Broadcast Twice a Week (or More)

For the most part, network prime time television has focused on weekly programming, scripted or otherwise. Each week a new episode (or a repeat) is broadcast and then the following week another new episode (or another repeat) is shown. This has been the norm for more than six decades. In a few select cases, primarily during the first few years of the network television, some shows were aired more than once a week. In 1964, ABC’s Peyton Place burst onto the scene and changed everything, at least for a few years.

In the late 1940s and the early 1950s when broadcast television was still young, it was relatively common for some programs to be shown two or three times a week or more. News, of course, was a nightly affair, but so too were many musical/variety shows. For example, between May of 1948 and May of 1949, CBS aired Face the Music twice a week, three times a week, four times a week and five times a week. The show had numerous time slots but was most often broadcast from either 7:30-7:45PM or 7:45PM-8PM.

NBC offered Musical Almanac, which also ran fifteen minutes, several times a week between May of 1948 and April of 1949. It doesn’t appear to have ever had a set schedule. For many years DuMont broadcast Captain Video and His Video Rangers five days a week (sometimes six times with an additional airing on Saturday). NBC showed Kukla, Fran and Ollie five days a week from 1948 to 1952; ABC would air the series Monday through Friday from 1954 to 1957.

For the most part these programs were only fifteen minutes long and weren’t scripted (Captain Video is one exception). One scripted sitcom that ran more than once a week was Mary Kay and Johnny. From June to August of 1949, NBC broadcast the series every night of the week from 7:15-7:30PM. Otherwise, the vast majority of scripted prime time programming was and always has been weekly.

Except for a brief period in the mid-1960s, that is, when ABC sparked a short-lived fad that quickly saw each of the networks offering at least one program (many of them scripted) at least twice a week.

When ABC announced it would be airing a twice-weekly, half-hour television series based on the best-selling novel Peyton Place, there were two things to be shocked about. First, the content of the novel, written by Grace Metalious and first published in 1956, was filled with sex and violence and many other morally objectionable things. The 1957 movie version was toned down somewhat but still, the idea of Peyton Place on television was questionable. So, too, was the idea of Peyton Place airing twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Reporting on the network’s 1964-1965 schedules on January 29th, 1964, Val Adams of The New York Times called Peyton Place a “major innovation” that “might qualify as the first nighttime serial” [1]. Terry Turner of The Los Angeles Times wrote that ABC “will be trying one of the most unusual program maneuvers in years” while revealing that “the proposed television series bears no resemblance to the sordid book that is one of the biggest sellers in recent years” [2].

Turner also gave some indication of how ABC viewed Peyton Place:

More noteworthy, perhaps, is the plan to present two episodes of “Peyton Place” each week. ABC officials insist it can be done without jeaopardizing the project.

One immediately ownders what would happen if a viewer chose to watch, say, on Tuesday evening but declined on Thursday. Woudld he miss anything? Would he be able to then watch the next Tuesday? ABC says Yes–each episode would be a “self-contained unit that, however, leaves the viewer with a desire to see the next show.”

If ABC can pull that one off, it would be the trick of the year. [3]

Although Peyton Place would be the first “nighttime serial” in the United States, Turner pointed out that the most popular television series in the United Kingdom at the time, Coronation Street, aired twice a week on ITV. Would the concept work in the United States? Paul Monash, executive producer of Peyton Place, suggested that serialized television would offer creative freedom: “My interest in serials stems from my growing impatience with the episodic, self-enclosed TV dramas that must rush helter-skelter through a plot to reach a quick and easy climax” [4]. He also suggested that Peyton Place should be viewed as a television novel rather than a prime time soap opera [5].

Peyton Place would also be the first television series in the United States to offer new episodes through the summer repeat season. Said Monash, “we couldn’t do a single rerun even if we wanted to. Each segment bears a direct relationship to the preceding one, and, once it’s aired, it just can’t be replayed” [6]. There was a lot riding on Peyton Place when it premiered in September of 1964. It was testing a whole new format for television.

The first episode of Peyton Place aired on Tuesday, September 15th, 1964. It drew a 27.1 Trendex 26-city rating; the following week, on Tuesday, September 22nd, it beat the season premiere of Petticoat Junction on CBS, 23.9 to 19.1 according to Trendex [7, 8]. The Thursday installment also did quite well, beating the Tuesday episode in Nielsen’s 30-city report for the week ending October 11th, 1964 [9].

Cast of Peyton Place – September 19th, 1964
Copyright © TV Guide, 1964 [1]

Peyton Place may not have topped the Nielsen charts but it was nonetheless an instant success with strong ratings for ABC. That led critic Hal Humphrey to worry that the series was television’s Waterloo:

…the current TV season could turn out to be catastrophic for both networks and advertisers, should Peyton Place be the only new series to maintain a high rating in the weeks to come.

By networks’ misinterpreting such a turn of events to mean that viewers crave nighttime soap-opera in twice and three-times weekly dosages, we could wind up next season with mostly old movies and Son of Peyton Place or Return to Peyton Place. [10]

Humphrey was right on the money. In fact, The New York Times had reported in June of 1964 — months before Peyton Place premiered — that the show’s executive producer Paul Monash was already “laying plans for another” serial; Warner Brothers, meanwhile, had scriptwriter Paul West working on a proposed serial to be titled Jack and Jill about a newly married couple [11].

Television Magazine reported in its November 1964 issue that production companies were already looking for the next Peyton Place. Screen Gems had two pilots underway, “both designed along Peyton Place lines,” while 20th Century Fox was in talks with ABC to film a “Peytonish” pilot based on The Long, Hot Summer [12]. There was also talk that Peyton Place would expand to three nights each week during the 1965-1966 season [13].

In the meantime, Peyton Place continued to deliver strong ratings for ABC. Jack Gould reported in early December that the network “had spectacular success with its line-up of new programs directed to young families, particularly in ‘Bewitched’ and ‘Peyton Place’” [14]. On December 28th, ABC announced it had renewed Peyton Place for the 1965-1966 season and would be keeping the series on the air throughout the summer with new episodes [15].

As the new year got underway so too did the rumors of new prime time serials. On January 5th, 1965 The Chicago Tribune reported that ABC was planning to premiere The Long, Hot Summer in April and then, should the series prove a hit with viewers, expand it to twice a week in September [16]. On January 20th, Hedda Hopper revealed that NBC was hoping to have Flipper on the air twice a week [17].

In a move that should have surprised absolutely no one, TV Guide reported in its January 23rd issue that ABC was planning a spin-off of Peyton Place to be called The Girl from Peyton Place. It would see the character of Betty Anderson, played by Barbara Parkins, move to New York City and would premiere during the summer of 1965 as a once a week series before moving to twice a week in the fall.

The magazine stressed the new show was still in the embroyonic stages. Said William Self of 20th Century-Fox, “all of this is still conversation. ABC has not ordered the show. Irna Phillips is developing a project, but nothing is on paper. In fact, Barbara Parkins has not even been told” [18].

A few days later, Larry Wolters reported that NBC was developing a serial called The Duffield Story about a famous stage actress with a 18-year-old son; Robert J. Shaw was writing the first script. The network also had two other potential serials in the works, one of which would start on Mondays and end on Tuesdays each week [19].

And the rumors just keep flying. According to Herb Lyons, Irna Phillips wanted to take her daytime soap, As the World Turns, to prime time on CBS twice a week [20]. Val Adams passed along word that NBC was considering Dr. Kildare for the twice weekly treatment, to air on Monday and Tuesdays [21].

As the networks began to finalize their 1965-1966 schedules, critics couldn’t help but notice the prolifiration of multi-weekly serials. Paul Molloy noted that ABC would have Peyton Place, The Girl from Peyton Place and potentially The Long, Hot Summer all running at least twice a week in the fall of 1965. “ABC clearly intends to lean strongly on violent human conflicts next season. Whether this is called h eavy drama or soap opera, it is obviously catching on in the rating marketplace” [22].

The Girl from Peyton Place was confirmed for ABC’s fall schedule on February 5th by The New York Times, with the network’s vice president of programming revealing that the series would air on Mondays and Fridays from 9:30-10PM [23]. Broadcasting confirmed The Girl from Peyton Place in its February 8th issue [24]. On February 16th Herb Lyon confirmed his earlier report that CBS would bring As the World Turns to prime time; he also confirmed that NBC would show Dr. Kildare twice a week [25].

Only days later, however, Val Adams revealed that The Girl from Peyton Place had been put on hold; Peyton Place, however, would add a Friday installment in June [26]. And on February 21st he explained that CBS would not be airing As the World Turns in prime time but a twice weekly spin-off. Irna Phillips, who created the soap opera, said that “as far as I know, this is the first time in the history of television an radio that there has been a spin-off of a daytime serial to a nighttime serial” [27].

Of all the concepts that were floated as possible prime time serials in the wake of Peyton Place, only two actually made it to the air. Dr. Kildare was sliced in half for its fifth and final season, with episodes airing Monday and Tuesday from 8:30-9PM. And CBS did show a spin-off of its daytime soap opera As the World Turns, called Our Private World, twice a week from May to September of 1965.

Advertisement for Our Private World – May 1st, 1965
Copyright © TV Guide, 1965 [2]

Our Private World starred Eileen Fulton as Lisa Hughes, a young divorcee transplanted from Oakdale, Illinois (the fictional setting of As the World Turns), to Chicago where she gets a job at a hospital. The series aired on Wednesdays from 9:30-10PM and Fridays from 9-9:30PM. Following its cancellation Fulton would return to As the World Turns. TV Guide’s Cleveland Amory reviewed the series for its June 26th issue:

Altogether it is the first show we’ve seen in a long time where literally nothing is good — the idea, the producing, the writing or the directing. As for the acting, it has to be seen to be believed — and, believe us, it shouldn’t be. The girls are bad and the boys are worse. One thing this show does, though. It makes Peyton Place look great. In fact, the only thing we cannot fault is the title, Our Private World. The mistake was in making it public. [28]