Sample Midterm Exams

Identifications

Please write a sentence demonstrating your knowledge about the following people, television shows, or concepts. Then, in another sentence, indicate the importance of each item to this course. Each question is worth 4 points each. Suggested time per question: 2 minutes each.

I1. Proscenium Style

A1. A television production technique commonly employed on sitcoms in which the characters perform on a stage under the "proscenium arch," filmed or taped by three cameras.

I2. "The T-H-T Plan"

A2. Pat Weaver’s scheme--the Today, Home, and Tonight shows--to link together the NBC schedule in the early 1950s into a continuous network-identified flow of programming.

I3. Barry Putterman

A3. The author of "Visit From a Small Planet," an article illuminating Ernie Kovacs as one of television’s first modernists.

I4. Bank on the Stars

A4. A 1950s quiz show in which the contestants are shown clips from recently released Hollywood films.

I5. McCarthy episodes of See It Now (i.e., very briefly indicate why knowing about Murrow’s See It Now helps argue the significance of TV in understanding the history of McCarthyism)

A5. Murrow made it a personal mission to expose the witchhunting anti-communist techniques of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Murrow accomplished this through a series of episodes: one featuring an Air Force pilot wronged by McCarthy’s accusation of his having had a Communist family member.

Quotations

Please identify the source of the following quotations (author’s name and/or approximate article title). Then, in one sentence, briefly describe how the quoted passage is relevant to the course. Each question is worth 5 points. Suggested time per question: 3 minutes each.

Q1. "[T]he commercial constraints of the medium often defined the look of a [show] to a greater degree than any particular director’s camera style. Marketing wisdom demanded that viewers not be ‘distracted’ from the stars they had tuned in to see--and usually that translated into close-ups, close-ups, and more close-ups."

A1. David Marc and Robert Thompson, "The Golden Age of Television Drama": The quote indicates that the anthology drama’s proclivity for close-ups emerged from production decisions linked to economics, a claim that Walter complicated in lecture, when he argued that there were also aesthetic and thematic reasons for the close-up featured at the end of Patterns.

Q2. "Although the sponsors were contractually forbidden from interfering in the production of [the show], their financial leverage as the source of network income made it impossible for [the network] to ignore their complaints. In commercial television, even a major Hollywood studio wielded far less power than did the networks and advertisers. Consequently, [the studio] would not be the sole author of [the show]; instead, the studio’s first TV series would be the product of this new economic affiliation, shaped by expectations that each participant brought to the relationship."

A2. Christopher Anderson, "Negotiating the Television Text": The quote refers to Warner Bros. Presents, and describes the way in which the studio, network, and advertiser had to haggle out a form for the show that would prove profitable for all parties concerned.

Q3. "Television’s mediating function had expanded rapidly over the last forty years, at times seeming to take on the dimensions of a third sphere, a separate space where fantasy and ideology overlap to problematize cultural formulations of history in relation to family, and family in relation to individuality."

A3. Dana Heller, "The Third Sphere": Heller argues that television represents a liminal space--a third sphere--between the private and public spheres.

Q4. "In 1957 Nikita Khruschchev, to the amazement of practically everyone, accepted an invitation to appear on the CBS-TV series Face the Nation. Allowing his Moscow office to be turned into a film studio tangled in cables and ablaze with lights, he answered questions from Daniel Schorr and Stuart Novins of CBS and B.J. Cutler of the New York Herald-Tribune, while CBS cameramen shot 5400 feet of film and a Soviet crew made its own footage."

A4. Eric Barnouw, "Prime" in Tube of Plenty: An example of Barnouw’s focus on the relationship between politics and television history.

Short Answer Questions

Write a brief paragraph (4 or 5 sentences) in response to each of the following questions. Each question is worth 15 points. Suggested time per question: 8 minutes each.

S1. By drawing on Amanda’s lecture on soap operas, briefly explain how the aesthetic and narrative conventions of the television soap opera have changed from the 1950s to the present. Briefly explain how this change has enabled the increased complexity of soap opera narrative. Be sure to mention one specific example of a 1950s and a more recent TV soap opera to support your answer.

A1. In the 1950s, television soap operas were shot live and were 15 minutes long. Because of this, the shows focused on a small set of characters, and did not produce complex narrative engagements with these characters. As the television soap opera developed, the shows increased in length (to 1 hour, often) and developed ever-more complex narrative strategies for intertwining continuing plot lines. For example, the 1950s Guiding Light episode about the missing doctor features two camera placements, and the entire episode focuses on this one plot line. In the 1990s episode of Days of Our Lives, featuring the trial scene, a number of cutting devices produce a complex narrative about how five sets of characters respond to one event during the trial.

S2. Briefly compare and contrast the programming strategies of the three major television networks in the mid-1950s (i.e., circa 1956). Briefly explain how these strategies make sense given the varied economic and industrial positions of these three networks in the mid-1950s.

A2. NBC in 1956 was programmed by Robert Kintner, recently stolen away from ABC due to his cost-cutting style. This new NBC fiscal stinginess makes sense given their position in 1956: no longer needing to sell TV sets for parent company RCA, they instead needed to generate profits through advertising. Advertising profits are what CBS, under William Paley and Frank Stanton, had always been about. Their programming strategy in the mid-1950s focused on "giving most of the people what they want most of the time," thus keeping ratings high and advertising dollars flowing. CBS did so through a staple of episodic, filmed programming such as game shows and sitcoms. ABC, the network with the poorest cash flow, adopted a strategy of farming out programming to Hollywood studios, achieving immediate success with Disneyland and The Mickey Mouse Show, and eventual success with the Cheyenne portion of Warner Bros. Presents.

S3. In the first of the two essays we read by David Marc and Robert Thompson, they produce a model for understanding the shift in programming from radio to television. Briefly state this model. Use this model to briefly compare and contrast Stars in the Eye and The Ernie Kovacs Show episode that we saw at screening. Does Marc and Thompson’s model accurately describe the historical development represented by these two shows? Briefly explain why or why not.

A3. Marc and Thompson argue that the shift from radio to television is characterized by a shift from "performer authorship" to "producer genre." Stars in the Eye is a perfect example of performer authorship: the show is set up as a series of vaudeville routines by CBS stars, celebrating the completion of Television City in Los Angeles. The Ernie Kovacs Show complicates Marc and Thompson’s model, however. The "Eugene" episode, from 1961, is a curious hybrid of performer and producer control, since Kovacs fulfills both roles.

S4. Briefly compare and contrast The Honeymooners and I Love Lucy as early TV sitcoms. In the course of your answer, be sure to mention aesthetic, narrative, and ideological similarities and/or differences between the two shows. Be sure to mention at least one specific episode of each program in the course of your answer.

A4. Aesthetically, TH and ILL are shot quite similarly, using proscenium techniques, with the sole exception that ILL was shot on film. Narratively, the shows are also quite similar: they are domestic family sitcoms about tensions between husbands, wives, and similar neighbors. The large difference is that TH focuses on the failures of a working class man, while ILL focuses on the failures of a middle-class woman trying to escape the private space. For example, in "The $99,000 Question" of TH, Ralph goes onto the game show to make his big score so that he won’t have to continue working as a bus driver. In "The Quiz Show" episode of ILL, Lucy appears on the demeaning radio show so that she can become a star like her husband.

Identifications

I1. The "Bob and Bob Show"

A1. The nickname given to Robert Kintner and Bobby Sarnoff while they ran NBC in the late 1950s. This is important because the firing of Pat Weaver resulted in a "bottom line" fiscal policy at NBC. Robert Kintner, hired away from capital-strapped ABC, and Bobby Sarnoff, David Sarnoff’s son, attempted a programming strategy geared around seeking low production costs and high advertising revenues.

I2. Explain very briefly how the camera work functions to set up the conflict at the beginning of the "Job Switching" episode of I Love Lucy.

A2. The I Love Lucy show is shot on telefilm, with proscenium production practices. This means three cameras across the horizontal dimension of the set. In the first act of "Job Switching," one camera captures them both in one shot, while the other two cameras each capture Lucy and Ricky separately. When Fred and Ethel enter, one camera captures all four of them in one shot. Then, the other two cameras capture the male and female characters separately. At this moment, the "battle of the sexes" begins, and the two dunderheaded couples come up with the plan to switch jobs.

I3. In two sentences, describe the plot of the Rawhide episode we saw at the Westerns screening.

A3. In "The Captain’s Wife," the cattlemen who are the recurring characters on Rawhide are running out of supplies. So, they send a few of their members to a fort. The captain of the fort is a well-meaning but not overly ambitious man. He has Lady Macbeth for a wife, however, played by Barbara Stanwyck. While her husband is away, she tricks the second in command at the fort to leading a bold mission to defeat the comancheros. The captain finds out about this plan in time to save the fort, but not his wife, who is killed in the fighting.

I4. A zero sum industry

A4. A zero sum industry is one in which the market for which a number of companies compete is rather stable. Thus, when another company tries to enter into the industry, the market share they capture is at the expense of the already established companies. The American network broadcasting industry is a zero sum industry. For a long time, it seemed as if American television could only support three networks. The fourth network in the system (for example, Dumont in the 1950s) could not capture enough of the audience to sustain itself. 

I5. The Third Sphere

A5. This is Dana Heller’s term for describing the complex functioning of television. Whereas a dominant binary opposition in understanding American culture has always been the public space versus the private space, Heller argues that television and television narratives (like The Donna Reed Show) are part of, and investigate, a liminal third sphere which encompasses facets from both the public and the private spheres. For example, when we watch television, we do so in the privacy of our homes, but in doing so, we are committing a public act, as other people are also watching. Thus, when we go into work on Fridays, we can talk about what happened on Seinfeld last night.

Quotations

Q1. "It was not a boom time for all of television. Theoretically the United States now had a dual television system, with noncommercial channels reserved for most cities. But little could be done with such a channel without substantial funds. The fact that the system had survived to 1956-57 was mainly due to the Ford Foundation."

A1. Eric Barnouw, Tube of Plenty, p201. A different model of television could have developed in the United States, a public one not after profit, but truly after broadcasting in the public interest. This did not happen, as we have studied. However, throughout the history of the medium, various people have argued that at least some of the channels should be reserved for this public function. At the behest of Truman’s FCC commissioner, a council was formed to reserve channel space for public television. In 1952, this was finally done, as the result of the 6th Report and Order. However, no money was appropriated to see that public television affiliates would actually go on the air. Thus, public television in the 1950s had to be funded by private foundations.

Q2. "Robert Saudek of the Museum of Broadcasting, looking back over a half-century of radio and television, has said that "broadcasting’s bone structure was formed in the 1920s, and has never been fundamentally altered or improved upon".... When we move beyond generalities and look closely at the history of network broadcasting, however, Saudek’s thesis is problematic, if not misleading and downright wrong-headed. The fact is that as commercial television took shape after World War II, the established radio model proved ill-suited to the new medium.... Desilu’s autonomy and authority--its so-called independence--steadily diminished as the economic stakes rose and the networks consolidated their control over the TV industry. By the early 1960s Desilu’s role in the overall network system had changed dramatically from only a decade earlier, when television was new and virtually anything seemed possible"

A2. Thomas Schatz, "Desilu, I Love Lucy, and the Rise of Network TV", pp117-18. Schatz argues that I Love Lucy is a specifically televisual show, not rooted in the radio model of variety-comedy, but in a new set of production aesthetics: the 3 camera proscenium style. The decision to shoot the show on film, and thus enable syndication profits, made the production company of the show, Desilu, rich. Desilu became a major program supplier to the networks, largely CBS, because of this.

Q3. "But, more than any other style of programming, these new local television stars were hired to handle the hosting duties on the long, early morning live children’s shows. With Bugs Bunny and Popeye cartoons replacing pop records and interview guests as the loose glue that held their shows together, these celebrities now held forth for hours each day kibitzing with puppets, enacting skits that featured the comic adventures of their own character creations, inventing schtick with dimestore props, and exploring whatever meager studio equipment was used to braodcast their shows. Many of these kiddie show hosts never ventured beyond their inidividual local market."

A3. Barry Putterman, "Visit from a Small Planet: The Comedy World of Ernie Kovacs", p137. Putterman traces Kovacs’ roots as a local radio and television host of morning television shows. Because local, daytime television is less regulated by the national, network model, such hosts were allowed to experiment with the potential of television as an artistic and communications medium. When Kovacs goes to prime time, he brings much of this televisual experimentation with him into prime time.

Short Answer Questions

S1. Briefly describe the significant historical developments (with approximate dates) as Amos ‘n’ Andy shifted from a radio to a television show. Assess what "The Kingfish Gets Drafted" episode of the show tells us about the ethnic TV sitcom.

A1. Straight out of the TV Comedy lecture: 1948 Talent Raids result in creators being stolen away to CBS (Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll). 1951 CBS produces a TV adaptation of the radio show. 1951 immediate NAACP protests, to no avail. The show garners large audiences. In the 1951-52 season, the show is #13, in the 1952-53 season, it is #25. The show is cancelled, but still remains CBS Films (its syndication arm)’s largest revenue drawer. 1951-1962, the show runs in syndicated reruns to great success. 1963 CBS Films tries to sell the show abroad. Kenya bans the show. 1964 a Chicago affiliate begins re-running the show. This sparks large and effective protests. 1966 CBS Films quietly withdraws the show from syndication, never to appear on TV again. 1990s Video Yesteryear releases the entire run of the show on videotape. The show relates to the ethnic TV sitcom in that it produces African-Americans as the only ethnic group incapable of assimilating. The Kingfish Gets Drafted episode shows the Kingfish as a lazy liar who is not appropriate for the American armed forces.

S2. Define closure as a term used in narrative theory. Explain how the issue of closure helps us to understand soap opera narrative. Apply this discussion to clips of soap operas we saw in lecture.

A2. Closure simply means the complete resolution of plot lines within a narrative. There has been much argument over the ideological implications of closure. Relevant to the soap opera, feminist scholars have suggested that closure might be associated with the functioning of patriarchy. That is, the quick and tidy resolution of problems might be a partiarchal gesture which seeks to close off debate and challenges to the hegemonic system. Soap operas, by their serial nature, resist closure. Even when a plot line has been adequately closed, as in the death of a character, it could at any time be reactivated and renewed (by having had the character not really die: he was in South America, he had plastic surgery, his death was just a dream, etc.). "Days of Our Lives" represents the soap opera’s resistance to closure. When Billie gets freed by the court, another question, whether her boyfriend still loves her, is immediately opened. Thus, our answer to the question, Will Billie ever find true happiness?, is once again delayed.

S3. Briefly describe the aesthetic and narrative features of the Anthology Drama prevalent during the Golden Age of Television. Is Patterns an example of an anthology drama according to these features? Briefly describe why or why not.

A3. Because anthology dramas were shot in New York City, they were able to draw on a vast amount of theatrical talent. As a result, many of the anthology dramas were the most artistically creative shows on television. As Marc and Thompson indicate, the backbone of the anthology drama was its writing. Anthology dramas became showcases for the personal work of top-quality theatrical writing talent, like Rod Serling and Paddy Chayefsky. The anthology dramas often brought to television types of shows rarely seen otherwise, such as Shakespeare and modernism (as in Pirandello’s Henry IV). Patterns is an anthology drama: it was broadcast live in 1955, from NBC in New York. It featured a script written by Rod Serling. It was grounded in dialogue, not action, befitting the cramped and limited sets of live television. The scene where Fred argues with Mr. Ramsey over Andy’s death uses these cramped quarters to nice effect, as we get a close-up of Mr. Ramsey’s face as he justifies his actions according to the dog-eat-dog world of corporate capitalism.

S4. What is the thesis (central argument) of Christopher Anderson’s essay, "Negotiating the Television Text"? Explain how he supports this thesis by discussing relevant television programs from the 1950s.

A4. Anderson studies the interaction between the ABC television network and Warner Bros. Studios. The title of the essay refers to the way in which these two entities, as well as the sponsor of the show Warner Bros. Presents, needed to negotiate what the show would look like and whose interests it would serve. Warner Bros. Presents did not just emerge one day as a successful show. Instead, it took years of refinement before it became a successful show as Cheyenne. First, Warner Bros. Self-promotional "Behind the Scenes" needed to be gotten rid of. Then, the two other narratives of the show--King’s Row and Casablanca--had to be cancelled so that the quasi-anthology format of Cheyenne could develop a steady audience. The quick success ABC had with its Hollywood partner Disney (with Disneyland and The Mickey Mouse Club) turned out to be the exception rather than the rule on American television.

Click Here to Return to the MTA 400 ("The History of Television") Syllabus

This page was last updated on January 8, 2001

Questions or comments?  Please phone me at (406) 994-6403 or send e-mail to:  metz@montana.edu

Walter Metz, Department of Media and Theatre Arts, Montana State University--Bozeman