Gidget - Television

Television

In 1965, the character was adapted for television in the sitcom series Gidget, starring Sally Field. The series reintroduced Larue, a timid, awkward girl who often accompanied Gidget on her zany escapades, and an older married sister Anne Cooper ("Ann Cooper" in the novels), both of whom appear in the original 1957 novel but are absent from the motion pictures. Gidget's brother-in-law, who appeared in the novels as Larry Cooper, an intelligent but condescending child psychiatrist was reinvented in the TV series as John Cooper, an obtuse but lovable psychology student. In the TV series, Gidget regarded both her sister and brother-in-law as clueless squares. In one of the first episodes, the producers sent Gidget's boyfriend Moondoggie east to Princeton University with the convenient understanding that both were free to date others while separated, thus opening plots to a variety of complications and guest stars. The sitcom essentially focused on the father-daughter relationship with Gidget receiving moral instruction from her father at episode's end and growing a little wiser from it. The sitcom ran for only one season, but spawned a devoted cult following.

In 1969, Karen Valentine starred as Gidget in the telemovie Gidget Grows Up, freely adapted from the 1968 novel Gidget Goes New York, but also functioning as a sequel to the 1965 sitcom series.

In 1972, another telemovie was made titled Gidget Gets Married, in which Gidget finally married longtime boyfriend Moondoggie. Monie Ellis played the title role. This incarnation of Gidget is unique in that it gives Moondoggie's real name as "Jeff Stevens." In the novels, the other telemovies and The New Gidget he is "Geoffrey H. Griffin" (the middle initial is mentioned only in the first novel); in the Hollywood films and the sitcom Gidget he is "Jeffrey Matthews." Later that year, Hanna-Barbera produced a 60 minute animated feature for television, Gidget Makes the Wrong Connection, with Kathy Gori as the voice of Gidget. It was broadcast as part of the Saturday morning series The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie.

In 1985, a follow-up of the 1965 sitcom series was launched with the telemovie Gidget's Summer Reunion, starring Caryn Richman as a grown version of the character played by Sally Field. This was followed by a sitcom series The New Gidget, which ran for two seasons, 1986–1988.