Falcon Crest (1981)

Nighttime soap fans will find plenty of "whine-making" characters in melodramatic straits in this sometimes sexy, often campy drama series set in the fictional Tuscany Valley region of California's wine capital, the Napa Valley. Aristocratic and ruthless Angela Channing runs Falcon Crest winery with an iron hand, and she is none too pleased when hard-working nephew Chance Gioberti inherits 50 acres of prime vineyards from her late brother. Coming west from New York with Chance are his vivacious wife, Maggie, and their two children, Cole and Victoria. After she fails to block a vital bank loan for Chase, Angela tries to divide and conquer the Giobertis by implying to young Cole that he might one day inherit Falcon Crest. What that gambit fails, she pushes her promiscuous grandson, Lance Cumson, into marrying Melissa Agretti, whose family owns another vast winery. Chase occasionally gets tactical advice on handling Angela from his mother, Jacqueline Perrault. The only character rivaling Angela in themean-as-a-snake competition is newspaperman Richard Channing, Angela's former stepson, who runs the San Francisco Globe with Angela's two daughters, Julia Cumpson and Emma Channing.