Tape #1: Early Television

This tape is devoted to the earliest television. Two comedy forms dominate very early television: the variety show and the ethnic sitcom.  These two forms were the dominant forms of comedy on the radio. Since the TV networks developed out of the radio networks, it makes sense that these successful radio formats would be the first tried on television. I wanted to give you a look at two of the most important early 1950s variety-comedy television shows: Texaco Star Theater with Milton Berle and Your Show of Shows with Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca. I am presenting the shows in two distinct ways: We will see a complete episode of Texaco Star Theater as it actually aired, so as to give you an idea of the "flow" of a variety show. For Your Show of Shows, I have clipped together an hour’s worth of important types of comedy culled from a couple of seasons of the show.  The example of an ethnic sitcom from very early television is Gertrude Berg's The Goldbergs, a domestic family sitcom about New York Jewish immigrants.

1. Texaco Star Theater (Guest star Gertrude Berg, NBC, 1950, 60 min): According to some television historians and popular mythology, Milton Berle is the single most important force behind the popularization of American television. His radio show was not so much of a success. This is usually attributed to Berle’s status as a "visual" comedian. As you watch, consider why Berle was considered so funny to early television audiences, and how his comedy is better suited for television as opposed to radio. Also consider the intertextuality of television implicit in this episode: Gertrude Berg, who wrote The Goldbergs and played Molly Goldberg, appears on this episode as herself.

2. Your Show of Shows ("From Here to Obscurity", 1951-53, NBC, 60 min): The importance of Your Show of Shows lies largely in the writing talent it provided with early breaks: Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner. Examine the types of skits the show uses, and think about how so much of our current television comedy seems to derive from models provided in Your Show of Shows.

3. The Goldbergs ("The Singer", 1st Run Syndication, 1955, 26 min): Here is the television adaptation of The Goldbergs radio show.   What about the show has changed by the time it becomes a television sitcom? What is the message the show forwards about the proper behavior of ethnic immigrants?  Why does the Goldberg family so much want their daughter to take music lessons?  If the sitcom is built around a tension between comedy and drama, how much of each is present here?  How does this differ from current examples of the sitcom? Of the ethnic sitcom (Martin, any show with Tony Danza)?

Tape #2: 1950s Television (Part 1)

This tape is devoted to three of the most important television genres of the 1950s: the soap opera, the sitcom, and the Western. I wanted you to see two important sitcoms built around the same self-reflexive premise--appearing on a television commercial--and think about the differences between various sitcoms’ premises. Finally, by the end of the 1950s, the Western would rise to become the highest-rated of the television genres. This week, we begin our examination of this form, with one of the mid-1950s shows produced by a Hollywood studio, Warner Bros.

1. I Love Lucy ("Vitameatavegamin", CBS, 5/5/52, 28 min): I Love Lucy is without a doubt the most popular television show of all time. It has aired everyday in Los Angeles since it went on the air in 1951. Something about the show still seems to attract people to it, despite its advanced age: Nick at Nite/TV Land airs episodes every week night. Is I Love Lucy merely a "timeless" show? What do you think explains its attraction for current viewers? Why is this episode in particular so engaging? (It is frequently named one of the greatest television episodes of all time). We are going to watch the episode in its original single-sponsor advertising format. How does it change our interaction with Ricky and Lucy to see them smoking Phillip Morris cigarettes constantly? What is smoker’s hangover anyway? Is I Love Lucy an ethnic sitcom? How is it similar to/different from The Goldbergs? What are the gender politics of I Love Lucy? Is Lucy a liberated woman, or subservient to her husband, or something more complex?

2. The Honeymooners ("Better Living Through Television", CBS, 11/12/55, 28 min): Here we have the same premise as in the "Vitameatavegamin" episode of I Love Lucy: The characters star in their own commercial. How does The Honeymooners differ in concept and execution from I Love Lucy? Does the show’s focus on the husband (Ralph) instead of the wife (Lucy) change the way you consider its representation of the family? What are the class politics of The Honeymooners, especially when considered in relation to I Love Lucy?

3. The Secret Storm ("The Masquerade Ball", CBS, 3/8/55, 15 min): Does the theatrical staging of the 1950s daytime soap opera surprise you? How and why does this soap differ from what the daytime soaps have become today? Is The Secret Storm closer to its radio counterpart, or to our contemporary soaps? Why do you think soaps have evolved from 15 min to 30 min to one hour shows? What does the added time allow the narratives to do differently?

4. Cheyenne ("The Iron Trail", ABC, 1/1/57, 48 min): Cheyenne is part of a set of shows Warner Bros. Studios contracted with ABC to produce. How does the influx of Hollywood creative personnel change the look of television? What is different about the way Cheyenne is shot from the other examples of 1950s television we have encountered? What political issues does the Western raise that the sitcom cannot? How does ethnicity work in this episode? Why would ethnicity be an issue in 1957? Why does the show motivate its suspense by threatening the life of the President of the United States? Why is it significant that Dennis Hopper is the bad guy?

Tape #3: 1950s Television (Part 2)

This is a sort of 1950s grab bag screening.  First, we will examine 1950s CBS news programming featuring Edward R. Murrow. Then, we will look at an example of the anthology drama, the centerpiece of "the Golden Age of Television."   Next, we will do an intensive study of early television advertising.  Finally, I want you to see how the sitcom makes the shift from the radio variety-comedy format to the full-blown television sitcom, a development that is marked by the intermediary Burns and Allen Show.

1. See It Now (Interview with Eisenhower, CBS, 6/29/52, 29 min): Here we have one of Edward R. Murrow’s CBS news shows which demonstrate how he made the transition from radio to television. To what extent is this show a pre-cursor to our newsmagazine shows, like Dateline, 20/20, etc.?

2. Person to Person (Interview with the Kennedys, CBS, 13 min): Compare the approaches on See It Now with Person to Person. How does Person to Person differentiate itself by being "softer" news? How does the interview format allow the appearance of a "personal" rapport between the newscaster and the interviewee not allowed in other news formats?

3. Kraft Television Theater ("Patterns", NBC, 1/12/55, 53 min): This is the example of the "Golden Age" anthology drama we will watch. It was written by Rod Serling, who would go on to write The Twilight Zone. Are there continuities that you can see between Patterns and The Twilight Zone? Why would the examination of corporate culture be important for a 1950s television show? How do the live aesthetic practices of the show enable/stunt artistic experimentation on television? Why were these shows seen by intellectuals as virtually the only meritorious programs on the air?

4. Vintage Commercials (23 min): We will be watching a number of 1950s-1960s television commercials. What about them makes us laugh? Do you think others 50 years from now in a broadcasting class will be laughing at our television commercials? Why or why not? What surprises you about Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble selling cigarettes?

5. The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show ("The Tax Auditor", CBS, 1950, 25 min): Like The Jack Benny Show, The Burns and Allen Show represents another example of the transition of the comedy form from radio to television. The show also represents a transition from the variety-comedy format to the sitcom. What sitcom features and variety-comedy features does it have? What is George Burns’ function in the show? Also consider the advertising strategy: Is Gracie a good way to sell Carnation milk?

Tape #4: 1950s Television (Part 3)

This week, we will study more 1950s television (and begin to push into the early 1960s), in the guise of game shows, domestic family sitcoms, and the modernist comedy of Ernie Kovacs.

1. The Ernie Kovacs Show ("Eugene", CBS/NBC, 11/24/61, 25 min): Ernie Kovacs is one of the most innovative comedians in the history of television. While his shows were never extremely popular, he has developed a cult following over the years, especially after his untimely death shortly after this episode was aired. What are the various experiments Kovacs is doing with the medium? For one thing, television theory has it that the key to television is its dominant soundtrack, constantly hailing the viewer to stop whatever it is they are doing and watch. Kovacs denies us dialogue in the entire episode. What visual gags relate self-reflexively to the way television works as an aesthetic medium? How does Kovacs relate to the comic giants of American audio-visual culture (Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd)?

2. Bank on the Stars ("Apache", NBC, 1954): Here is an example of the wide array of game show formats that became popular in the mid-1950s. Think about how this show represents yet another intersection between the film and broadcasting industries. Why did game show hosts like Bill Cullen have such lengthy careers on television?

3. Twenty One (Van Doren defeats Stempel, NBC, 12/5/56, 25 min): This is one of the most infamous episodes in the history of television. This is the famous fixed episode in which Charles Van Doren was given the answers so that he would defeat the unpopular Herb Stempel. Popular mythology has it that Stempel was visibly unpleasant while Van Doren was eminently likeable. Do you agree from the actual televisual evidence? How is ethnicity expressed in the actual events? Compare your reactions with those reconstructed by the history of this affair and by the film, Quiz Show.

4. The Donna Reed Show ("The World’s Greatest Entertainer", ABC, 1960, 25 min): Here is one of the utopian domestic family sitcoms popular in the 1950s and 1960s: Leave It to Beaver, Father Knows Best, etc. How do the bland aesthetics match the bland plot lines? Does it matter in assessing the gender politics of the show that Donna Reed is in charge of this family?

5. Bewitched (Pilot: "I Darrin Take This Witch", 9/17/64, ABC, 25 min): Critic Dana Heller argues that The Donna Reed Show represents the conservative nature of the domestic sitcom, while Bewitched represents the progressive counterreaction. Do you agree based on this, the pilot episode of the series? A vibrant debate in feminist analysis of television is between those who claim Bewitched is a sexist show because it shows Samantha giving in to Darrin’s desires, while others suggest that Samantha’s transgressive nature as a witch who is not bound by petty domesticity is a progressive gesture. What do you think?

Tape #5: Late 1950s-Mid 1960s TV Westerns

This week, we will make an in-depth study of the dominant form of late 1950s television, the Western. Here are two important telefilm Westerns.

1. Have Gun, Will Travel ("Hey Boy’s Revenge", CBS, 4/12/58, 25 min): In this Western, we have a mysterious vigilante who takes the law into his own hands. How does the Western format justify this behavior? What are the racial politics of this episode? Is Paladin’s liberal friendship with Hey Boy enough to counteract the use of racial stereotypes? Why or why not?

2. Gunsmoke ("The Jailer", CBS, 10/1/66, 49 min): Here we have yet another Western which uses a giant from the Classical Hollywood Cinema--this time, Bette Davis--to invigorate its plot. Why do you think Davis, a glamour queen from Classical Hollywood, is used in this unflattering way?

Tape #6: 1960s Television

The TV shows on this tape all come from the 1960s. This is the period of television usually referred to as "The Vast Wasteland," after Newton Minnow’s phrase referring to the cheaply produced, seemingly asinine telefilm sitcoms, Westerns, and cop dramas. As you watch, consider whether you agree with this assessment. Are these shows any better or worse than the rest of television? Than today’s television? By what standards?

1. The Rifleman (The Mountain People, ABC, 1960, 25 min): I wanted you to watch some of the early 1960s shows that feature the breakdown of the family. In the early 1960s, a flurry of shows depicted disrupted nuclear families, usually families without a parent. Certainly this was a response to the domestic nuclear families which dominated 1950s television. Here is an example of a Western featuring a fragmented family without a mother. How does the show compare the new family to the older clan-like family represented by the mountain people? What does this narrative say about class? About ruralness? Does this show allegorize a decaying family structure? Or does it re-affirm the goodness of the family no matter what its configuration?

2. My Three Sons ("Sal Mineo", ABC/CBS, 1960-1972, 25 min): Here is a sitcom variant of the single-parent family narrative of the early 1960s. Does it grapple with the familial issues differently than how the Western did? How so?

3. Gilligan’s Island ("Gilligan Goes Gung Ho", CBS, 1967, 25 min): Here is the quintessential example of a Wasteland sitcom. Often voted one of the worst shows in the history of television, I believe it is one of the most interesting. For example, while most critics (and even everyday commentators on the show) cite as evidence of the show’s stupidity that the characters never get off the island, I believe this is the secret to the show’s brilliance. Because it is a representation of a Utopia, the cultural unconscious of the show suggests that the characters unconsciously do not WANT to get off the island. Consider this theory in relation to this episode. What does law and order mean in this episode? Why don’t the castaways get rescued? What sort of utopia is this island? How do gender roles work on the island? Racial roles?

4. Bewitched ("Sam in the Moon", ABC, 1/5/67, 25 min): Here, I’m interested in the Cold War politics of the show. How does the sitcom form grapple with the American space race differently than the dramatic form? What does the Space Program mean in the narrative logic of Bewitched? Is this a patriotic show? In what sense?

5. The Fugitive ("10,000 Pieces of Silver, ABC, 10/11/66, 47 min): One focus of our study of the 1960s needs to be how the politics of the Cold War arrived on television. More obvious examples come to mind of course: I Spy or The Man From UNCLE about CIA operatives, for example. But I wanted you to see how deeply the logic of the Cold War plunged into the very fabric of American culture. Here, we see the Cold War in the genre of the detective show. Watch the show to figure out what I mean by the episode as being about the Cold War. How does the fugitive allegorically express the fear of anti-communist witchhunting? Why does the fugitive always serve as a social worker in every community he lives?

Tape #7: The Television Renaissance

The TV shows on this tape are all part of the "Television Renaissance," that period of American television history in which the shows began to grapple with the social change of the late 1960s.

1. All in the Family ("The Insurance is Cancelled", CBS, 11/27/71, 25 min): For sure, the staple of the TV Renaissance’s intervention into the ideological terrain of television history is the sitcom. Three sorts of early 1970s sitcoms dealt with various social issues in ways unseen since the Golden Age, if then. M*A*S*H couched a critique of the Vietnam War in a sitcom about the Korean War. The Mary Tyler Moore Show grappled with issues of women in the work force. All in the Family returned to the domestic family sitcom tradition, but imported the social issues of the day into the narrative. Rather than the petty issues of the 1950s domestic family sitcom (who would Betty Anderson go to the prom with, which of the Nelson children would get to borrow the car, etc.), the AITF plots revolved around political arguments over the issues of the day. Here we have Archie Bunker confronted with the effects of his own racism.

2. Brian’s Song (Made-for-TV Movie, dir. Buzz Kilik, ABC, 1970, 73 min): During the Renaissance period, a new TV genre was developed. Also tending to feature melodramatic engagements with social problems, the Made-for-TV movie has been a television staple ever since. Here is a very early TV movie about racism and professional football. Think about how the race plot is framed within a melodramatic story about disease. Does this make the movie’s grappling with social problems more or less effective? How and why?

3. The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (2nd Episode with Pete Seeger, CBS, 2/25/68, 50 min): The late 1960s also marks the resurgence of the variety-comedy show. Shows like The Sonny and Cher Hour, Laugh-In, and The Flip Wilson Show garnered high ratings during the period. One of the most interesting of these shows is The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, since it met with one of the most bitter censorship battles in the history of television. This episode features anti-war folk singer Pete Seeger. Earlier in the show’s run, Pete Seeger had been a guest, but at the last minute, the CBS censors pulled his song, "Waste Deep in the Big Muddy," a Vietnam protest song. This time, the censors did not object and Seeger sang the song. A bit later, CBS would cancel the show, without cause, as it was getting very high ratings. The Smothers Brothers sued, and eventually won, but their career as weekly television stars had been stifled because of the political threat they represented to the country’s conservative, corporate power structure.

Tape #8: 1970s and 1980s Hour-long Dramas

The late 1970s marks the ascension of ABC to the top ratings position among the networks. Led by the programming strategies of Fred Silverman, whose philosophical contributions to television include "tits and zits" shows, the ABC network built a series of popular shows which rejeuvenated traditional generic forms: Charlie’s Angels and the detective show, Happy Days and the sitcom, The Love Boat and the anthology show. The late 1970s also saw the premiere of a number of hour-long serial dramas that represented the importation of the soap opera into prime time. With the hysteria over the "Who Shot J.R." episode of Dallas, these prime-time soaps became by the early 1980s the most popular shows on television. For a number of years, Dallas and Dynasty competed for the #1 show on television. During the 1980s, the MTM studio maintained its success by branching out into hour-long dramas. These shows artistically rejeuvenated the tired old "franchise" dramatic forms, such the "doc" shows (St. Elsewhere) and the "cop" show (Hill St. Blues).

1. Charlie’s Angels ("Bullseye", ABC, 1976, 48 min): Charlie’s Angels is often seen as a prime example of the Silverman-ABC programming’s inherent sexism. Certainly the show is built around displaying the Angels’ bodies, but is there more to this show than meets the eye (pardon the pun)? Is the show’s flirtation with feminism at all convincing? Why are so many of the Charlie’s Angels plots built around women participating in male institutions (strip clubs, the military, truck driving companies, prisons), only to have corrupt men polluting those very institutions. I also show you this sort of program to see the simplicity of the plot; so that you can see why the 1980s MTM dramas were seen as such godsends of narrative complexity.

2. Dallas ("Lessons", CBS, 4/9/78, 48 min): Here is one of the first episodes of the show. Notice that the early Dallas is more a telefilm Western (updated yes, but a Western nonetheless). As Dallas becomes more popular into the 1980s, it shifts serial in a major way. This episode, though, is still linked to a series narrative format. The story about Lucy’s loose morals can stand on its own.

3. St. Elsewhere (The Final Episode, NBC, May 1988, 48 min): Some academic critics consider this the greatest episode of a television series of all time. Watch for the way the plot lines are being resolved, as this is the last episode of the show. Consider this in relation to other famous final episodes (Cheers: The Last Call, the final episode of M*A*S*H, of Newhart). How does it differ? Why is it so interesting to have the entire show appear to be the invention of an autistic boy?

Tape #9: 1980s and 1990s Sitcoms

This tape features two sitcoms from the Reaganite period, The Cosby Show and Family Ties, which perfectly embody the neo-conservative defense of the family.  Then, we look at two post-Reaganite sitcoms which assault the idealization of the family in these prior shows, Roseanne and The Simpsons, both assaults on the class pressures placed on working families.

1.  The Cosby Show ("The Track Race," NBC, 25 min): Is it possible for a show about a black family to be conservative? What are the ideological implications of the race ending in a tie? What conflicts does this non-resolution avoid?   How different is this show from Father Knows Best?

2. Family Ties (Stephen's Dad is Dying, NBC, 25 min): Here we have another Reaganite sitcom that celebrates the importance of the conventional nuclear family, despite its surface comedy driven by liberal parents arguing with conservative children.   Is there any difference between their political positions?  How are politics overridden by family ties, in both the local plot of Stephen's Dad and the global plot of Michael J. Fox's relationship to his parents?

3. Roseanne ("Sweet Dreams", ABC, 12/7/89, 25 min):  Here we have a very different take on the family sitcom: No longer is the family middle-class and idealized, now the Conner's are seen to be struggling at every moment to merely make the mortgage and put food on the table.  The gender shift is also important here: we experience this class conflict through the mother's frustration at not getting any time for herself.  Does this sitcom actually override the importance of family, or does it fail to do so?  What is the significance of the dream sequence being played as a high gloss Hollywood musical?

4. The Simpsons ("Dead Putting Society," FOX, 11/15/90):  As in Roseanne, we have a working class family being assaulted by the American class structure, particularly in the guise of Mr. Burns' running the town.  However, in this episode, we focus on the conceit of competition as presented in The Cosby Show.  How does the kids' decision not to compete at the end of the episode compare to the tie at the end of Cosby's show?  These two sitcoms went head to head in a famous programming war, where FOX was able to demonstrate its viability by succeeding against NBC's vaunted Thursday night line-up.  How different are The Simpsons and The Cosby Show in terms of the politics of the family?  Of race? Of gender?

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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