The cast of ‘The Love Boat.’

By Randal Hill
Guest Columnist

Can you imagine a TV series changing the fortunes of a major business?

From 1977 to 1987, millions of television viewers set aside Saturday nights to enjoy Aaron Spelling’s ratings behemoth “The Love Boat” on ABC-TV.

As goes an old saying, nobody loved the show except the public. Critics detested it, citing corny jokes and absurd storylines. Some early cynics even predicted that Spelling’s offering would sink faster than the Titanic.

Wrong!

“The Love Boat” was based on a 1976 TV movie of the same name, which itself had been built around a 1974 book by former cruise director Jeraldine Saunders. She breathlessly claimed to witness numerous lovey-dovey stories while asea.

Each of Aaron’s more than 250 hour-long episodes usually presented three separate story arcs, with numerous celebrity actors having their issues resolved just before the credits rolled.

Hundreds of famous folks made guest appearances, and the show’s success also allowed Spelling a personal side benefit: “I was able to fulfill my own dreams by hiring some of the great old Hollywood legends as guest stars. The studios weren’t banging their doors down with offers, but these actors still had lots of talent, and I was happy to provide an outlet.” Such VIPs from Tinseltown’s golden years included Lana Turner, Olivia de Havilland, Shelley Winters and Ginger Rogers.

Each episode brought together the ensemble cast of Captain Stubing (Gavin MacLeod), the onboard doctor Adam Bricker (Bernie Kopell), cruise director Julie McCoy (Lauren Tewes), bartender Isaac Washington (Ted Lange), and purser “Gopher” Smith (Fred Grandy). Together the crew steered the high-seas celebrities toward romance-drenched situations by igniting PG-rated new romances or salvaging faltering alliances.

Some of the show’s scenes were filmed during actual voyages on Pacific Cruises’s Pacific Princess, as well as two sister ships, the Island Princess and the Sun Princess. Real-life passengers were often used as extras rather than professional actors.

Then there was that iconic theme song, recorded by crooner Jack Jones — best known for “Wives and Lovers” — with his “The Love Boat” becoming a Top 40 single.

In 1970, about half a million people took cruises. Within three decades, that number had zoomed to 5 million, thanks in large part to the exuberant interest brought about after “The Love Boat” showcased the glamorous world of ocean cruising.

One of the show’s scriptwriters, Michael L. Grace, said, “’The Love Boat’ really created the industry. You had 50 million people watching, and they all wanted to go on a cruise.” To cater to the sudden rush of interest, a boom in cruise-ship building exploded in full force by the early 1980s and continued well into the next decade.

Gavin MacLeod once explained, “People always ask us why ‘The Love Boat’ was so popular. I always say it gave people something to dream about. They would dream about being out on the open seas on a cruise and discovering the world’s greatest destinations, dreaming about love and, of course, happy endings, since the shows always ended on a high note.”