MELROSE PLACE

Creator Darren Star and executive producer Aaron Spelling followed up on the massive success of their 1990s teen drama BEVERLY HILLS 90210 with a spinoff series that went on to match its parent show's popularity (and made its Monday night timeslot an evening of must-see TV). A grownup, racier version of 90210, MELROSE PLACE harked back to the days of classic nighttime soaps like DYNASTY and DALLAS while adding a decidedly younger, hipper edge with amped-up levels of sex, betrayal, murder, and a multiple personality or two. The backstabbing action centered on a group of fashionable, affluent twentysomethings living in a stylish apartment complex on the L.A. strip of the title: vulnerable ad exec Alison Parker (Courtney Thorne-Smith); her roommate/love interest, Billy Campbell (Andrew Shue); conniving doctor Michael Mancini (Thomas Calabro); his sweetly innocent wife, Jane (Josie Bissett); her trashy stripper sister, Sydney (Laura Leighton); nice guy Jake Hanson (Grant Show); openly gay Matt Fielding (Doug Savant); the utterly psychotic Kimberly Shaw (Marcia Cross); and, of course, villainous vixen Amanda Woodward (Heather Locklear). Divorce, deception, and brain tumors metastasize among the show's photogenic cast in the show's fifth season. This collection presents the first 19 episodes which welcome restaurateur Kyle McBride (Rob Estes) and his devious wife Taylor (Lisa Rinna) to the seedy mayhem.