How Television Shows Reflect the State of the National Psyche

By: John Anderson
Submitted: 2007-01-17 11:01:15
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In the '30s and '40s, during the heyday of radio and long before television, comedy was king. People were sick of the realities of the Great Depression and wanted to laugh. Jack Benny, Fred Allen, Burns and Allen, and Amos and Andy were some of the big stars. What Americans wanted in entertainment was obvious and it didin't take a great deal of psychoanalyzing to understand why.

Then came the fifties and television became the popular media. Fans followed their favorite comedians to the screen and comedy stars, especially Milton Berle, Sid Caesar, Jack Benny were the household words. It was a return to the days of Vaudeville. But a new form of comedy appeared, the Sitcom. America was blessed with I Love Lucy, probably the greatest series ever to appear, and the nearly as good, The Honeymooners. Desi and Lucy, the Cramdens and the Norrises were real people. But with comedy, another type of show, the western, began to dominate air time. Gunsmoke was a popular radio show and moved easily onto camera with James Arness replacing William Conrad as Matt Dillon.

Soon came Richard Boone as Palladin in Have Gun Will Travel, Clint Eastwood and Rawhide and numerous other shows set in the old west. Fans clearly liked the genre, but the question is why. The most common reason given is that Americans were sick of the restrictions and rationing imposed during the Second World War and the storied freedom of the west was the type of catharsis they needed. Yes there were bad guys, just as there were in the real world, but the cowboy hero would step in to straighten things out, then ride off into the sunset. I believe that many people knew America was needed in the world, but hoped it could clean up the mess and leave.

The 'sixties had myriad detective shows. Something clearly was wrong in the world at the time. The Soviets were ahead of us in scientific technology, launching the first satellites. Our foreign policy didn't seem to be working. Long-time friendly regimes were being overthrown, civil wars in Africa, and we had communism at our southern border that refused to go away when we tried to force them out. The Bay of Pigs was an enormous blow to our national pride. We would take more with the Viet Nam War, the unrest of the Civil Rights Movement, the Kennedy Assassination(s), the Assassination of Martin Luther King and the Long Hot Summers.

Someone or something was to blame and we needed detectives to figure things out. Nearly everyone who watched TV at the time can remember "Book 'im, Dano," from Hawaii-Five-O and Peter Gunn's racy sports car. Two of my personal favorites were Mannix and Mission Impossible. With the bloodshed and the uncovering of clues, Sitcoms carried on the tradition of real people with the Andy Griffith Show and Leave it to Beaver.

Sitcoms came on even stronger in the 'seventies when the country reacted to the social activism of the 'sixties and the country made a sharp turn to the right. Mary Tyler Moore was the farm girl who came to Minneapolis to make good at a television station. All in the Family became the most famous sitcom of all times with a harried average-guy hero who couldn't seem to put a handle on all the things that were happening in the world. His perplexity reflected the country's own confusion at the time. But whether he liked it or not, the world was changing.

Diversity was becoming a social and economic force. Happy Days and the Jeffersons were joined by Sanford and Son. An interstellar couple even made an appearance in Mork and Mindy and Three's Company dealt with unmarried men and women living together. Not surprisingly, Good Times and Luverne and Shirley looked back to the simpler days of the 'fifties and family values shone through in the Brady Bunch and the Partridge Family. But in the end, the most memorable series of all would be a reflection on Viet Nam. Though set in the Korean War, M.A.S.H. reflected on the insanity of war and quietly reminded us that we had lost for the first time since 1812.

Archie Bunker's confusion carried on into the 1980s and America seemed to share his obsession about crime. Hill Street Blues, was about murders and drug trafficking and the very real people who had to deal with it. Americans watched gritty shows like NYPD Blue and Miami Vice and the slightly less violent Cagney and Lacey and Hunter. With Ronald Reagan president, family values now clearly predominated. Family Ties had a young neocon as its hero, but Different Strokes, with its mixed race family, showed that blacks were now clearly included in the American consensus. The importantce of family even extended to Aliens, with Alf, and to the local bar with the close ties between the characters on Cheers. Reagan's economic bubble burst in October of 1987 and the Wonder Years reflected back to the joys of an earlier and perhaps simpler age.

A subdued America elected the senior Bush to replace Reagan and sitcoms ruled as America entered the 'Nineties. With the election of Bill Clinton the focus seemed to shift away from family values, though they were still clearly there in a slightly different format in shows like Rosanne and Friends. The most important new show starred the Jewish comedian Jerry Seinfeld. The realism of the cop shows of the 80s reappeared in force with Law and Order. Concerns about the end of Millenium and the possible end of the world came to focus in Milennium and the cult-favorite, the X-Files.

Law and Order continued into the new milennium and has spawned two sequels. The most important new development was the rise of the Crime Scene Investigator shows which began with CSI in 2000. After 9/11, three more CSI shows have come to the small screen. Why? Perhaps people are still wondering about how 9/11 could have happened. Just as important, who was behind it and how can they be tracked down and brought to justice. The nitty-gritty of Forensics might just be the way the case will ultimately be solved.

In conclusion, our entertainment has always reflected the things we most needed to deal with. At times, it can provide an escape. At others, it may even have pointed out the way to a solution. Either way, it has always been one of our most important forms of dealing with issues.

Raymond John loves mysteries and forensics and they play an important role in his novel, The Cellini Masterpiece, written under the pen-name of Raymond John. You can read the first chapter or leave John a commemt or a question at http://www.cmasterpiece.com.

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