"How to Marry a Millionaire" began life as a play by Zoe Atkins called, The Greeks Had a Word for It. Several movies were made based on it, including "Three Broadway Girls." But this sitcom's most direct ancestor was the Cinemascope motion picture of the same name, starring Betty Grable, Lauren Bacall and Marilyn Monroe, released in 1953.
The story of this small screen adaptation of that film is simple. Three twentysomething women: Greta Hanson (played by Lori Nelson in Season One of the series - replaced by Gwen Kirby played by Lisa Gaye in Season Two), "Mike" McCall (played by Merry Anders), and Loco Jones (played by Barbara Eden) are intelligent, friendly, capable and determined, and, who frankly have very expensive taste for the late 1950s, are each seeking their method of succeeding: finding a millionaire to wed.
To accomplish this challenging task, they decided to pool their money and resources and rent a swank penthouse apartment (pictured in exterior shots as being located just off Columbus Circle, on Central Park South) so they can appear affluent themselves, and attract the kind of wealth their budgetary demands required.
Of course, putting up this front is expensive itself, and the three women were constantly having monetary issues of their own, either making the rent on this fabulous apartment, covering the cost of their designer label wardrobe from every department store in town, or being able to afford food for their usually empty pantry, despite the fact that they all made a decent living and would probably have succeeded in their own careers if they weren't so intent on this scheme.
Each episode of the program began with an unseen male announcer, describing, very much like the announcer would narrate for the show "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" three decades later, some fantastic location as seen on the screen, like the French Riviera or Miami Beach or a luxury item like an expensive yacht or automobile that only someone with great wealth could afford. The narration is interrupted by a woman's voice who states that there IS another way to afford it. You can marry it, which immediately lead to the show's opening titles.
Barbara Eden became something of the breakout star of the series, her first regular role on a television show, primarily because Loco was myopic and needed to wear glasses to see properly, but never wanted to be seen wearing them by her suitors, so she frequently removed them and then had the issues of bumping into the furniture or in some cases, other men, along the way. Eden's physical comedy and sprightly delivery as the most sweet and innocent of the three ladies of the program made her a favorite. In fact, in the second season of the show, Barbara was elevated from being listed third in the credits to first.
New York played a part because there were no end of potential candidates for the women to attempt, there was no end of their hand-to-mouth existence (of all things! Their "impoverished wealth!") because they were constantly on the edge of eviction as they would manipulate their finances to try to finagle their way around paying one bill this week and paying another, the next.
Though there was a potentially gauche element to the concept, especially for that era, there also was a kind of collective strength these women were displaying. They were doing all of this without any help, other than the support they gave each other, kind of the first mainstream example of "Girl Power" on the small screen!
Clearly this wasn't really a "How to" instructional, but much more a cautionary tale against trying this method! In some ways it was a precursor for the Road Runner cartoons (albeit those were produced by Warner Bros. And this was a 20th Century Fox production). All the time, effort and money Wile E. Coyote poured into catching that Road Runner never seemed to pay off.
But even that wasn't true in this scenario, as original castmember Lori Nelson's character allegedly succeeded in marrying a Gas Station owner and moved out west, which explained the need for a new roommate, as actress Lisa Gaye joined the show.
Maybe the message was: anything CAN happen in New York!