Random Sightings

RANDOM SIGHTINGS OF “FANTASY ISLAND”

This section is devoted to odd references to the series that I may find in books, magazines, TV shows or movies. As I continue to find them, this list will get longer. I’m also happy to add references discovered by readers of the site; so if you happen to come across something somewhere, by all means send it on.

1) from Words You Thought You Knew by Jenna Glatzer, pp. 43-44: As an example of the difference between the meanings of “bi-weekly” and “semi-weekly,” the author provides the following sentence: “The People Who Love Tattoo From Fantasy Island Club meets semi-weekly, on Tuesdays and Fridays.”

2) from The 100 Best Worldwide Vacations to Enrich Your Life by Pam Grout, p. 145: Brian Kurth, founder of Vocation Vacations based in Portland, OR, describes his business in a quote as being a blend of reality TV meets “Fantasy Island”.

3) from Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper and Brian Bellmont, pp. 56-57: “Fantasy Island” gets its very own entry in this book listing long-gone (and sometimes forgotten) things from the 1970s and ’80s. Highly recommended for the ’70s kid who’s been pondering the disappearance of his favorite toy, TV show or junk food and wonders if there’s any chance of its ever coming back.

4) from A Red State of Mind by Nancy French, p. 176: The author makes humorous and regretful note of the fact that her father would promptly shut off the TV at the first curse word, no matter if it was Murdock pulling the A-Team’s fat out of the fire or Roarke and Tattoo about to make someone’s fantasy come to life.

5) from The Wilder Life by Wendy McClure, p. 128: The author, who grew up watching a lot of 70s and 80s television (particularly “Little House on the Prairie”), mentions “Fantasy Island” in passing when she states that her mother would ask her and her brother if they understood what was happening during some especially dicey moment on whatever show they were watching.

6) from 20th-Century Pop Culture: the 70s by Dan Epstein, pp. 25 and 41: Ricardo Montalbán’s Chrysler Cordoba ads are listed for 1974 and he is mentioned by name; Hervé Villechaize (whose surname is misspelled once) is first in a list of “unusual” new TV stars for 1978.

7) from Sitcoms: the 101 Greatest TV Comedies of All Time by Ken Bloom and Frank Vlastnik, we get several sightings. On page 10, the “Addams Family”‘s Cousin Itt is described as a “cross between Tattoo from Fantasy Island and one of Jean Shrimpton’s wigs”. On page 113, “Flying Nun” co-star Alejandro Rey is called “a sort of B-list Ricardo Montalbán”. And on page 306, FI is mentioned as an example of the hour-long anthology series that were popular during the prime-time run of “Taxi”.