Preserving the 1000 Greatest Icons and Significant Events of Television History... A project by Greg Howell exploring the history and development of television and its cultural impact.
Tiny Tim was one of the most unlikely pop culture heroes ever. Sporting stringy hair and elongated nose, his eccentric personality matched his bizarre looks. His popularity soared to new heights with appearances on Rowan and Martin's Laugh In, and his debut album release in 1968 scored him a Top Twenty pop hit, Tip Toe Through The Tulips. It was his appearance on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in late 1969, however, that pushed Tiny Tim to his greatest heights - as well as Johnny Carson's.
A publicity stunt for sure, Tiny Tim was set to wed Miss Vicky on the late night talk show. Calling her "Miss Vicki, my darling, fantastic angel," odd-ball Tiny Tim's wedding to the attractive, 17-year old Victoria May Budinger caught the public's curiousity, and the Tonight Show's ratings crested at a whopping 85% of the viewing audience and an estimated 40 million viewers. Tiny Tim and Miss Vicky wrote their own wedding vows for the show.
When Ellen Degeneres officially announced her sexual orientation on the cover of Time Magazine, "Yep, I'm Gay," it seemed like old news. Rumours had been circulating for months that both Degeneres and her TV character, Ellen Morgan, would come out of the closet. The show had never been a big hit, but the crossover of Ellen's real life into the fictional series catapulted the show to the top of the ratings and public attention. Religious groups scorned Disney-owned ABC, threatening to boycott anything related to either party. Jerry Falwell called her Ellen Degenerate, to which she aptly responded "I haven't been called that since 4th grade." The intensity of the debate essentially landed into the hands of advertisers, as groups on both sides of the issue awaited to see which corporations would sponsor the show. In the end, only the Chrysler Corporation pulled out.
The episode, however, was brilliant. Witty, poignant, and sharp, Ellen pulled together a classic show and an audience of 42 million. Many critics and viewers had long suspected there was great potential of the show, but seemingly never able to tap into a distinctive voice. "The Puppy Show," so titled to mislead the media about the episode's content, featured great performances and writing, ultimately winning both the prestigious Peabody Award and an Emmy, and gave Ellen much needed creative direction and energy.
Even with huge support from icons like Oprah Winfrey, ABC was a nervous wreck about the new Ellen. Beginning with the April 30, 1997 show, every episode that aired until the end of its run was given an opening viewer warning - as if it was an episode of NYPD Blue. After another season of time slot changes and internal fueding over the show's direction, viewer's gradually tuned out and ABC canned the show in 1998.
The show's impact was substantial, however, and the next season Will and Grace and Queer as Folk premiered, and other television shows began including postive portrayals of gay characters.
There was no reason to suspect Rhoda would be more popular than Mary Tyler Moore, but the spin-off was a power house from the start. As Mary Richards' best friend, Rhoda was not the American dream girl next door. She was fiery, witty, heavy-set, and neurotic, but she had a heart of gold. So after 4 seasons on Mary Tyler Moore's show, she visited her family back home in the Bronx, met a man named Joe, and fell in love.
In just nine episodes, the romance blossomed into engagement, and on October 28, 1974, marriage. The classic episode featured the entire gang from Mary Tyler Moore, and was expanded to a full hour special broadcast. As America's favorite ne'r do well and first popular Jewish television character, Rhoda and her wedding were par for the course. There were bickering relatives, the put-upon sister, plus the prickly gang from Minneapolis, including her nemisis Phyllis (played by Cloris Leachman). And Rhoda, deliciously played by Valerie Harper, nearly missed her wedding! The climax came as she ran through the streets of New York in full wedding attire late for her own ceremony.
The episode was the highest rated sitcom episode ever at the time. Valerie Harper won any Emmy, also becoming the first Emmy-winning character for both supporting performance and lead performance. This feat has never been matched again in television.
Not since I Love Lucy had a television show broadcast one classic episode after another classic episode, and the 116th episode of Seinfeld, broadcast during the show's seventh season, is only one of the shows dozens of pop culture defining momements. In the 1990s, every Thursday was a television event and nearly every Thursday was Friday's conversation. Arguably the greatest Seinfeld show was the Soup Nazi.
Seinfeld writers had a knack for creating a crescendo of comedy from nothing at all, and this episode proves hilarious with just a string of elements such as a soup line and a typical New Yorker's difficulty moving furniture into an apartment.
The episode was influenced by a real New York restaurant famous for soup. Al Yegeneh, the inspiration for the Soup Nazi character, closed his restaurant in frustration with fans of the show, but in 2005, began selling his classic soups in grocery stores across the nation. "No soup for you!" became a national catch phrase in fall of 1995.
Late in the long run of the Carol Burnett Show, after a decade on television, this classic variety show was funnier than ever. On November, 13, 1976, episode #238 opened with typical Burnett banter with the audience, and announcing the show's guest, Dinah Shore.
It was the last half hour of the broadcast that can still produce a roomful of laughter just speaking about it! The sketch, Went with the Wind, was timed with the television premiere broadcast of the movie classic, Gone With the Wind. Carol Burnett parodied Scarlett, Dinah Shore played Miss Mellie, Harvey Korman mocked Rhett, and Vickie Lawrence, nearly stealing the show, spoofed Prissy.
The sketch created a greatly condensed version of the movie, and produced one of the most iconic moments in television history. Scarlett, in attempt to look fresh and successful, rips the green velvet drapes down from the window to make a new gown. From the top of the grand stairs, Carol Burnett's Scarlett decends in her new dress, with the curtain rods still attached. As one of the longest laughs in television history finally subsided, Rhett complements her dress and Burnett replies, "Thank you, I saw it in the window and just had to have it."
Trivia: It should be noted that an almost equally funny paradoy of Gone With the Wind had appeared on TV's Here's Lucy four years before, with guest star Flip Wilson, and over the years some viewers have confused and combined the two sketches. Almost no one, however, confuses the iconic image of Burnett's Scarlett O'Hara, as it is permanently burned into the fabric of American culture.
In the mid-1980s, Moonlighting reshaped and broadened the television landscape. Notorious for mixing tense drama and side-splitting comedy, this television masterpiece influenced the direction of television like no other show of its era. On November 25, 1986, "Atomic Shakespeare" demolished old television devices and created a fresh new approach for entertainment. The episode opens with a young boy obligated to read "The Taming of the Shrew" as homework, but the young tyke would prefer instead to watch the TV show "Moonlighting". This scenario bookends the episode, as the kid daydreams that the Moonlighting cast, including Petruchio Dave and Kate Madie, perform a feminist take of "The Taming of the Shrew," in full iambic pentameter.
The complexity of the writing, including the self-mocking show-with-in-a-show formula, was landmark. Television networks (and cable) began to push for the development of smarter programming. It was cable that paid the most attention, however, as broadcast networks continued to demand too many episodes per season for this type of production. Moonlighting, refusing to litter their catalog with filler episodes, set a new standard for production companies. Ultimately, Moonlighting's refusal to create a 22 episode season was muddied by ABC's demanding schedule of repeats, and the smash show lost viewers.
In 2007, television viewers who love cable TV's superior, shorter season series of 12 to 15 episodes with superior production values, such as the Sopranos, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Rome, can thank "Atomic Shakespeare" and Moonlighting.
On the eve of the home video explosion, TV viewers gathered at the same time, on the same channel, entering a type of national collective consciousness, as millions of minds, eyes, and ears would be tuned to their favorite programs. Some programming, such as Mary Tyler Moore (and much like I Love Lucy, Dick Van Dyke, and All In the Family) promised better televsion than most shows, and on occassion, transcended into thirty minutes of excellence to be discusssed, not just the coming week over watercoolers, but for decades.
October 25, 1975 was one such rare occassion. Just a month into the new 6th season, Mary Tyler Moore took the unlikely comedic subject matter of death and left America doubled over from laughter. As our heroine Mary Richards listens, aghast, the WJM crew crack joke after joke about Chuckles the Clown's disturbing death. Dressed as a large peanut, he was crushed in a parade by a rogue elephant. Mary's dismay represents the moral view, and home viewers respected her struggle with the entire station's flip, disrespectful conduct. At the same time, the jokes about Chuckle's death were hysterical.
Of course, the payoff is Mary Richards, in the midst of the funeral service, as all involved have shamed themselves into respectful silence, gets the giggles. As the minister eulogizes, "If only we could all deal with it as simple and bravely and honestly as Mr. Fee-Fi-Fo. And what did Chuckles ask in return? Not much--in his own words--"A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants," our heroine can hold the laughter in no more.
Turning in a performance ranking as great as any Lucille Ball accomplishment, Moore's transcendance into gut-bursting laughter toward a final, embarrassed gut-wrenching wail is a comedic masterpiece. The entire viewing audience knew they had just witnessed a very special televison moment.
Maude, the radical spin-off from All In the Family, was even more controversial than Archie Bunker. Brash, loud, and feminist, Maude Finley was a character like no other before on television. Just ten episodes into the series, Norman Lear's comedy created one of the biggets television controversies of the decade. 47 year old Maude discovered she was pregnant. This was before the Supreme Court's landmark Roe vs. Wade decision, but Maude decided to have an abortion.
Titled Maude's Dilemma, the two-part episode unfurls plot devices dealing with the abortion, and also birth control as Walter considers a vasectomy. Over 25,000 letters were written in protest, yet 65 million viewers tuned in. The boycotted show produced a little expected result: CBS, and the entire television industry, discovered that extremely controversial television brought blockbuster ratings, and Maude hovered in the top ten for the next 4 years.
Maude's Dilemma started a revolution as various advocacy groups turned their attention to television. Religious groups, African-Americans, Gays & Lesbians, and Hispanics began to threaten networks and advertisers with boycotts. A 1989 New York Times article, Taming of the Tube, "details a more chilling story of human vulnerability to power and corruption: how again and again the networks craftily subverted idealistic protesters by offering them official status as consultants, thus transforming them, if not into pussycats, at least into well-behaved beasts of burden, unwittingly laboring to help the networks achieve their primary goal: higher ratings for the very programs under protest." By the home video explosion in the 1980's, the networks were using hot-button topics to actually lure viewers back to television .
In an interview with USA Today, Maude's star Bea Arthur describes her experience portraying "the liberal, 4-time married adversary of Archie Bunker, "She was not your average, beautiful heroine, but I felt like Cinderella," says Arthur, now 83. "It was one of the first times on television that a woman was seen as the head of the family instead of the usual fumbling male."
This I Love Lucy story arc is the pinnacle of the television event for entertainment. As Christmas, 1952 approached, TV's top show was enjoying record-breaking ratings and enormous publicity. American audiences had flipped for Lucy Ricardo's independent spirit and Lucille Ball's comic genius. The second season premiere, the famous "candy factory episode" had placed Ball and the show at the top echelon of comedy, not just for TV, but any comedy ever preserved on film.
In deed, Lucille Ball's brilliant performance created a character so sharp and so complex, audiences had taken her into their hearts and families almost instantly. Most actors are lucky if they are capable of resonating a few distinct character traits, but Ball's Lucy Ricardo came to life through hundreds of nuances. Take a minute to describe Lucy Ricardo. She was zany, independent, determined, conniving, maniupulative, inventive, loving, and fiery. She was loyal, envious, smart, sexy, cheerful, agressive, and feminine. She was humorous, imaginitive, sophisticated, and fearless. This excercize could go on for hours. No other television character in history was as well defined or expertly crafted. And in December, 1952, Lucy Ricardo was about to fold "maternal" into the list of character traits.
America responded as never before and never since. The first "baby" episode is a masterpiece, establishing the intense joy and excitement of a new baby. Through 7 episodes that holiday season, the anticipation grew. When would it happen? What was the baby's sex? The entire story arc was the talk of America.
As word was leaked that January 18, 1953 was the date for the baby's birth, as well as the real date for the birth of Lucille Ball's baby, the two events combined into one, unprecedented explosion of publicity and outpouring of national emotion. The January 18 episode captured almost two-thirds of the audience. 71.7% of Americans with television watched the birth of the Ricardo baby. More people watched the episode than watched Eisenhower's inaugaration the previous day. More people watched the birth of Little Ricky than watched the coronation of Queen Elizabeth earlier in the year. Newspapers in large cities and small towns exclaimed on front pages, "LUCY HAS A BOY!," and above headlines related to Ike's inaugaration or politics. Walter Winchell reported it a "banner week" as "the nation got a President, and Lucy got a boy."
The influence, both in culture and entertainment, was staggering. The use of story arcs became a television staple. I Love Lucy began a merchandising campaign that still resonates today. Little Ricky dolls, cribs, pajamas, and furnishing made the Arnaz's tens of millions of dollars. And television immediately became THE favored medium in America. It is nearly impossible to fully describe the baby show's impact and longevity.
Even as recently as 2006, the Ricardo baby was used to define the excitement surrounding the Cruise-Holmes baby by ABC News. In a lengthy discussion, ABC News acknowledged "The hoopla over the baby girl born Tuesday to Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes recalls another highly anticipated birth 53 years ago arguably, one of the most-covered births of the 20th century."
This journal, a sketchbook exploring the significant events and icons of television history, is a draft and research tool for a project by Greg Howell. The goal is to offer a new and unique spin on the documentation of the history of television and its impact on modern culture.
Many entries are simply "water cooler" television, a collection of individual telecasts that had the U.S. population and media talking, often prior to the broadcast and definitely the following days, weeks, and even months. Other entries are larger moments that changed and influenced monumental historical events - and impacted the culture at large as well as influenced the direction of television.
This project intends to explore individual television broadcasts, those events that are tied to a very specific date and time. It is not a broad review of television shows or networks. The only exception is the documentation and discussion of television icons, those people, entities, or symbols that had a long-lasting impact on popular culture, some of which are often forgotten or nameless by newer generations, but whose influence is still apparent.
