Peacock’s upcoming drama series “Five-Star Weekend” is set on Nantucket, putting the island back in the television spotlight this summer. The show is based on the novel by Elin Hilderbrand and stars Jennifer Garner as a food influencer coping with the sudden death of her husband.
For Hilderbrand, the project is another turn in a long relationship with the island that has anchored her career and helped define how many readers picture Nantucket. She has written 27 Nantucket-centered books and sold more than 20 million copies, turning the island into both a setting and a destination for fans who want to see the places they have read about.
Hilderbrand said her readers tend to travel in the shoulder seasons, especially in May and October, when the island is less crowded. That timing matters because Nantucket, 30 miles out to sea, is already a difficult and expensive place to reach, with only so many daily ferries and flights serving the island.
The island has long sold itself through a mix of isolation and access. It has 50 miles of undeveloped, pristine beaches open to the public except for one very short stretch, and it is a designated National Historic Landmark. The first house on Nantucket dates back to 1695, giving the island a history that runs far deeper than its summer image. In the peak season, its population swells to 80,000.
That is part of why the incoming attention can cut two ways. Hilderbrand said the island’s visibility helps, but some people there worry about being overrun. “It’s a double-edged sword, because there are people on Nantucket who are very wary about it being overrun,” she said, adding that her hope is the show brings visitors outside the height of summer rather than adding to the glut when the island is already packed.
The tension is familiar on Nantucket, where tourism powers the local economy but also creates the crowding that year-round residents and second-home owners complain about every summer. Hilderbrand’s books have already sent fans toward local businesses including Murray’s Toggery Shop, Gypsy, Nantucket Looms and Mitchell’s Book Corner, and a television adaptation could widen that effect beyond her readers to a much larger audience.
That is the immediate story now: “Five-Star Weekend” is likely to deepen Nantucket’s pull just as the island is trying to manage how many people arrive, and when. Hilderbrand’s own answer is simple enough. She wants the newcomers in May and October, not in the crush of peak season.
