There once was a Long Island-set prime-time soap opera. It lasted 5 episodes.
Holly Roberts,left, and Bibi Besch were part of the casr of the ill-fated 1983 prime-time soap opera "The Hamptons." Credit: Comworld Productions/Everett Collection
In the summer of 1983, the hottest trend on network TV was the prime-time soap opera: Shows like "Dynasty," "Dallas," "Falcon Crest" and "Knots Landing" captivated viewers with their tales of treachery, romance and incest among the ultra-rich.
So, thought ABC, why not make room for one more, especially in the summer when these shows were airing reruns? That one more would be among TV's biggest turkeys and we can proudly hail it as our own.
We're talking about "The Hamptons," a misguided attempt to bring the daytime soap sensibility to prime time.
Yes, Long Island was (nominally) the setting. But if you blinked, it was gone.
"Nighttime megahits like 'Dynasty' and 'Dallas' were usually over the top to the point of campiness," explained Connie Passalacqua Hayman, a veteran soap opera journalist." "Everyone was mega-rich, the characters were bigger than life and wore outlandish costumes made by famous designers. In contrast, 'The Hamptons' was more like a toned-down daytime soap opera. It had no big stars like John Forsythe or Larry Hagman. Instead it featured mostly daytime soap retread actors. Even incest and murder story lines couldn't spice it up."
The show certainly had a good pedigree: It was created by Gloria Monty, who had turned "General Hospital" into a national phenomenon just two years earlier with its storyline about the romance and subsequent wedding of Luke (Anthony Geary) and Laura (Genie Francis).
"The Hamptons" focused on two feuding families, the Chadways and the Duncan-Mortimers, dynastic owners of a high-end Manhattan department store. A lot of the action thus had to take place in the city, but the characters did summer in East Hampton. The cast was populated mostly with daytime actors, the most well-known being Leigh Taylor Young ("Peyton Place") and Bibi Besch ("Somerset").
ABC gave "The Hamptons" a five-episode order, hoping that would be enough to stir viewers' interest to turn it into a full-season series. (CBS had tried the same five-part formula with "Dallas" in 1978 with much success.) The show was shot on videotape to look like a daytime drama and was filmed partially on the East End, with some segments taped in other parts of Long Island and Westchester. The show premiered on July 27 at 9 p.m.
On opening night, Newsday sent two reporters to the East End to gauge local reaction. Max Blum of New York and Sagaponack, who was watching the show with 10 others at J.G. Melon in Bridgehampton, didn't mince words: "It was the worst thing i saw in my life. It wasn't about the Hamptons, it was about hospitals."
And the Newsday reporters couldn't resist a little snark: "The viewers were impressed by the opening shots -- the windmill at Water Mill, the beach at Southampton, the country club in ... oops ... Westchester that's supposed to be Southampton."
After viewing the first episode, Newsday's longtime TV critic Marvin Kitman labeled the show a "festival of bad acting," bemoaning that the show did not look like real Hamptons. Kitman described "The Hamptons" as "a third-generation rip-off of 'Dallas,' moving the usual conflict from oil to merchandising. but it's the same venal people wishing everyone else was dead."
The Washington Post's critic made Kitman seem positively diplomatic: "Totally, irredeemably, amateurishly and idiotically worthless."
Over the next five weeks, viewers saw the usual daytime tropes: Boardroom battles, bitter family feuds, secret affairs, and the contrast between old aristocratic wealth and aggressive new money.
But viewers didn't tune in and the show aired its final episode of Aug. 24. And not surprisingly, ABC nixed the plant to make it a full-time series.
Today it is virtually impossible to find a full episode of "The Hamptons." The best you can do is a podcast discussion, a grainy video of the show's introduction or two trailers on YouTube. In the latter's 50 seconds you'll get a flavor of the show from the voice-of-God narrator ("From the bedrooms to the boardrooms") to some choice snippets of overheated acting. Don't forget to gape at those '80s hairdos.
On the other hand, maybe deep in the basement or wine cellar of an East Hampton mansion, someone has stashed their collection of "Hamptons" VHS tapes. If so, please share with the world immediately.
Andy Edelstein, Newsday's entertainment editor, supervises coverage of TV, celebrities, movies and pop music. He has written three books on popular culture, including "The Brady Bunch Book."
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