The “Dolls” of course, were the pills. The stuff given to all the poor stars and starlets of mid-century by the studios. Dolls to get up, dolls to get you through the day, dolls to get you to sleep. Alas, poor Judy Garland was exhibit A for what dolls can do to you, sending her to an early grave at just 47.
The film adaptation is a curiosity, so long as you view it like a soaper comedy. I pity poor Patty Duke who didn’t realize they were going for high camp where the material was concerned. She thought she was making another “The Miracle Worker” and nabbing another Oscar. It was going to be difficult to adapt, regardless, because it followed the trials and tribulations of its female heroes (which were thinly-veiled depictions of real people) over a period of decades. Having a fresh-faced Barbara Parkins play the lead role at the start and still being fresh-faced at the end of the film where she was supposed to be world-weary decades later (when it looked like only weeks had passed by) just wasn’t going to translate well on film. Boy, though, they did have that nice song by Miss Dionne Warwick for the theme, so at least it had that going for it.
Getting back to “Peyton Place” for a moment, I got to visit the lovely town in Maine (Camden) where they filmed it in the late ‘50s. Other than for the cars, it looked unchanged when I went there in 1994. Alas, the values had so dramatically changed (and even more so since). Curiously, Grace Metalious hated the film adaptation despite making a decent chunk of change (for the era) off the film.