Watch Peyton Place Online

Peyton Place is an exposé of the lives and loves of the residents of a small New England mill town, where scandal, homicide, suicide, incest, and moral hypocrisy hide behind a tranquil façade in the years immediately preceding and following World War II. At the core of its plot are three women. Constance MacKenzie is a prim and proper sexually repressed woman who had an affair with a married New York City businessman and bore him a child out of wedlock. She has struggled to shield her daughter Allison, a high school senior and aspiring author, from her tarnished past, leading her to believe she returned to Peyton Place with her newborn baby after her husband died. Selena Cross, Allison’s best friend, is a good girl living on the wrong side of the tracks. Her alcoholic step-father, Lucas Cross, terrorizes the family, abusing his wife and child behind closed doors.

Other characters include Allison’s classmate and confidant Norman Page, anxious to gain his independence; bad girl Betty Anderson, who longs to have a relationship with wealthy Rodney Harrington; new school principal Michael Rossi, who attempts to crack Constance’s icy veneer; and Dr. Matthew Swain, the town’s leading physician who places his long time medical career in jeopardy to save Selena during the trial in which she is charged with Lucas’s murder.