'Scruples' & 'Valley Of The Dolls' Return As Prime Time Soaps

[John]

http://popconfidential.zap2it.com/2011/09/26/glitzy-trash-novel-classics-scruples-and-valley-of-the-dolls-heading-to-tv#comment-201948

[DRW50]

NBC = a bunch of boring and generally unattractive people looking pensive in bad lighting

ABC = overlit and empty crap

Good luck there.

[quartermainefan]

The original Valley Of The Dolls was so perfect and of a time there is just no way any modern film can compete with it's glorious horribleness.

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They won't play it seriously and thereby create the camp factor, they will try to be campy and wind up not being entertaining at all.

this is the 1981 version and you can see the charm is just not there

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[EricMontreal22]

That's my main concern. Yes Valley's main appeal is camp (probably true of Scruples too, but I know nothing of it), but these revivals, I'm sure, will play upt he camp from the start--which will kill it.

[SFK]

My mom had the book Scruples and I remember flipping through it randomly and being shocked by how graphic some of those sex scenes were. Uhhhh, and the bitchy gay guy in the office, I can't even repeat here what he said/did.

Is anyone else thinking what I'm thinking re: Lee Daniels? Remember his admitted Susan Lucci fascination?

[All My Shadows]

I saw some parts of Scruples back when WEtv used to show all of those great 80s mini-series (Hollywood Wives! Deceptions! Sins! Scruples! Lace! Bare Essence! why SOAPnet never aired these, I will never know). I saw the book for sale at my university's annual used book fair a few years ago, but I didn't buy it because it would have took up too much space in my brown paper bag Wish I'd gotten it.

Valley of the Dolls...sigh. I read it earlier this year, and I really wish someone would come in and do a mini-series version of the book because the movie just glosses over ENTIRELY TOO MUCH for any of the characters to be likeable or for the story to make sense. I hated Anne with a passion all throughout the book, but she's even worse in the movie, which sucks, because Barbara Parkins is my boo.

[Cat]

The beauty of Valley of the Dolls, for me, was the retro aspect -- post-WW2 new England girl goes to NYC to make it big. Then there was the Judy Garland character. It is so gloriously old school it should be done almost completely seriously, like Mad Men with heightened Technicolor. Because otherwise it is going to look like just another episode of 90210.

Man, Judith Krantz was my crack back in the day. Nobody could write a sex scene quite like her. Shirley Conran's Lace was amazing, too. There is a boinkbuster book called Destiny and it's by Sally Beauman -- but came out just when that era of glitzy miniseries was coming to an end. I swear, if I had the money, I would make that book into a miniseries and try and shop it to the networks. It is awesome.

[DaytimeFan]

Valley of the Dolls could absolutely be done in the style of Mad Men and be a straight up hit.

Scruples is a harder sell, but if it's done as an ensemble like Dynasty, Dallas or Falcon's Crest, it has potential.

Prime time soaps always have potential.

All I can say is PAGING JOAN COLLINS!

[DRW50]

I hope no one will hire Lindsay Lohan for this.