Darren Star

Central Park West is an American prime time television soap opera that ran from September 1995 to June 1996 on CBS. The series was created and executive produced by Melrose Place’s Darren Star. As the title suggests, CPW was set in New York, in the affluent Central Park West area of Manhattan. Actresses Mariel Hemingway, Lauren Hutton, and Raquel Welch portrayed three of the central characters on the show.

The program represented CBS’s attempt to reestablish itself after a disastrous 1994-95 television season where the network lost a heavy amount of established affiliates due to affiliation switches related to Fox acquiring NFC football rights, and an attempt by the network to attract younger viewers. It was the network’s most-promoted new show in many years with a promotional campaign exclusively produced to appeal to younger viewers, and attempted to recapture the network’s past nighttime soap glory from the years of Dallas and Knots Landing.

The series was not successful and was removed from CBS’ schedule mid-season, returning some months later with new additions made to the cast. The retooling was not enough to save the show, which was canceled in June 1996. The failure of the series returned the network quickly back to their traditional broadcasting focus and repairing relations between both the network’s new affiliates and their older stations which were frustrated by the network’s moves in programming rights and programming within the Laurence Tisch era, which would end shortly thereafter with Westinghouse’s purchase of CBS Corporation in 1995.