Tales of the City

Book first.

The original miniseries follows the book very, very closely. But read the book first anyhow.

They're beach books. Fluff. The series suck, especially since some of the original cast didn't return.

I saw mini series on PBS as it aired (I was home from college) and was astounded on what I was seeing on the screen - I wasn't out yet. I found the books at my local library. I was going to say "books first" of course, but realized I did in the reverse order. So I'm not sure it matters.

Spoiler alert: the cast changes after the first series. I missed movie Mouse, even though #2 more closely adhered to Book Mouse.

Don't bother. It depicts a world that died in 1990 if it ever existed at all. If it did COVID killed it. It will depress you to no end.

The first few books are the best. This story started as a weekly serial in the newspaper, and those early books were compilations of those weekly (or multiple times weekly?) story segments.

The earliest series is the best, IMHO. The first Mouse and first Mona were great.

What I haven't watched is the Netflix revival.....apparently Olympia could barely speak and it's lots of young kids being annoying and GET OFF MY DAMN LAWN YOU KIDS!!

I am just talking the 6 episode miniseries from 1993/94.. The sequels and that 2019 show do not sound very good to me....

Read the books first OP and then watch the original miniseries.

Yes, R8 is correct

Books, VERY easy reads. Very light (at first) and funny .

OK- I will read the books first!!!

OP, I would read the books and then enjoy the series without measuring it against the books. It is very good and stands on its own. Keep in mind what a big deal such an explicit gay story was at the time. Purists don’t like the sequel but don’t dismiss it. It is entertaining and continues the story, which you will probably enjoy.

Regarding the cast changes in the two sequels, I preferred the original Mona (Chloe Webb) and the second Mouse (Paul Hopkins) and found all the others to be neutral recasts. Jackie Burroughs was terrific as Mother Mucca and Thomas Gibson was a gorgeous Beauchamp.

I haven’t seen the 2019 Netflix version. Much of the appeal for me is the nostalgia therapy of the earlier stories.

I watched the original 1993 miniseries a few months ago. It was fine. Definitely light entertainment. I made it 20 minutes into More Tales of the City because the spark was gone.

[quote] Don't bother. It depicts a world that died in 1990 if it ever existed at all. If it did COVID killed it.

I might have had a hand in it.

[quote]Thomas Gibson was a gorgeous Beauchamp.

He was totally gorgeous in the miniseries. Boner producing gorgeous. I just googled and he's 62 now! Time flies.

I strongly recommended the first miniseries. The ensuing cast changes were jarring.

I love them both. But the two TV series really capture the 'magic' of the SF and the apartment complex.

Yes - the cast changes were strange, but you get over it after a couple of episodes.

The books are perfect "bathroom reading." Short chapters that won't last too much longer than the average shit.

It captured a world that no longer exists. It’s a time capsule from the 70s and early 80s - half a century is a long, long time ago.

The books first, definitely.

I was young and living in the SF Bay area in the early 80s when the material was coming out as a serial in the SF Chronicle. It captures that time and place perfectly. That society was destroyed by the HIV epidemic so now both the early books and the original TV series are a time capsule of what once was. We've come a long way since then, and not necessarily in good directions.

The books are lightweight to a fault. Where other people followed them breathlessly in serial form, I wanted to red pen 50% of every book that I could bear plodding through.

The original 1993 Ch4 UK (aired in the US on PBS) production was excellent and a vast improvement in tightening the plots and keeping, even improving upon the period details and aspects of the writing. The Channel Four series are much better than the books in which they are based, most especially the first "Tales of the City" production of 1993. The.slightly sinister air of the Ch4 TV series is a nice touch.

Read the books first if you like, but it's not as though you will be missing out on nuance or great literature. They're rather bad, especially decades later.

Unenthusiastic as I am for the books, the first series by Ch 4 are great.

Book, it sets the definitive template for the series. But it’s not Shakespeare. The mini-series is problematic, particularly with casting.

I like the books very much.

Characters sort of come and go, weaving in and out of each others' lives.

When I finished up with MaryAnn in Autumn a few years ago, it was amazing to me that I have been reading about these people for 20 years or so.

No, they aren't great books, but hey, I think I might start over from the beginning again.

Is "Babycakes" the one about the Bohemian Grove-esque camp for rich men and politicians?

R24, no. That’s ”Significant Others” which I liked more than “Babycakes” which was darker and had the ridiculous subplot about the Brian lookalike. You could see where it was heading a mile away.

R21 I had a friend who worked for Pan Am who introduced me to the Chronicle serials. He’d pass them on across the country, clipped SFO to JFK, back in the day when you had to physically move the story on paper to share it, pre-internet. Pre-fax machine, even. They were that good.

The whole concept - a fictional local newspaper serial - would be impossible to replicate today. People don’t consume media the same way. People sue a lot more, too. But it’s how I came to love the characters, week by week, so when the books first came out they were like lightly rewritten summaries (and neater copies) of what I’d already read.

The first TV series was the best by far and the quality of Maupin’s literary output was best early on and that’s not starting from a very high bar. Light fiction’s his field. Profound he is not. Surprisingly, though, The Night Listener was gripping. I haven’t seen the movie.

But there was nothing like it back then. I loved the San Francisco of the 70s and 80s and the latest episode of Tales of the City, trivial as it was, connected me to it when I wasn’t there.

ALWAYS almost,

book first.

I was surprised how much the first book focused on label and brand names.

R28, I think it made everything feel more realistic and of the moment.

But I still have no idea what Banana Cow was.

I always say Maupin would have made a great soap opera writer. Of course the gay content wouldn't have made in onto daytime TV (it barely made it to PBS) but he did have the rhythms down.....a lot of well defined characters, some romance, some musings from young characters about their lives and futures, some good sex, and a few umbrella stories pulling everyone in.

Skip the books and watch the OG series. It flows better and doesn’t leave out anything important.

Ignore what R31 says.

R4 Oh yes indeed I can testify that world did exist. The serialization in the SF Chronicle seemed so closely parallel to my life and my friends in SF at the time it seemed as if WE were being written about without ever having met the author (to our knowledge, haha; late 70s SF was really something else - talk about the wild west...).

Le sigh.

1. Books first. 2. One of the delights of the series is how Maupin became a better writer as the books progressed. The first two books are breezy and fun. He loses his way a bit in book 3 and 4. And then 5 and 6 are brilliant -- I disagree with those above who say they are bathroom reading -- they're really high quality fiction, and quite moving. 3. Don't read the sequels he wrote many years later. They're mostly dreadful, and are full of his complaints about daily life (Maupin's, via the characters). He lost his way as a fiction writer. Keep the memory of the original six. 4. The first series is quite good. As some of the posters above say, don't measure them against the books. They're just fun. The more recent series is fine as long as it sticks to the original characters, but the series introduces seriously annoying additional characters that really undermine the experience. I'd stick to the original series and retain that memory.

I mostly agree with R34. While I agree that Maupin's writing improved over time, the first 3 books are breezy fun and well written serials. The 4th book, Babycakes, is a bit odd because it has some of the breeziness of the first three but it also introduces AIDS so the tone definitely changes here and continues through the 5th and 6th books which aren't as "fun" as the earlier books but very well written. (Though I don't necessarily agree with what he did with Mary Ann in the 6th book...it felt a bit sudden and rushed and a bit mean). The later books are "ok" but they're not the same as the first series of six.

The first miniseries is brilliant...well cast, written, directed, designed and produced. Really exceptional television and very faithful to the first book. The second and third series aren't as good....they feel cheap and rather blatantly 'Canadian' and cast changes were unfortunate. The Netflix reboot from a few year ago was so awful and annoying, that I didn't bother finishing it. Apparently, the producer wasn't even aware of the books or Maupin when she signed on and she was eager to make it 'her own' to disastrous effect. Maupin didn't make a fuss because he was desperate for the cash infusion to fund his retirement to the UK.

Barbara Garrick deserved a better career.

I have friends who lived in SF in the 90s and met maupin and said he was entirely insufferable

I agree with comments on the original six books. I loved them and have re-read them frequently over the years. Time to revisit and see how I feel now.

Original series a hoot - Maupin said the Mona wigs made both actresses insane divas which is hilarious. Didn’t agree with the recasts but got used to them. Laura Linney, Olympia Dukakis, Barbara Garrick, Paul Gross and Murray Bartlett were excellent and they should have been SUFFICIENT for that execrable Netflix reboot which, as mentioned above, was handed to a later life lesbian from Orange is the New Black who’d never read the original books.

The revisted Tales books are very uneven. I think the younger husbear actually “writes” them now. Maupin has become more pompous and insufferable.

All I remember is FUCK IT BEAUCHAMP THE BABY'S CHINESE!

With Thomas Gibson as Beauchamp!

The one thing about the later books I liked is that he brought Mary Ann back. I really hated how things ended in “Sure of You” and didn’t like what she became. She did not even get a farewell scene.

Plus, I was glad Anna did not move to Greece. I was sure that’s what she was keeping from Mouse at the end of “Sure of You”.

Yes, I did like him bringing Mary-Ann back as she was dismissed unfairly in the books. I think her reappraisal had a lot to do with Laura Linney bringing the character so beautifully to life and her subsequent long-term close friendship with Maupin.

R39, I remember Thomas Gibson’s saying “you didn’t do that yourself” as he gestured to DeDe’s heavily pregnant stomach (still thinking the twins were his) and thinking his line reading was hot as fuck. He also showed his beautiful ass at one point.

I loved the “Tales of the City” theme. It was so perfect for the series.

The books were pure joy (1-4 anyway). I too had them mailed to me by a friend whose assistant clipped them from the Chronicle. And I distinctly remember my reaction when I walked into a bookstore and saw the first columns gathered in a book. Loverly. Also a fan of the first series and the wonderful Marcus D'Amico as Mouse. When he appeared on Broadway in Inspector Calls, I trailed him for a few blocks after the show. Not gay, it seems, but played gay rather effectively.

R43, thank for your sharing that. It was fun to hear the theme again and yes it does seem to fit well!

I’m watching this for the first time today as a 35 year old. What should I expect?

I saw the first series and I liked it. Then someone recommended I read the first book and I thought it was just shallow fluff. Knowing it was originally published as short episodes in a newspaper helped, because I think it probably would have been good to read, that way. But as a novel, it's barely a novel, and kind of dumb.

The 2019 Netflix series was utter shit, don't bother watching.

I’m watching the 1993 version.