marriages fray, friendships calcify, betrayals become history, history becomes intimacy again. “Built” is the key verb. Relationships aren’t discovered; they’re constructed, maintained, renovated, sometimes sabotaged. The word smuggles in labor, patience, and the unglamorous repetition that TV usually edits out.

The subtext carries a defense of the medium, too. Long-running network drama gets dismissed as disposable, but Van Ark’s framing argues that duration is an artistic tool: the audience’s memory becomes part of the storytelling. You don’t just watch characters change; you remember who they used to be, which makes every reconciliation or relapse feel earned.

Contextually, it’s also an actor protecting legacy. By centering “many years,” she makes the case that the show’s value wasn’t any single iconic moment but the cumulative trust between performers, writers, and viewers - a relationship built the same way the characters’ were.