Vitals

Cliff Robertson as Burt “The Big Kahuna” Vail, beach bum and Korean War Veteran

Malibu, California, Summer 1959

Film: Gidget
Release Date: April 10, 1959
Director: Paul Wendkos

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Now that it’s summer, let’s flash back to the beach party movie that started it all. Before Frankie and Annette and before we ever followed Elvis to Hawaii, there was Gidget.

Czech-born writer Frederick Kohner was inspired to pen a novel by his daughter Kathy, who was nicknamed “Gidget” (a portmanteau for “girl” and “midget”) while learning to surf on the beaches at Malibu. Gidget, the Little Girl with Big Ideas became a top seller after it was published in 1957, so Kohner sold the rights to Columbia Pictures—awarding five percent of the $5,000 sale to Kathy—where screenwriter Gabrielle Upton adapted it for the screen. With journeyman director Paul Wendkos at the helm, Gidget was shot in just 26 days through the early summer of 1958, primarily on location at Leo Carrillo State Park in Malibu.

Gidget was a breakthrough role for Sandra Dee in the titular starring role as 16-year-old Francine Lawrence, who doesn’t share her girlfriends’ interest in man-hunting and rather wants to spend her summer learning how to surf. She makes a splash at the local beaches, where the regular surfers adopt her as their mascot. The boys like “Moondoggie” (James Darren) all idolize the beach-dwelling “Big Kahuna” (Cliff Robertson), who describes himself simply:

I’m a surf bum! You know: ride the waves, eat, sleep—not a care in the world.

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