Fox's "Party" Crashes

Wed., May. 3, 2000 10:35 AM PDT by Emily Farache

The party is just about over.

In tonight's two-hour finale of Fox's Party of Five (8 p.m.), six seasons and 142 episodes of emotional turmoil, family squabbles and angst comes to a tearful (natch) climax.

From the beginning, the Gen-X soap has been a Kleenex-worthy affair. Party joined the Fox lineup in 1994, with the joyous premise that the five Salinger siblings have bonded together to take care of themselves after the traumatic death of their parental units.

"I wanted a show that would possess many of the same values that 90210 had in the beginning," Sandy Grushow, Fox's then-entertainment president, now chairman, recalls. "A show about teenagers and for teenagers."

Of course, these teens suffered more than most, surviving alcoholism and drug abuse, pregnancy, date rape, Hodgkin's disease, battery and fires--often all in the same episode.

"We always felt the idea of the show was not an idea that was worth exploring forever," Amy Lippman, a cocreator and executive producer (with Christopher Keyser), says. "It was about a family that was dealing with the death of their parents. That can only go so far. We always knew that."

It went a lot further then expected. The series had been pronounced dead nearly every season it was on the air. Despite critical kudos during its freshman year, it took a letter-writing campaign by thousands of rabid fans to keep the melodrama on through the '95 season. A 1996 Golden Globe for Best TV Drama fended off the vultures for another year. The series managed to survive the '97 season and hit the key 100-episode mark the following year, guaranteeing a forever-in-reruns syndication deal.

Finally, in March, Fox put the series out of its misery. This season, before moving back to its Wednesday night home last month, PO5 had been pounded by the competition in a tough Tuesday-night slot, averaging a meager 4.7 million viewers and not even cracking the top 100 in the Nielsen rankings.

That brings us to tonight's aptly overwrought episode, in which each of the Salinger sibs finally leaves their treasured home.

Bailey (Scott Wolf) heads off to an Ivy League business school, Claudia (Lacey Chabert) gets accepted at Juilliard, and Julia (Neve Campbell) is offered a job in Washington, D.C., with the National Organization for Women. Charlie (Matthew Fox) and Kirsten (Paula Devicq) agree to care for Owen, but they can't decide what to do about the house.

Ah, martyrdom.

Speaking of martyrs, the show's producers decided to forget about former costar Jennifer Love Hewitt, who was spun off into Time of Your Life this season--she doesn't even make an appearance in a flashback. (Chances are good Hewitt's post-Party series will also soon be killed off--will the tragedies ever end?)

Die-hards need only to get online to participate in the final Party. Memorabilia up for auction at the cyber-fete include autographed items from the cast's wardrobe, Claudia's violin and menus from Salinger's restaurant. The event, sponsored by Yahoo! and PO5 producer Columbia TriStar, runs through Friday at promotions.yahoo.com/promotions/partyoffive.

Meanwhile, the PO5 faithful are holding farewell parties of their own, and, as per the show's vibe, commiserating en masse in the alt.tv.party-of-five newsgroup. As "Chris420B" writes: "As bad as the show has gotten (in my opinion, anyway), I still hate to see it go...These are fictional characters, but for those of us that love the show, they seem real...I will miss this show. It's given me many hours of entertainment and many memories. The Party ends tonight."