Harry regales the representatives from Life Cereal:
So the Shusters move in to what used to be the Harrington house, and meanwhile Betty gets extremely jealous when she sees Allison dancing with Rodney at the after party. But then Michael asks Betty to dance with him, and then also dances with Claire. And that is all I can tell you about the next few weeks of Peyton Place.
Here is the IMDb synopsis (complete with typos) of Season 1, Episode 70 of Peyton Place (original air date May 18, 1965):
All of the guest have arrived at the Wayside Church for Connie and Elliot’s wedding, except for Connie. Before she gets in, Allison gives her a necklace. At the church, they are finally married. Meanwhile, the Schuster family move in their stuff in the former Harrington house. Betty becomes jealous when she sees Rodney dancing with Allison at the after party. Michael asks Betty to dance with him and later dances with Claire. Everyone seems to be happy, except for Norman. He gets a violent outburst and accuses everyone of being liars.
Hahahaha! I love me for finding that.
And by the way, kudos to Rich Sommer for spewing out all that gobbledygook with such enthusiasm. While pouring drinks. I don’t want to know how many takes that required (well, yes I do). It must have been a riot!
17 Responses to “Peyton Place”
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I love you for finding that, too!
And, kudos to Rich Sommer for pulling that off with a straight face.
Weiner might be slyly commenting to MM's fans with Harry's spoilers. Peyton Place, originally a 1955 novel written by housewife Grace Metalious, then a 1958 movie with Lana Turner, was a wildly popular show in the mid-60s–in fact, when Mia Farrow, who played Allison MacKenzie, cut her beautiful long straight hair (in a fit of pique during her romance with Frank Sinatra), it made the cover of Life Magazine. You can find more info in Inside Peyton Place: The Life of Grace Metalious, written by a friend of mine, Emily Toth. (Bit of Hollywood inside info: Sandra Bullock optioned Emily's book back in 2005 and was seriously psyched up to play Grace–which she hoped would get her an Oscar nomination–but the screenplay was botched by my arch-nemesis and so the project was permanently shelved.)
I wasn't alive when the show was on (and never saw the movie), but I read a lot & I did read the book a while back and liked it.
Is this Peyton Place person related to Peyton List? ::It's okay — I'll show myself out.::
Ha! Possibly her parents named her after the book or the movie?
BTW, my favorite cereal has always been Life. In recent years, I've switched to Cinnamon Life, but the recent episode made me think I should try buying "regular" Life for a change of pace.
Peyton Place was a pretty big hit for ABC in the 60s. I remember that it and Batman were both on twice a week during their primetime run.
There was a movie earlier, which was based on the 1956 novel by Grace Metalious.
If you ever get a chance to see the History Channel series "The Fifties," there are a couple of segments about the book and the author – neither of which were very typical for the staid Eisenhower era.
Here's what I recall about Peyton Place, being Bobby Draper's age in the mid 60's.
First, there was a story that my grandmother had caught my two uncles (mother's younger brothers) with a copy of the book and gave them a good verbal thrashing. They were in high school in the late 50's and were caught reading it on the sly, a la the SC ladies with Lady Chatterley's Lover. It was considered a hugely immoral read at the time.
The TV show was never on in my house. There was a lot of self-censorship back then, but where I grew up we only received two stations in the mid 60's, a CBS and an NBC, so we never watched any of ABC's programing.
Peyton Place was a town in New Hampshire named after Samuel Peyton who lived in a castle. I was not allowed to watch the TV show, ever, and the movie was also banned in our house once it showed up on TV. But I found a copy of the book at a library sale when I was in high school. I guess for the times it was pretty dirty – Serena was raped by her stepfather and later shot him. And Allison McKenzie had an affair with her married editor in New York. I think there might have been some creepy stuff between Norman and his mother, too.
Of course, it has nothing on Mad Men.
Oh, it brought back memories, all right. I saw a paperback perched on top of the fridge. I asked my mother, why is that up there? Oh never mind. Anyway, she was reading it because she was watching the show. Just like nowadays, something becomes popular on tv or at the movies & people buy the original book. I climbed onto a stool to fetch it a few days later, but she caught me. Busted. She was pretty open with what I wanted to read but not in this case. I remember stomping off to bed, upset, because I really wanted to know about this Allison person & all the people the adults were chatting about.
[...] Peyton Place | Basket of Kisses [...]
Would you believe that there’s a connection between a popular DC area radio station and Peyton Place?
It’s a tenuous connection, but here’s the story …
In the 60s, when Top 40 radio was big, stations would always try to capitalize on things that were going on in pop culture.
One example of this, from 1964 at the start of Beatlemania, WABC in NYC referred to itself as W-A-Beatle-C, and gave the time/temperature checks in Beatle Minutes and Beatle Degrees.
In my part of the country (Washington DC), in the late 60s, a popular Top 40 station was WPGC. One of their disc jockeys was called Bob Peyton.
It was one of the station’s “house names”. When they hired a fellow named Bob Burian, in 1967, they gave him the name “Bob Peyton” to capitalize on the popularity of the hit show Peyton Place. Another jock had been using the name there, but he was hired by a competing station, but since WPGC owned the name, he couldn’t take that name to the new station.
Here’s a link to hear a short segment from New Years Day 1968, featuring Bob Peyton counting down the top 100 songs of 1967 …
http://www.amandfmmorningside.com/wpgc_aircheck_1968_01_01st_bob_peyton_top_100_of_1967.html
Oh how I loved WPGC, AM and FM, Morningside, Maryland! I was a kid in glee club at Camp Springs Elementary School in the 6th grade when we went on a field trip to WPGC to sing Christmas carols on the radio. It was a great station in the mid-sixties, and I listened to it religiously on my aqua transistor radio. Thanks for the link!
GoodSally –
Here are two other links you’re sure to enjoy …
http://www.98wrc.com/
http://www.thejoyboys.com/
Solves the question as to whether the term “after party” was anachronistic.
T-6 minutes
Heads up for the moderators:
“Tags: Petyon Place, Waldorf Stories”
“petyon” mis-spelled
Haha! Ya’ll are reminding me…I never watched the soap Peyton Place…LOVE the movie….and I’m reminded of one of my fave 60s movies, “The Impossible Years”…with the youngest daughter Abbie stealing peeks at the risque novel “Fanny Hill”..;O)
Here’s what I recall about Peyton Place, being Bobby Draper’s age in the mid 60′s.
First, there was a story that my grandmother had caught my two uncles (mother’s younger brothers) with a copy of the book and gave them a good verbal thrashing. They were in high school in the late 50′s and were caught reading it on the sly, a la the SC ladies with Lady Chatterley’s Lover. It was considered a hugely immoral read at the time.
The TV show was never on in my house. There was a lot of self-censorship back then, but where I grew up we only received two stations in the mid 60′s, a CBS and an NBC, so we never watched any of ABC’s programing.