Category: TV

So what could television be capable of in 1977, anyway?

The one-eyed monster had gone from an expensive luxury for the wealthy thirty years earlier to a ubiquitous part of practically every American home. It captivated a huge portion of the nation’s population every night with fare that ranged from good to horrible.

But could the idiot box make a moral statement? Could it present history as viewed through the eyes of its oppressed, and change the way modern society did business?

Well, there was only one way to find out.

In January of the year that I graduated from high school, Roots began airing in an unprecedented eight-consecutive-night run. ABC had no idea what to expect from the public. The series would depict unprecedented cruelty, violence, and innuendo. But there was nothing titillating about it. It was a serious story that ended up hooking the nation and keeping it glued to their sets for an entire week.

Alex Haley wrote his book in 1976, and it was a smash. ABC immediately cut a deal to make it into a miniseries.

The concept of the miniseries was itself relatively new. In 1976, Rich man, Poor Man was a hit, although it was broadcast on a weekly basis. The idea of showing one series over consecutive nights was revolutionary.

After all, who was home to watch TV every night? The VCR was an expensive toy that most households did not yet own. Would viewers lose interest if they missed an episode? Would anyone bother to keep up with something that took eight days to play out?

Indeed, ABC execs worried that the historical drama about slavery’s cruelty would be a ratings disaster.

Instead, history was made. Each night, record numbers of viewers tuned in to see the saga of Alex Haley’s ancestors. I recall that Roots was all anyone in school could talk about. It was the same with the entire nation.

The series stretched what censors would allow. But it was necessary in order to present the gritty tale that Haley told. After all, we’re talking about humans being owned by other humans, being transported across a wide ocean in nearly unbearable conditions, and being punished with physical torture when they made mistakes in the eyes of their owners. Sugar-coating was out of the question.

One of the things that made Roots successful was its cast. An unknown named LeVar Burton stole the show as the young Kunta Kinte. John Amos showed that he was capable of more than being a sitcom actor. Other towering talents that shone included Lou Gosett, Jr., Cicely Tyson, Leslie Uggams, Ben Vereen, Maya Angelou, Chuck Connors, Ed Asner, and many more. Even O.J. Simpson showed up, back when we all loved him.

The storyline was gripping, too. We anguished with Kunta Kinte when he was captured by slavehunters. We ached when he was punished for running away by the partial amputation of his foot. We wept when Chicken George missed gaining his freedom by losing a cockfight. We felt the rage when family members were separated by mere economic decisions to sell some of them off. We mourned elderly Chicken George’s death in a fire.

We cared deeply about these people, and they became our family members too, even if we happened to be WASP’s with European roots of our own.

The series was rerun the next year, and Roots II also did very well when it was televised.

I would like to think that Roots removed a lot of racial prejudice from those who watched it. That would be its ultimate accomplishment.

Wednesday nights were for a great lineup of clever sitcoms around 1970. One of these was Room 222.

Room 222 was Pete Dixon’s classroom where he taught American History. His students loved his easy-going style. It was also a place where nobody ever graduated.

Shows about schoolteachers have always faced the challenge of what to do with actors who play students that audiences like. Some have followed the students as they “move on” to new grades and new teachers. Room 222 just chose to have the same students stick around year after year. It lasted just 4 1/2 seasons, so I guess it was believable enough.

In researching the show, I was impressed at the list of names of actors who played students “just passing through.” They include Teri Garr, Cindy Williams, Rob Reiner, Richard Dreyfuss, Mark Hamill, and Chuck Norris.

The show had one undeniable highlight for any male viewers of even as young as ten years old: Karen Valentine in various sweaters.

Karen defined “perky” long before Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Aniston, or Meg Ryan. She was a beautiful lady, and I hope she’s living a happy life somewhere. Nobody will ever look better in a turtleneck.

Greek actor Michael Constantine played Jewish principal Seymour Kaufman. It was great to see him playing a real Greek recently in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. He still looks young.

So, how does one tastefully cash in on a show that was canceled after only 39 episodes, but which had proven immensely popular after its demise?

That was the quandary faced by execs of the perennially-third-ranked ABC network in 1960. The Honeymooners was dropped by CBS after slipping from #2 to a still-respectable #19 in the Nielsens. But the now-more-popular-than-ever series lived on in regular sketches on Jackie Gleason’s variety show.

ABC smelled gold, but how to cash in without being too obvious?

The answer lie in a groundbreaking series: The Flintstones. The half-hour show, first aired in 1960, would be the first cartoon aimed at an adult audience. It would also be the first animated series to carry a single plotline for the entire episode. And it would also prove to be the hit series that ABC was looking for.

Most people didn’t even realize they were watching a show that was pretty much based on The Honeymooners. ABC managed to accomplish the perfect cash-in.

And, as could be expected, the cartoon series was as big a hit with the kids as it was for its intended adult audience. ABC probably foresaw that, as it had begun airing The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, another hit with all ages, the year before.

Fred Flintstone was a blue-collar of prehistoric times. He was into bowling, hanging out at the lodge, and having a smoke (more on that in just a bit). Mechanization involved animals. Brontosauri performed as cranes to lift heavy objects. Miniature wooly mammoths vacuumed up dirt from the floor. And noisy birds honked like horns if you gave their tails a yank.

The voice of Fred was provided by Alan Reed. Reed was a veteran voice-actor, and also had character roles on many sitcoms of the 60’s. Wilma and Pebbles were voiced by Jean Vander Pyl, who also provided the voice of Rosie the Robot for The Jetsons. She, too, was a character actor in many sitcoms of the era. Barney was played by the great Mel Blanc, who also handled Dino’s jabbering. And Betty was performed by Bea Benaderet, who also voiced Tweety Bird’s owner for Warner Brothers’ Looney Tunes. Of course, in real life she was familiar as the star of Petticoat Junction. And let’s not forget her role as Jethro’s mother on The Beverly Hillbillies. Back to the subject of the column, Harvey Korman had a semi-regular role as the voice of space alien The Great Gazoo.

Part of the appeal of The Flintstones was that the stories, like those of The Honeymooners, were ones the average working stiff could relate to. Getting the boss off of your back. Winning the bowling tournament. Taking a chance on risky business ventures. That could be anyone, not just a stone-age dweller who propels his car with his feet.

Celebrities were regular visitors. Anne-Margrock, Cary Granite, Stony Curtis, and many others would pop into the scene from time to time, voiced by their obvious real-life counterparts.

One of the show’s early sponsors was Winston cigarettes, and Fred and Barney were actually featured in a sixty-second spot that received lots of airplay early in the 60’s. It can be seen here, as well as a short ad which appeared at the show’s signoff.

The cigarette sponsorship was dropped in 1963 due to another groundbreaking moment in the show: Wilma’s pregnancy with Pebbles. Still another cutting edge plotline that was explored was Barney and Betty’s inability to conceive, resulting in the eventual adoption of Bamm-Bamm.

The theme song, which was recognized in the great John Hughes film Planes, Trains, and Automobiles as being recognizable by practically every person in the world, didn’t actually appear until season 3. The tune was composed by Hoyt Curtin, and the lyrics were written by Hanna and Barbera, who produced the show. Other hit tunes were frequently performed on the show by the original artists, although the voice actors themselves were also known to belt one out from time to time.

The show’s episodes were rebroadcast in several series afterwards, and the original series has now found a permanent home on cartoon cable networks. A live-action movie was released to middling reviews in 1994, and a live-action show was held at Universal Studios for a few years after the movie’s release.

Like many of us, the show just keeps going and going.

The only good thing about TV
Is shows like ‘Leave it to Beaver’ –Neil Young, “Grandpa’s Interview”

Two different generations of Boomers remember this show two different ways: For the older set, it was a Saturday night offering. For us youngsters, it was on every day after school. But one thing was for sure: we all watched it.

Leave It to Beaver was a simply brilliant, understated sitcom. It used real-life situations and made us laugh at them. And it did so under the constraints of very strict censorship. After all, husbands and wives were given twin beds to sleep in. The thought of them being in the same sack was out of the question.

What do you do under these conditions? You create a great show that depends on excellent writing and acting. 90% of the sitcoms that followed could have learned something from this.

Part of Beaver’s appeal was his genuineness. He was absolutely average. He got average grades, lived in an average home (for the time. Most housewives don’t wear pearls to dust the furniture these days). He was naive, and his buddies were always getting him into trouble. But he always survived and learned something in the process.

The rest of the cast was equally as perfect. Wally had just a little more common sense than Beaver, as older brothers should. But he would get drug into trouble himself periodically, usually at the hands of Eddie Haskell.

We all work with Haskell clones: they berate management and company policy away from the eyes of bosses, and instantly turn into fawning suckups when their superiors walk in. Ward and June were wise to Eddie, but unfortunately, managers tend to fall for the Haskell treatment.

I always got a kick out of the relationship between Lumpy Rutherford and his dad, Fred. Clarence was an underachiever, and no amount of yelling from Fred seemed to have any effect on him. One of my all-time favorite episodes was the one where Beaver and Wally wanted to get back at Lumpy, a bully in the early days. So they laid barrel hoops out in his yard one night (Ward’s idea, surprisingly enough) and began taunting him to come out. Fred and his wife were bewildered at the yelling outside. When Wally hollered “Hey, meathead!” Fred’s wife said “I think they want you, dear.” Of course, Fred trips on the barrel hoops, and Wally and the Beave are in dutch yet again.

The show enjoyed a six-year run, even though it was dropped by CBS after the first season. ABC ran it the rest of the way. As Beaver entered puberty, his deepening voice and loss of childhood cuteness meant it was time for things to come to an end.

My kids grew up watching the reruns, just like I did. The show is just as timeless today as it was in the 60’s

CBS faced a dilemma in 1971. Sure, they were the top-rated network. Sure, they were making untold millions in advertising revenue. But their audience was old enough to remember WWII, many even recalling the hard times of the Great Depression. CBS execs would have preferred a younger demographic. So they did what any clueless bunch of corporate clods would do: they unceremoniously dumped a batch of well-performing shows because their audience was too old.

The victims of what became known as “the rural purge” included The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, Sullivan, and a relative newcomer called Hee-Haw.

Hee-Haw was a variety show that had a distinct country flavor. Hosted by Buck Owens and Roy Clark at the peak of their popularity in 1969, it was kind of like Laugh-In set in a cornfield. It was also a hit.

But, of course, seeing how the target audience wasn’t precisely 24.879 years old, the show had to go. But Hee-Haw‘s producers felt like they had a winner, and offered the intact show to any stations that would like to syndicate it.

The result was phenomenal. Not only was it grabbed up by stations all over the country (including decidedly non-rural L.A. and New York City), but it remained on the air for another 22 years. Not bad fora show deemed by CBS to be not worth keeping.

Hee-Haw was a montage of acts that became very memorable to its fans. Some people became fans despite themselves, sneering at a corny, countrified variety show until they saw enough episodes to get hooked themselves.

A group that never lost their animosity was the critics as a whole. They didn’t like the clean, simple humor. They didn’t like the the country music, which was years from being popularly embraced itself. And, horror of horrors, the Politically Correct among them decried the perpetuations of stereotypes.

Oh well, we simple, homespun, unsophisticated fans all over the country tuned in anyway.

Among the acts that we came to know like a a comfortable old pair of shoes was KORN News (performed by Canadian Don Harron as Charlie Farquharson); Pickin’ and Grinnin’; Gloom, Despair and Agony On Me; The Fence (somebody would tell a bad joke and get smacked in the wazoo by the fence); Hey Grandpa! What’s for supper? (Grandpa Jones would then recite a short poem describing a calorie-loaded Southern dinner); and, of course, my favorite: Samples Sales.

Samples was a former stock car driver who garnered a novelty hit in 1966 at the age of forty by telling a story about a really, really big fish. A local Georgia celebrity, he was added to the cast and his bumbling misdelivery of lines became an audience favorite years before Andy Kauffman.

One I recall was when he asked Buck Owens “How come some women are called amazin’?” Buck’s reply, delivered through unsuccessfully stifled laughter was “That’s because so many of them are named Gracie! You know, (singing) Amazin’ Gracie, how sweet thou art . . .”

Samples was supposed to say “Amazon,” not “amazin’.”

The beautiful Hee-Haw gals added to the festivities, including Barbi Benton, Misty Rowe, Lisa Todd, Gunilla Hutton, and many others. In addition, Grand Ole Opry queen Minnie Pearle, comedienne Roni Stoneman (who frequently played a nagging wife), and telephone-operator-gogo-dancer-turned-comedienne Lulu Roman rounded out the female cast.

And let’s not forget Stringbean, whose life took a tragic twist. One of his gigs was playing a scarecrow with a cawing crow on his shoulder in the Cornfield segment. After his death, the now silent crow remained as a memorial.

The show probably stayed on too long. Many of the original female leads had to deal with aging issues after twenty years. So did the males, for that matter. Plus, Buck Owens, half of the starring cast, split in 1986. A disastrous attempt to reinvent the show as more appealing to younger audiences was made late in the game. It didn’t go over well, particularly with long-term fans.

But when a Boomer pours himself a good glass of bourbon and puts his feet up and recalls pleasant memories of the past, one of them is surely Hee-Haw, even if he once watched it from a Brooklyn tenement.

Westerns (both radio and television) were largely kiddy fare in the early 1950’s. Kids loved shows like The Lone Ranger, but most of their parents found the stories a bit simple and, well, suited for children.

In 1952, CBS began airing a western that was aimed at adults. The result was a smash hit that eventually dominated both television AND radio. In fact, for an amazing six years, from 1955 to 1961, the radio and television versions of Gunsmoke existed side-by-side, with two different sets of cast members!

The radio cast consisted of William Conrad as Matt Dillon, Howard McNear (better known as Floyd the barber) as Doc, Georgia Ellis as Kitty, and Parley Baer as Chester.

The radio version was one of the last, if not the VERY last network radio drama. I was astounded to find that it was still on when I was born.

But Boomer kids of my age range remember the TV show. Originally broadcast on Saturday nights, it went from a half-hour to a full hour beginning in 1961. In 1967, it moved to Monday nights, and also began being broadcast in color.

I don’t remember Dennis Weaver’s Chester or the B&W episodes. The Gunsmoke that populates my memory banks had Festus (he first appeared in 1964, the same year that Chester limped off into the sunset) and bright colors on our shiny new color TV.

The show made many changes over the years, arguably getting better with each one. However, political correctness reared its ugly head in the late 60’s. I was always a kid who noticed details, and the opening scene was one of my favorite replayed moments in TV. The “man in black” would square off against Mat Dillon on Dodge City’s main street, then crumble into a heap as the marshal would outdraw him.

That scene was endlessly reenacted by my friends and myself in our back yards or in front of the full-length mirror at Montgomery-Ward’s.

But one night, probably in 1968, I noticed that instead of seeing the bad guy crumple, instead the scene cut back to show Matt shooting. What the heck?

By the 1970’s, the PC police had watered the opening down to Matt riding across the desert. Sheesh.

Gunsmoke had a plethora of guest stars over its 20-year run, and also provided a regular role for Burt Reynolds as blacksmith Quint Asper from 1962-1965. Among its guest stars were Jack Albertson, Claude Akins, John Astin, Cicely Tyson, Slim Pickens, Edward Asner, “Mr. Spock” Leonard Nimoy, John Drew Barrymore, Ed Begley, Ralph Bellamy, “Hoss” Dan Blocker, “The Bad” Lee Van Cleef, Bruce Boxleitner, Beau Bridges, “Batman” Adam West, Charles Bronson, “Mr. French” Sebastian Cabot, “Mr Drucker” Frank Cady, and both versions of Trapper John, Pernell Roberts and Wayne Rogers.

Gunsmoke’s ratings had taken a bit of a dip by 1971, the end of the 15th season, and CBS announced its impending cancellation. A letter-writing frenzy was launched by angry fans, and the show stayed. Ratings went up, too. But in 1975, they had slipped a bit, but the show still placed a very respectable 28th at the end of the season. But CBS pulled the plug permanently this time, as part of the housecleaning it was doing to try to attract younger viewers.

Today, Gunsmoke is one of the most popular shows on TVLand. Many of us former class clowns still offer our drawled imitations of Festus saying “I don’t know, Matthew” when confronted with quandries at work. And I’ve been know to occasionally reenact that shootout scene when nobody’s looking, too. Both The Simpsons and Law and Order will likely eclipse its 20-year run. But that won’t minimize the pleasant memories that we Boomer kids have of watching the daily events unfold in Dodge City all of those years ago.

In the TV theme song hall of fame, if such a thing exists, surely the Most Hallowed section contains the tune that tells the tale of how first mate Gilligan and his skipper (named, as every trivia fan knows, Jonas Grumby) and the rest of the gang found themselves stranded on a desert island.

I seriously doubt that there is a Baby Boomer alive who isn’t familiar with the ditty.

But what you may not have realized about Gilligan’s Island is that it had something in common with Star Trek. Both shows’ popularity didn’t REALLY take off until after they were cancelled after a relatively short first run.

Gilligan and his buddies got shipwrecked on the Saturday night of September 26, 1964. That was when the first episode aired, and the black and white show did very well in the ratings with that particular time slot. After the first year, it began to be broadcast in color, and it was also moved to Thursday nights. The ratings were still quite respectable, never straying from the Top 25, but a strange set of circumstances would doom the show after its third year. More on that in just a bit.

The show was the brainchild of prolific TV screenwriter Sherwood Schwartz. He put together the motley cast of characters who would have their lives irreversibly changed during a pleasant three-hour trip (although Mrs. Howell must have had some premonition of disaster, otherwise why would she pack so many suitcases???). Who would play the part of lovable, bumbling Gilligan?

Well, that was a no-brainer. It would have to be Jerry Van Dyke.

Van Dyke said no, thanks. He saw the show as a potential bomb. The next year, he jumped at the chance to star in My Mother, the Car. Incidentally, he also turned down the role of Barney Fife.

That’s why we love Jerry. He is just as capable of making dumb decisions at the rest of us.

The show’s plotline was painfully predictable. The gang would be within an eyelash of being rescued when Gilligan would goof things up. The skipper would smack him with his hat. Another week stuck on the island, until the next episode. Sigh.

But we kids ate it up. Our fathers and older brothers enjoyed it too, particularly the recurring roles of sultry Ginger and sweet, cute, innocent Mary Ann.

This stirred up an eternal debate: Ginger, or Mary Ann?

The question was immortalized in a 1993 Budweiser commercial, which was one of the earliest examples of Boomer nostalgia. And yes, I have to strongly agree that Jeannie surpassed them both.

The show came to an untimely end after its third season. Here are the details from its Wikipedia article:

Under pressure from the network president, William S. Paley and his wife Babe, as well as many network affiliates and longtime fans of Gunsmoke (which had been airing late on Saturday nights), to reverse its threatened cancellation, CBS rescheduled the Western to an earlier time slot on Monday evenings. This had been Gilligan’s Island’s timeslot in its third season. (The show ran on Saturdays in its debut season, before moving to Thursdays in season two.) Though Gilligan’s Island’s ratings had slumped from 24.7 (18th) to 22.1 (22nd) out of the top 25 (possibly as the result of two timeslot shifts in two years), the series was still profitable. Nevertheless, it was cancelled at practically the last minute. Some of the cast had bought houses based on Sherwood Schwartz’s news of verbal confirmation that the series would be renewed for a fourth season.

So, the last episode ended just as the other 97 did, still stuck on the island.

Three reunion movies were made, however, bringing closures of sorts to the whole situation.

Today, Gilligan’s Island continues to be a hot syndicated item. Our grandkids are getting as big a kick out of it as we did. And popular opinion seems to continue to favor Mary Ann over Ginger.

But let’s face it. Neither one can touch Jeannie.

Saturday nights were a good TV night when I was a kid. Flipper was on, as was Pistols ‘n’ Petticoats, a show I loved that was only on for a year. But another show I loved, which lasted a lot longer, was Get Smart!

The show was pretty wacky, but with a deadpan approach. Think of Dragnet, with Joe Friday replaced by a bumbling secret agent. Here’s a typical exchange, delivered in deadpan:

Senator: Mr. Smart, how many arrests did Control make last year?Maxwell Smart: I don’t know.

Senator: Who’s the number one man in your organization?

Maxwell Smart: I don’t know.

Senator: How many cases were assigned to Control last year?

Maxwell Smart: I don’t know.

Senator: What would you do if you were fired, Mr. Smart?

Maxwell Smart: They can’t fire me. I know too much.

The show was brilliant, hilarious, and fun. How could it be anything else, seeing how Mel Brooks and Buck Henry were the main writers? The show’s popularity wasn’t hurt by the appearance of one of the foxiest ladies on 60’s TV: Barbara Feldon. Man, I’ll bet she sold a lot of Mercury Cougars.

Maxwell Smart would, agent 86 of Control, would find himself in one fix after another in his struggles with Kaos. However, he would manage to finagle a solution and get away in time for next week’s episode.

The show’s unforgettable opening involved driving his car to Control headquarters, then making his way though five doors until he gets to the phone booth at the end of the hall. He would then dial a number and drop through the bottom.

Max’s lines were memorable and repeated by us ad nauseum. “Sorry about that, Chief!” “Would you believe…” “Missed it by that much!” “I asked you not to tell me that!” “Ah, the old (fill in the blank here) trick!”

And then there were the gadgets. The Cone of Silence (which worked a little too well). The shoe phone. The car cigarette lighter phone. The potted plant phone. The fireplace log phone. The pocket disintegrator pen. The ping-pong paddle gun. The gun that fires three directions at once. The cigarette butt grenades. And, of course, the aluminum knuckles (cheaper than brass).

This was quality stuff. Brooks and Henry took some outrageous chances with jokes that were unlike any on TV, and they scored big. I laughed as hard as my parents. Some of the adult humor went over my head, but there were enough pratfalls and such that it was fun for all ages.

Max and 99 ended up married and the parents of twins before it was over with. Most agree that the show took a turn for the worse with all this family stuff going on.

Get Smart! the movie is slated for release some time in 2007. It has some pretty big shoes to fill.

For all you would ever want to know about Get Smart!, go to http://www.wouldyoubelieve.com/