The New People

It is ironic that the top show on TV in the early 21st century, "Lost" echos greatly the rarely seen 1969 TV series, "The New People'. Like "Lost", "The New People" concerned the survivors of a plane crash in the pacific. "The New People' however was a reflection of the social issues of the day and in the pilot episode it featured the only adult in Richard Kiley. Kiley did a superb job in the clash of generations and made the pilot episode seem like a 1969 episode of The Twilight Zone.

All of the existing episodes of the New People aired only once on US TV and have never been even surfaced on internet tape trading sites. Recently however all of the episodes have been found at the UCLA video library. It would be great, now that "Lost" is such a big hit, to show people....new people, (ahem) what the original plane crash survivor show was like...and issue these episodes as a boxed set....for Christmas....perhaps even track down the original cast for commentary....etc......The New People shouldn't be lost forever.....(ahem)

Rod Serling as "Creator" is deceptive. He was probably in an executive capacity with little "creative" contribution. In other words, they used his august name.

If memory serves, this programme did not last a full season, and its 45 minute running time is a mystery. THE NEW PEOPLE was very much a product of its time, inspired much less by LORD OF THE FLIES than MOD SQUAD. It showed. To be honest, however, during the late '60s -- which I remember very well -- more than one middle-aged individual wondered how well all these griping young people could do if they were left to re-shape society. It is a small detail that starting from scratch in an environment red of tooth and claw is not the best way to test a high-falutin' hypothesis. The only "old guy" dies a long and expository death in the first episode, and life, such as it is, begins for the new society. Of course, by 1970 both great powers had high resolution spy satellites, although with non-Pacific targets, and it would be a matter of maybe two or three casualty filled years before things would be put to right. If they ever gave it a thought, that is probably how the "creators" planned to end the series.

For some bizarre reason, however, I found the theme attractive. Perhaps as a failed man in his middle-20s, I wanted to be off by myself on a non-desert isle with a nice high mountain at centre from which to watch the Sun go down and the Moon come up.

This started off as an excellent, but short-lived series about a group of college-aged students stranded on an island in the Pacific after an airplane crash. The premise was for this group of teenagers and early twenty-somethings to survive and, at the same time, develop some kind social order by learning to deal with the responsibilities of adulthood. The pilot episode was entitled "Day One" and was apparently written by Rod Serling under the pseudonym of John Phillips. The writer, John Phillips is also credited with a "Playhouse 90" episode entitled "The Second Happiest Day". This is interesting because Serling cut his TV teeth on numerous "Playhouse 90" episodes before "Twilight Zone". As I recall, "The New People" aired on ABC in the 1969-70 season with a 45-minute time format. This was one of the odd programming attempts that was done to capture a specific audience, as it came just before another 45-minute show entitled "Music Scene" hosted by David Steinberg. This short-lived series was produced by Aaron Spelling, who brought us "The Mod Squad" a year earlier (1968) and "The Young Rebels" a year later (1970). Of course, Rod Serling went on to host "Night Gallery" from 1970 to 1973.

I really enjoyed this when it was on -- two hip and interesting shows (it was paired with David Steinberg's show right afterward) that my parents didn't really get, cute young actors and both highly topical (well, Steinberg was more satirical). Or as topical as you got in 1969.

Yes (as noted above) Vietnam was on all our minds. This show struggled with issues we were confronting, at a level a young person like me could relate to. Frankly it taught skepticism of war but also cynicism about the human condition as the young idealists struggled again and again with the same dilemmas. Kind of a Lord of the Flies with less murder and more food. And girls.

I also remember being impressed with the innovative (and of course completely failed) time format, which I've never seen tried again.

Even though I was only three years old at the time this show came out, for some reason it stuck with me. One reason is the fact that it is one of the few failures in the illustrious career of the master television writer Rod Serling. It also marked one of the few failures for Aaron Spelling, who had just produced the Mod Squad and would later go on to dominate the 1970's with such shows as Charlie's Angels and the Love Boat. Another reason is the concept of the show. The whole concept of this show was that a plane carrying a group of college students on the way back from a trip abroad gets caught in a storm and crashes on a seemingly deserted island. However, this seemingly deserted island was an abandoned nuclear test site, which was completely stocked with enough provisions to keep them alive almost indefinitely. They then go about creating their own society complete with their own rules as they try to survive on the island. This show definitely was a product of its time, the late 1960's, when youth rebellion was was very prevalent. I think that this would have been better if instead of being a weekly series that it should have been either a movie of the week or maybe a mini-series and maybe it would have been remembered better.