Mary Coustas remembers unaired Skirts episodes

Dancing with the Stars contender Mary Coustas is happy to show her serious side as well as her comic characters.

“I like doing high drama or high comedy. I like the highs. I’m not so big in the middle. I’m useless in the middle of the road,” she insists.

Her return to Seven comes after her celebrated run as Effie in Acropolis Now from 1989 until 1992, but there were other projects including a dramatic turn in police drama Skirts, for which 40 episodes were made in 1990. The cast also included Tracy Mann, Antoinette Byron, Nicholas Bell and Sally-Anne Upton.

But there are doubts the final 14 episodes ever went to air.

“I did a very dramatic episode being stuck in a lift with a dead body. I don’t know whether that ever saw the light of day. It was always going to be a hard hitting drama. and then they put us on at 7:30 after Disney on a Sunday night and that’s when the soap (storylines) started to appear. And I’m like, ‘I don’t think we’re making drama anymore!’ she tells TV Tonight.

“It was a great idea, very much motivated by Hill Street Blues and all that sort of stuff. All the gender commentary and issues that were were brought upon by male cops to the female cops. The title was an example of them calling them ‘Skirts.’ just undermining their own capacities. It started off as a great idea. I’m like,’ Yeah, this will be good’.

“There are people that really loved it. I just wanted it to be more hard hitting.”