Karen MacKenzie record for an actress on American primetime television. Karen's storylines focus on family troubles, addiction and kidnapping. In her early years on the serial, the character had much more of an "edge" in order to test the audience on who would be the most like J. R. Ewing (Larry Hagman), the primary character of its parent series "Dallas". (The bad girl role would later be taken on by Abby Cunningham, Karen's sister-in-law.) Over time, she became much more of a wholesome character. Series creator David Jacobs said "Karen is the tent pole. She says the things I want to say.
A House Divided (Dallas) was so strong that actor Larry Hagman had a 10-day holdout in which he demanded $100,000 (equivalent to $ in ) per episode, while Lorimar Productions offered $55,000 (equivalent to $ in ). After 10 days, Hagman agreed to work filming the subsequent season for $75,000 (equivalent to $ in ) per episode. Hagman had been working for $25,000 (equivalent to $ in ) per episode. The episode earned Fred W. Berger an American Cinema Editors Eddie Award for Best Edited Episode from a Television Series and earned Irving J. Moore a Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing