Peter Pan Slightly David Bean Director Tootles Ian Tucker Jerome Robbins Ostrich Joan Tewkesbury Crocodile Norman Shelly Programming Wendy (as adult) Ann Connolly History NBC Nibs Paris Theodore Two hours; March 7, 1955 Noodler Frank Lindsay Executive Producer Further Reading Richard Halliday Hanson, Bruce K., The Peter Pan Chronicles: The Nearly /00 - Year History of the "Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up," Secau- Producer cus, New Jersey: Carol. 1993 Martin, Mary, My Heart Belongs, New Quill, 1984 Fred York: Coe Rivadue, Barry, Mary Martin: A Bio-Bibliography, New York: Greenwood, 1991 Peyton Place U.S. Serial Melodrama When it appeared on ABC, at that time still the third - in Latin America, telenovela, and Francophone ranked U.S. network, Peyton Place, a prime -time pro- Canada, telerornan.) Set in a small New England town, gram based on the Grace Metalious novel, was an Peyton Place dealt with the secrets and scandals of two experiment for American television in both content generations of the town's inhabitants. An unmarried and scheduling. Premiering in the fall of 1964, Peyton woman, Constance MacKenzie, and her daughter, Alli- Place was offered in two serialized installments per son, were placed at the dramatic center of the story. week, Tuesday and Thursday nights, a first for Ameri- Constance (played by 1950s film melodrama star can prime -time television. Initially drawing more at- Dorothy Malone) eventually married Allison's father. tention for its moral tone than for its unique Elliott Carson, when he was released from prison, scheduling, the serial was launched amid an atmo- though his rival Dr. Michael Rossi was never entirely sphere of sensationalism borrowed from the novel's out of the picture. Meanwhile, Allison (Mia Farrow) reputation. ABC president Leonard Goldenson de- was caught up in a romantic triangle with wealthy fended the network's programming choice as a bread- Rodney Harrington (Ryan O'Neal) and Betty Ander- and-butter decision for the struggling network, and the son (Barbara Parkins), a girl from the wrong side of moral outcry settled down once the program estab- the tracks. Over the course of the series, Betty tricked lished itself as implying far more sensation than it Rodney, not telling him until after they were married would deliver. This prototype of what came to be that she had miscarried their child; Rodney fled and known in the 1980s as the prime -time soap opera ini- found love with Allison, but Allison disappeared; tially met with great success: a month after Peyton Betty was married briefly to lawyer Steven Cord but fi- Place premiered, ABC rose in the Nielsen ratings to nally remarried Rodney. Other soap -operatic plotlines number one for the first time. At one point, the pro- involved Rodney's younger brother, Norman Harring- gram was so successful that a spin-off serial was con- ton, and his marriage to Rita Jacks. sidered. Both CBS and NBC announced similar The production schedule was closest to that of day- prime -time serials under development. time soap opera, with no summer hiatus, no repeats, Executive producer Paul Monash rejected the "soap unlike any prime -time American series before or since. opera" label for Peyton Place, considering it instead a Within the first year, the pace was increased to three "television novel." (His term is, in fact, the one applied episodes per week rather than two, going back to two 1754 .