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Knots Landing is a primetime television soap opera that aired from December 27, 1979 to May 13, 1993 on CBS. Set in a fictitious coastal suburb of Los Angeles in California, the show centered around the lives of four married couples residing in a cul-de-sac, Seaview Circle. Initially intended to be a "scenes from a marriage" type drama series, storylines also included rape, murder, kidnapping, assassinations, drug smuggling, corporate intrigue and criminal investigations. By the time of its conclusion, Knots Landing had become one of the longest-running primetime dramas on U.S. television after Gunsmoke, and tied second place with Bonanza (although Bonanza had made far more episodes).
Knots Landing was created by David Jacobs (one-time writer of Family and later producer of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman) in conjunction with producer Michael Filerman (who also co-produced Falcon Crest), who were initially rebuffed by CBS in 1978, as the network instead accepted the more "saga-like" Dallas. After Dallas became a hit, CBS asked Jacobs to adapt Knots Landing as a spinoff of that show, hoping to extend its success. The series was loosely inspired by the 1973 Ingmar Bergman movie, Scenes from a Marriage, but with four marriages. Though not as popular as Dallas, Knots Landing outlasted Dallas itself) and would win much critical acclaim. The series peaked during the 1983-84 season with a 20.8 rating (finishing in 11th place) and a 20.0 rating for the 1984-85 season (when it finished 9th). This can be attributed, in part, to more dramatic storylines as the series became more soap-opera like, and the gradual inclusion of newer characters to interact with the original cast. By the 1988-89 season, Knots Landing was ahead of Dallas in the ratings, though audiences for both shows by this time were less than their earlier years.
