The Victorian-style summer house at 738 Surf Avenue in Belmar, on the Jersey shore (off Exit 11 on the Garden State Parkway), costs $8,000 to rent for the summer.
Three young guys – Zack Singer (Lew Schneider, pictured bottom right), Eddie Cheever (Tom McGowan, pictured above left) and Aldo Carbone (Louis Mandylor, above centre) – want to rent the house but they can’t afford it. Three young girls – Miranda Halpern (Pamela Segall), Arden (Anna Gunn) and Donna Shipko (Cathryn de Prume, pictured below) – are also seeking to rent it, but they also can’t afford it. And so the two groups decide to split the rent and share the house.
Cathryn de Prume.
The girls all work at the Dow and Hummel advertising agency in New York City. Arden – who attended Cornell University and got her MBA at Columbia University – is the boss; Miranda works in the merchandising department as a receptionist and longs to become an artist, and Donna also works in the merchandising department. She attended Teaneck High School (class of ’85) and previously held a job as a salesclerk at K-Mart.
Although Donna is extremely attractive, she feels she is just a dumb blonde and is apprehensive about meeting men she thinks are smart. She has no self-confidence and says, “I know I’ll never be smart, I just have to accept it”.
The guys have been friends since childhood. Zack is an inner-city junior high school teacher (seventh-grade social studies); Eddie is a computer game designer, and ladies’ man Aldo works as a clothing salesman for Clingware Fabrics.
When the series returned for its second season the format changed slightly and Miranda had gone. Apparently, she became an artist, got a gallery opening and decided to remain in New York to devote her time to painting as there were too many distractions at the beach house.
Lew Schneider.
The group now needed a new roommate to help with the rent. While on the beach, Arden meets a childhood friend (they have known each other since the fourth grade) named Sammy (Nancy Sorel) and invites her over to see the house.
Sammy – who had spent one semester at Brown University (she was expelled for having an affair with a professor) and now designs jewellery exclusively for Bloomingdale’s and the Guggenheim Museum – falls in love with the place and decides to move in with the group.
The Tidal Wave is the singles’ club frequented by the group.
Kim Walker appeared as Arden’s younger sister, Hillary.
Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes sang the theme, I Don’t Wanna Go Home.
Miranda Halpern
Pamela Segall Arden
Anna Gunn Donna Shipko
Cathryn de Prume Zack Singer
Lew Schneider Eddie Cheever
Tom McGowan Aldo Carbone
Louis Mandylor Sammy
Nancy Sorel Hillary
Kim Walker
