Dec. 12, 1964 - Motorists driving by the Leo Carrillo Beach north of Malibu, Calif., might easily have mistaken the goings-on for a beach party. A group of teenagers were riding their surfboards, some bikini‐clad blondes were dancing the Watusi with their partners at the water’s edge, and a phonograph blasted rock ‘n’ roll music. Hidden in the background, however, a director and crew crouched behind a camera, solemnly recording the proceedings.
The frolicking youths were members of a serious sort of cinematic repertory company that is making an enormous amount of money around Hollywood these days. The same teenagers have wiggled and writhed their way through such sand‐and-sex epics as “Beach Party,” “Bikini Beach,” “Muscle Beach Party,” “Pajama Party” and the current “Beach Blanket Bingo,” and have seemingly won the hearts of the nation’s teenagers.
The success of these pictures has given support to a theory circulated by some low-budget moviemakers — namely that perhaps two‐thirds of all movie tickets are purchased by people in the 15-to-25 age group.
Mindful of this, a company called American International Pictures, which once focused its attention on horror films, set about to discover what teenagers really wanted in the way of film fare and then to mass‐produce it.
In “Beach Party,” the company found its formula. The idea was simply to put some lithe teenagers on a beach, turn on the rock ‘n’ roll music and let the cameras roll. When “Beach Party”— which cost about $250,000 to make —rolled past the $2 million mark at the box office, AIP took the same teenagers and plunked them into a second film, “Muscle Beach Party.”
“Beach Blanket Bingo,” now in production, is their fifth, and a sixth — aptly titled “How to Stuff a Live Bikini”— will roll shortly.
Presiding over all the fun is a short, balding director named William Asher, who also directs the “Bewitched” television show, which stars his wife, Elizabeth Montgomery. Asher, in fact, regards his beach pictures as akin to a T.V. series.
“We take the same teenagers and put them into a slightly different experience in each picture,” he says in a booming, hoarse voice. “The plot may change, but the faces stay the same.
“The key to these pictures is lots of flesh but no sex. It’s all good clean fun. No hearts are broken, and virginity prevails.”
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