Gidget (TV series)

Gidget is an American sitcom about a surfing, boy-crazy teenager called "Gidget" and her widowed father Russ Lawrence, a UCLA professor. Sally Field stars as Gidget with Don Porter as father Russell Lawrence. The series was first broadcast on ABC from September 15, 1965 to April 21, 1966.

Gidget was among the first regularly scheduled color programs on ABC, but did poorly in the Nielsen ratings and was cancelled at the end of its first season.

Background

The television series was based upon concepts and characters created by Frederick Kohner in his 1957 novel Gidget, the Little Girl with Big Ideas, which Kohner based upon the adventures of his teenage daughter Kathy. The novel was adapted into a 1959 movie starring Sandra Dee, James Darren and Cliff Robertson. The 1965 weekly, half-hour television series is seen by some as a sequel to the 1959 film, despite numerous discontinuities in plot, time frame and other details. It can also be seen as an independent incarnation, related to but distinct from either the novels or the films. Kohner served as a script consultant on the show.

Gidget (film)

Gidget is a 1959 Columbia Pictures CinemaScope feature film. It stars Sandra Dee, Cliff Robertson, and James Darren in a story about a teenager's initiation into the California surf culture and her affiliated romance with a young surfer. The screenplay was written by Gabrielle Upton, a nom de plume of Gillian Houghton who was then head writer of the soap opera The Secret Storm. This would be Upton's sole contribution to the Gidget canon. The screenplay was based upon Frederick Kohner's 1957 novel Gidget, the Little Girl with Big Ideas. The film was directed by Paul Wendkos. Gidget was the precursor to the "beach party film" genre and was followed by two sequel films, various television series, several telemovies, and the spoof Psycho Beach Party. Gidget received one award nomination.

Gidget is credited by numerous sources (Stoked! A History of Surf Culture by Drew Kampion; The Encyclopedia of Surfing by Matt Warshaw; Riding Giants documentary film by Stacy Peralta - to name just three) as being the single main influence to bring surfing and the surfing subculture into the American mainstream.