tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-47273419197107467982024-03-12T20:20:49.289-07:00There Should Be a Name ForThis used to be a blog about ideas and phenomena that seemed like they should have a name. Now it's a blog about that plus other thoughts.LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.comBlogger82125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-18673898084405164662015-09-06T19:31:00.001-07:002015-09-06T19:32:38.859-07:00A Hospital Waiting Room, Circa 1983<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
Do normal people re-watch <i>Terms of Endearment</i>, like, for fun? Well, at any rate I do. And it really is the gift that keeps on giving. Exhibit A:</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDxRHg6dUumCBL7ycPA_FrGNMyGQCzC8s7uaJSKneUrlYq7XiNgU9qkEJiO3IP8b-5dK_knJaWvY7EC-8SubGcLvqF3ZaKRpsZPthk7hzuTlU1XB9VJV-pGJJGpN4R7uaNfIV1Hz9BCdxG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-09-06+at+6.34.36+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="325" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDxRHg6dUumCBL7ycPA_FrGNMyGQCzC8s7uaJSKneUrlYq7XiNgU9qkEJiO3IP8b-5dK_knJaWvY7EC-8SubGcLvqF3ZaKRpsZPthk7hzuTlU1XB9VJV-pGJJGpN4R7uaNfIV1Hz9BCdxG/s400/Screen+Shot+2015-09-06+at+6.34.36+PM.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-65394767944741266352015-07-06T13:16:00.001-07:002015-07-06T13:21:59.255-07:00The Symbols of our TribesI recently read <i><a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/The-True-American/" target="_blank">The True American</a></i>, Anand Giridharadas’s account of the 9/11-motivated shootings of gas station workers in Texas. Rais Bhuiyan was the last of the three men shot by Mark Stroman - the others were Indian and Pakistani - and the only one who lived. Rais was a Bangladeshi man who had lived in New York City and who had recently relocated to Dallas; Mark was a native Texan with the signs of white supremacy tattooed on his body. I read this passage soon after the shootings at the AME church in Charleston and the parallels with that shooter’s flag-adorned jacket jumped out at me:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil4vBI1T5Ju_A7biFsH56PnnXDNXoIpqZoJmd1BbInpF3JXJmnmOujvPWv12bTq0jSEHIYdYEL7-VUo0j1rn4gETLaIurtaCh5i5aEK6uJzTCKvW29Z28LdIGx-xnRDBRT2sHxNBsJruwH/s1600/20150624_164743.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil4vBI1T5Ju_A7biFsH56PnnXDNXoIpqZoJmd1BbInpF3JXJmnmOujvPWv12bTq0jSEHIYdYEL7-VUo0j1rn4gETLaIurtaCh5i5aEK6uJzTCKvW29Z28LdIGx-xnRDBRT2sHxNBsJruwH/s400/20150624_164743.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
And a few days later I read this series of tweets from <a href="http://www.slate.com/authors.jamelle_bouie.html" target="_blank">Jamelle Bouie</a>, a writer for <i>Slate</i>:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtNM9i_Fy8S0iIufr2cmb6qfkBINMWLQ86fPlLNlHzL9200EEp_PMIvlXjO0jwvrT9GlnKdtKgL4vmdDwJGg_ArsDU4nYmN_zPeHbb6XkuCfVuRjVmjLbTbAIRb-3KjQVy78LvMwekK4aE/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-06-24+at+8.23.01+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtNM9i_Fy8S0iIufr2cmb6qfkBINMWLQ86fPlLNlHzL9200EEp_PMIvlXjO0jwvrT9GlnKdtKgL4vmdDwJGg_ArsDU4nYmN_zPeHbb6XkuCfVuRjVmjLbTbAIRb-3KjQVy78LvMwekK4aE/s320/Screen+Shot+2015-06-24+at+8.23.01+AM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
And I thought about what I was up to last summer, reading <i>The Grapes of Wrath</i> and watching <i><a href="http://www.cbs.com/shows/family_ties/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, among other things, and I remembered the <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/tom-and-judith-and-geena-and-daphne.html" target="_blank">dance episode</a> where Alex has two dates, one of whom is the wonderful Daphne Zuniga. The theme of their high school dance? "Gone with the Wind." I went back to the episode, vaguely remembering it; in it, Alex describes how they're going to transform the gym into a "magnificent Civil War plantation." But it was worse than that; check out what decorates one wall:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsLeeP5PZZCDeYZTRQdqAx5341-VIIHItlf7YAVgT_Y0v8QUX4oITaq-F2BfsLRNAineRD6mAFm8CKgsC6LfFw6X_WJKsTdZQ0WDPfFHrutRJ-TaBpZvU0mRjP-Y77VHANsv88oCFIZh5j/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-07-06+at+12.41.32+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="155" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsLeeP5PZZCDeYZTRQdqAx5341-VIIHItlf7YAVgT_Y0v8QUX4oITaq-F2BfsLRNAineRD6mAFm8CKgsC6LfFw6X_WJKsTdZQ0WDPfFHrutRJ-TaBpZvU0mRjP-Y77VHANsv88oCFIZh5j/s320/Screen+Shot+2015-07-06+at+12.41.32+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
This is the Confederate nostalgia that Bouie wrote of, not as extreme as a direct paean to Robert E. Lee, but in its presentation as innocuous, arguably all the more insidious.<br />
<br />
Speaking of Michael J. Fox vehicles, I also recently read a <a href="https://medium.com/message/mad-men-and-the-coke-jingle-theory-4a5bf1fbaf02" target="_blank">great piece</a> about the <i>Mad Men</i> finale (spoiler alert!) that discussed one of the real creators of the Coke ad, an African American advertising executive named Roquel "Billy" Davis. Tim Carmody argues that <i>Mad Men</i> erased Davis, much like <i>Back to the Future</i> erases Chuck Berry by suggesting that Marty McFly inspired “Johnny B. Goode”:<br />
<i style="text-align: center;"><br /></i>
<i style="text-align: center;">In Back to the Future, this little bit of songwriting-musical-chairs-as-temporal paradox is a joke. </i><i style="text-align: center;">It’s a clever contemporary pop-culture reference for the audience, who (one assumes) knows how it</i><i style="text-align: center;"> all really turned out. But it’s a joke with a nasty center, parked at the end of a movie that, for all its </i><i style="text-align: center;">charms, kind of plays like an unapologetic nostalgia-fest for the 1950s. You know — the old, </i><i style="text-align: center;">oppressive, fully-segregated bad times that even in Season One, Mad Men is trying to escape. </i><br />
<br />
Is it possible to be nostalgic without erasing vital stories, events, people? Not for the United States, it seems.<br />
<br />
Bryan Stevenson knows this, and that’s why he’s working to revive those stories, events, and people through erecting memorials at the sites of violence against African Americans. I <a href="https://hereandnow.wbur.org/2015/06/30/bryan-stevenson-racial-tensions" target="_blank">heard him on the radio show <i>Here and Now</i></a> last week and found him completely convincing, though I was a bit frustrated by how consistently the interviewer, Robin Young, embodied the naysayer’s point of view. I know that good interviews require the raising of potential objections, but here I longed for more kudos, more admiration. <br />
<br />
Rais Bhuiyan also started an organization, <a href="http://worldwithouthate.org/" target="_blank">World Without Hate</a>, which works to increase understanding between cultures.LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-38003591076146974822015-05-02T18:27:00.000-07:002015-05-02T18:29:39.377-07:00Recommended ReadingMy friend Tyler wrote a <a href="http://www.hobartpulp.com/web_features/three-milwaukee-brewers" target="_blank">great essay</a> for <i>Hobart</i> about the Milwaukee Brewers.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-16185221555491128402014-12-17T16:43:00.000-08:002014-12-22T13:06:19.667-08:00Looking for Lillian Randolph<div class="background-container">
</div>
<div id="header" style="top: -57px;">
<div class="header-tops-wrapper">
<div class="header-top" style="margin-top: -48px;">
<div class="ht-logo">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZUiUJHleB143B5Wr0rOk2jjllnKhzTCFXQw5j3aAjf8qy4PMMYZC-Vs_dG_NBrsI3yOEQQGsMUHbVmk06jwYYORL1tywi_HriMEABm1P2eYrCYXvl8q6y3iAp3Y7MzoD7HWfM0TjUXgCJ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-12-17+at+11.56.15+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZUiUJHleB143B5Wr0rOk2jjllnKhzTCFXQw5j3aAjf8qy4PMMYZC-Vs_dG_NBrsI3yOEQQGsMUHbVmk06jwYYORL1tywi_HriMEABm1P2eYrCYXvl8q6y3iAp3Y7MzoD7HWfM0TjUXgCJ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-12-17+at+11.56.15+AM.png" height="307" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">When a once-prolific actress is no longer easily found. (Credit: Ebony magazine)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Tis the season for showings of <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i>, the Christmas classic. A few years ago, I went to one of these, at the <a href="http://www.grandillusioncinema.org/" target="_blank">Grand Illusion</a> theater in Seattle. Watching an old movie with an audience highlights what no longer holds up, and the character of Annie, the Bailey family's African American maid, definitely fell into this category: she has only four or five lines in the whole film, each of which is supposed to be funny; she's portrayed as loyal, nosy, and jovial, dependable for her service and a laugh. But in our seats we mostly greeted her with sounds more approaching groans than chuckles - or with silence.<br />
<br />
<i>Boys and girls and music - who needs gin?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>I was saving this money for a divorce if I ever got myself a husband! </i><br />
<br />
I have called this movie my favorite; in high school, I had a poster of it on my bedroom wall, Jimmy Stewart lifting Donna Reed in the air. I knew the names of all the actors who played the main characters: Ward Bond, Henry Travers, Beulah Bondi, Lionel Barrymore, and more. But there was one person I didn't know: Lillian Randolph, the actress who played Annie.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Lilian Randolph" class="left" src="http://www.greatgildersleeve.com/images/lillian_randolph.jpg" height="320" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="296" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lillian Randolph (Credit: greatgildersleeve.com)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
I was curious how Randolph felt about Annie, if she spoke directly about the paucity of non-maid roles for black actresses the way her contemporaries Hattie McDaniel and Butterfly McQueen had. So I did some rudimentary searching. Obviously what I found only scratches the surface; media scholars and critics and historians have no doubt covered this material in far greater depth. But I do think what I found is revealing. <br />
<br />
Randolph was a radio star, singer, acting teacher, and actress who did voice work and appeared in film and on television up until the year before her death in 1980. Although the website for <i><a href="http://www.ebony.com/" target="_blank">Ebony</a></i> magazine returned no results, what I found <a href="http://www.rusc.com/old-time-radio/Lillian-Randolph.aspx?t=1087" target="_blank">elsewhere</a> <a href="http://www.blackpast.org/aah/randolph-lillian-1915-1980" target="_blank">online</a> indicated that she had in fact graced their pages - in 1946, in fact, the year that <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i> was released. <br />
<br />
Through my university library, I read an article about trends in radio portrayals of African Americans, which ran in the January 1946 issue (only the third issue of <i>Ebony</i>), and which features a big photograph of Randolph and other actors from the radio show <i>The Great Gildersleeve</i> with the caption WORST SHOW. It continues: "in its malicious maligning of minorities" the show "oozes dialogue in the Octavius Roy Cohn (<i>sic</i>) tradition through the medium of Lillian Randolph who plays the maid Birdie." <br />
<br />
Cohen was an author whose most prolific period seems to have been the 1920s; if you're like me and hadn't heard of him, it's probably because, as Paul McCann writes in <i><a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=YCXOh2rNDBgC&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=Octavus+roy+cohen+racism&source=bl&ots=ikMQk8B8DJ&sig=rQlB0JF_dvcEndQVYkjn3jkrRyk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=SPWRVMzwDIKvoQTQh4HoBw&ved=0CCEQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Octavus%20roy%20cohen%20racism&f=false" target="_blank">Race, Music, and National Identity</a></i>, "His work is grounded in racist caricatures of the African American community and if he is mentioned at all by critics, writers, and historians, it is usually with scorn." So to compare the writing on a radio show to Cohen's was no mild critique.<br />
<br />
And it's a charge that Randolph answered. In the April 1946 issue, <i>Ebony</i> published two letters under the header, "In Birdie's Defense," and the first is from Randolph. She writes, "You have a splendid magazine but whoever gave me the criticism I'm sure has never heard the show." She describes the amount of fan mail <i>Gildersleeve</i> has received and continues, "The writers have never put a word of dialect in the script and are particularly careful in the dialogue so as not to offend. I am proud of my race and in no way do I mean to make them ashamed." (The second letter is from Sam Moore, a <i>Gildersleeve</i> writer, who argues that radio needs African American writers. Moore notes, "Surely the central problem, for the sake of good drama as well as a better world, is to present the Negro truly and honestly as a human being, fighting to make a place for himself in a country that for him is still only half a democracy"). <br />
<br />
This defense of <i>Gildersleeve</i> seems never to have wavered: in a <a href="http://www.speakingofradio.com/interviews/randolph-lillian/" target="_blank">1976 <i>Those Were the Days</i> radio interview</a> about her career, much of the 22 minutes are devoted to <i>Gildersleeve</i>, which Randolph describes in warm terms. (Although Randolph may be most well-known now for the role of Annie, that part isn't even mentioned in this interview).<br />
<br />
Notable moments in this interview include at minute 3:15: "I was taught - this sounds ridiculous, but this was true - I was taught Negro dialect by a Caucasian by the name of James Jewel who was one of the originators of the <i>Lone Ranger</i>…I owe everything I've ever done in radio to Mr. Jewel." (A whole essay could probably be built off of that one excerpt, but I'll just say that at the very least this seems to complicate her claims about dialect and dialogue in the <i>Ebony</i> letter); at 16:09, when she describes her upcoming role on the TV mini-series <i>Roots</i>; and this dialogue at 19:33, after Randolph has discussed a commercial she's going to be in for Wesson Oil:<br />
<br />
Interviewer (I believe this is Chuck Schaden): "Keep you in the kitchen a lot, from Kraft mayonnaise to Wesson Oil."<br />
Randolph: "I don't mind it at all. It's work."<br />
<br />
And maybe therein lies a partial answer to how Randolph felt about playing so many maids. It was work, and in the case of <i>Gildersleeve</i>, it was work that lasted nearly two decades (compare that to the few minutes she got in <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i>), work that she didn't share with anyone else (unlike the part of <i>Beulah</i>, for example, on the show of the same name, which was played by several actresses), and it was work that she felt aligned with her Christian values. (Near the end of the interview, Randolph talks about turning down jobs that she wouldn't want family or fellow church members to see her in). <br />
<br />
Randolph has been recognized for her professional achievements, including <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=-rYDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA54&dq=lillian+randolph+intitle:jet&hl=en&ei=eDCyTPCUEMOQnwfh3rnNBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCcQ6AEwADgK#v=onepage&q=lillian%20randolph%20intitle%3Ajet&f=false" target="_blank">being inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame</a>, but she's also been erased, as when her voice work on the <i>Tom and Jerry</i> cartoon was <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=X7ZYsnTPIhwC&pg=PA277&lpg=PA277&dq=lillian+randolph+interviews&source=bl&ots=uS71p5S6PG&sig=7QjqU9NAGzVN-puaOkejlTYsJX0&hl=en&sa=X&ei=KhqSVOy1O5HvoATXgIKoAg&ved=0CDEQ6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=lillian%20randolph%20interviews&f=false" target="_blank">dubbed over</a>. <br />
<br />
<i>It's a Wonderful Life</i> recognizes and erases Randolph at the same time, too: she shows up in the last scene with the rest of the community, but she's not on the ensemble poster (even though pretty much everyone else is). <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://www.impawards.com/1946/posters/its_a_wonderful_life.jpg" height="400" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="262" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">(Credit: impawards.com)</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Watching<i> </i>the movie in that theater, we
were also recognizing and erasing - seeing her on
the screen, but wishing an uncomfortable depiction of race
and labor away. But those of us who still cycle <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i> through our holiday viewing should look carefully, instead; we won't find all of Randolph through Annie, but we will learn something about the opportunities available to African American women at the time, actresses and not. We'll learn about work, race, and gender. We'll learn something about our own time, too, about the movies we make now, and the implications of continuing to love what we have loved. <br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
***</div>
<br />
Addendum: Years ago I watched a clip of something - a movie? TV show? Music video? I can't remember - that showed a young African American man returning home one night to find his grandparents watching <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i>. He paused to look at them, shook his head, and left the room. The implication was that their generation was out-of-touch to still enjoy such a film. Does anyone know the name of the movie, TV show, etc., with this scene? <br />
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: medium none; color: black; overflow: hidden; text-align: left; text-decoration: none;">
</div>
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-12042143647484431132014-11-04T05:50:00.000-08:002014-11-04T05:50:30.840-08:005 a.m. = semi-random thoughts<br />
-Babies don't really have special, stay-at-home wear, do they? I mean, I have my favorite "not going anywhere" outfits, like the rolled-up blue jeans with the growing hole in the left knee and the v-necked shirt with orange and pink shells. But babies these days seem like they're always so fashionable, so ready-to-go. Obviously they don't decide what to wear, period, let alone what to wear when they're having a pajamas day. I mean, I know they have <i>pajamas</i>, but do they have special, extra-laid back pajamas? <br />
<br />
-Why are all my insecurities about teaching channeled through political metaphors? For instance, why do I sometimes wonder, "Am I the Jimmy Carter of teachers?"<br />
<br />
-Speaking of politics, I still want to read an academic paper on Elmo and Bob Dole's use of the third person.<br />
<br />
-Yesterday the student I bought my coffee from told me that the puppy he and his wife are fostering is named Julie Taylor. I was like, "Julie Taylor...why does that name sound so familiar?" <i>Friday Night Lights</i>, he told me, and I scream-laughed with joy. Apparently all current puppies at Motley Zoo Animal Rescue are named after characters from the show. One of Julie Taylor's brothers is Matt Saracen. Hilarious but also a bit creepy, right? LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-57862697864821734582014-10-11T13:47:00.000-07:002014-10-11T16:28:44.499-07:00Why Are Almost all of These Women White?C'mon, Grey Lady, get it together. It's only been a few weeks since <i>The New York Times</i> caused an uproar for publishing Alessandra Stanley's <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/21/arts/television/viola-davis-plays-shonda-rhimess-latest-tough-heroine.html?_r=0" target="_blank">inaccurate, clueless, and offensive piece</a> about Shonda Rhimes and her TV creations. One of the <a href="http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/24/shonda-rhimes-alessandra-stanley-margaret-sullivan-column/?module=BlogPost-ReadMore&version=Blog%20Main&action=Click&contentCollection=Opinion&pgtype=Blogs&region=Body#more-6850" target="_blank">conclusions</a> that Margaret Sullivan, the Public Editor, reached was that a lack of diversity in the ranks of culture editors could have contributed to the piece's publication; she notes that, "among the 15 culture editors...just a few are nonwhite." <br />
<br />
Now this week's Sunday Book Review is focused on Women & Power, and what do you see when you scroll (or flip) through the contents? Of the 13 photos or drawings of women or girls that accompany each article, 11 are white. (I'm providing the link <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/pages/books/review/index.html" target="_blank">here</a> although it appears that the table of contents in this order will only be available until the next Book Review replaces it). There's Diane Sawyer, Lena Dunham, Gail Sheehy, and Kirsten Gillibrand, among others, and then there's Sonia Sotomayor and a story about <i>The Underground Girls of Kabul</i>, which chronicles the practice of passing girls off as boys in Afghanistan (one such girl and her mother appear in the accompanying photo). Two books profiling nonwhite women, two images; that's it. This even when some stories - such as a piece about abortion rights and the origins of birth control pills - involve and affect all women and are illustrated with drawings, drawings that easily could have depicted nonwhite women.<br />
<br />
At the end of her piece about the Stanley article, Sullivan wrote, "This contentious chapter may not seem like a welcome gift to anyone
involved. But if The Times takes it seriously – looking hard at its
diversity and its editing practices — it can be exactly that." It's clear that <i>The Times</i> isn't looking hard enough; I plan to email Sullivan to tell her just that. <br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-4218899672013258962014-10-11T04:28:00.001-07:002014-10-11T04:28:45.626-07:00Under the Dome with Only Microsoft for CompanyConfession: I have not read <i>Under the Dome</i>, but I have watched it. It is so very nearly bad enough to be wonderful, but not quite. Anyway, I was curious how the book compared, so I read James Parker's <i>New York Times</i> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/08/books/review/JParker-t.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Aw%2C%7B%222%22%3A%22RI%3A17%22%2C%221%22%3A%22RI%3A6%22%7D" target="_blank">review</a>, which includes plot details such as President Obama writing a letter to the town's dome-entrapped citizens and a second selectman seizing control of the police department, ready to enact his right wing agenda now that de facto secession from the U.S. government has occurred. Parker closes:<br />
<br />
<i>The coalition that forms against him includes a journalist, a librarian, an Iraq</i><br />
<i> veteran, some acned skateboarders and an English professor from</i><br />
<i> Massachusetts who (rather wonderfully) has just edited an issue of</i><br />
<i> Ploughshares. </i><i>Get ready, libruls, King seems to be saying: If the dome</i><br />
<i> comes down, you’re </i><i>going to need one another. </i><br />
<br />
In other words, it's the then-present day of 2009, a year after Obama's election, and it's recognizably our world, complete with our president, our war, and our literary magazines. It's got guts and gore, but it also has a political viewpoint.<br />
<br />
In contrast, on the TV show the Iraq War veteran is retained, as well as the power-hungry government official, but there's nothing Iraq or Tea Party-specific about either of them. And the Zuzu's petals of the whole thing, <i>Ploughshares</i>? It's not there either, George. Yet we're in our world, product-placement-wise, from Microsoft to Prius, and others have written about the <a href="http://betanews.com/2014/07/17/under-the-dome-goes-over-the-top-in-promoting-microsoft-surface/" target="_blank">strange and unlikely ways</a> these products have been introduced on the show. I know I'm writing seriously about a not-serious show and a book I haven't, ahem, read, but I think it's worth noting that Bad Stephen King Adaptation + Microsoft doesn't only = cringe-inducing viewing. It's that some proper nouns have ascended while others have been erased. It's Microsoft - Politics which creates such an empty vessel.<br />
<br />
Not every story based in our world needs to ground itself in our real political names; of course alternate-reality narratives and straight-up allegories can offer politically and culturally astute commentary. I just think it's interesting when we keep the signifiers without the significance; for example, keeping the Iraq War veteran in name only. What does this accomplish? What box does it check off? Is it just a shorthand for, "This character is an experienced badass who has been through the shit"? Does the director think, "Let's show a photo of him with his Army buddies and their guns and call it a day"? How do actual Iraq War veterans feel about such characters?<br />
<br />
I'm writing this late at night/early in the morning, so maybe my brain is fuzzified, but I'm also wondering now about <a href="http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/01/political-cameos-on-the-good-wife-donna-brazile-likes-them/?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Aw%2C%7B%222%22%3A%22RI%3A17%22%2C%221%22%3A%22RI%3A6%22%7D" target="_blank">political cameos on shows such as <i>The Good Wife</i></a>. Is this another example of a signifier without significance?<br />
<br />
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-61612694852982771642014-09-18T07:54:00.002-07:002014-09-18T07:54:47.082-07:00Throwback Thursday<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMXTjazt6o9AcK-6K0mtnCLGSZBA0I9kw7Ho8PZCiV6qWSsFytX34P5vBO7PZ1R5cLz1DdM6FN6vbm_3QvPBADXvMi8QBDJpiz7z3mDCVPmDLqhh-gb7iJ0y-p_NLtgNpmv631MQPM_dk4/s1600/Hula+back+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMXTjazt6o9AcK-6K0mtnCLGSZBA0I9kw7Ho8PZCiV6qWSsFytX34P5vBO7PZ1R5cLz1DdM6FN6vbm_3QvPBADXvMi8QBDJpiz7z3mDCVPmDLqhh-gb7iJ0y-p_NLtgNpmv631MQPM_dk4/s1600/Hula+back+cover.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></div>
Hula was my friend Jenny Gillespie's zine; this issue (#2!) is from the summer of 1996, when I was 16 and she was 15. I found this on my bookshelf and thought I'd share the back cover with you because a) it manages to celebrate a throwback while being one itself, and b) <i>Say Anything</i>-era John Cusack + cabbage = enjoyment<i>, </i>yes? Regardless of how you'd actually answer that question, happy Thursday. LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-1730069920519915532014-09-15T05:49:00.001-07:002014-09-15T05:49:10.180-07:00Steinbeck vs. Very Tall Trees (or Things to Learn in California)This summer I taught a class, re-watched <i>Family Ties</i>, and finally read <i>The Grapes of Wrath</i>, which I loved and was <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/14/grapes-of-wrath-75-years-old-more-relevant-than-ever" target="_blank">not alone in finding unfortunately yet inspiringly still relevant</a>. So I was excited to visit the <a href="http://www.steinbeck.org/" target="_blank">National Steinbeck Center</a> in Salinas, CA. If you haven't been, and you're a mostly-uninformed Steinbeck admirer to any degree, I recommend it. I learned about his reporting - on migrant workers and World War II, among other subjects - how the themes of <i>The Grapes of Wrath</i> earned him an invitation to Russia at the start of the Cold War (not exactly a common occurrence), and how critical derision about him receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature caused him to give up writing fiction. (It <a href="http://reason.com/blog/2012/10/08/new-travels-with-charley-edition-acknowl" target="_blank">eventually became clear that he never truly gave it up</a>). I learned about books I'd never knew he'd written - <i>In Dubious Battle</i>, about a farm workers' strike; <i>The Winter of our Discontent</i>, about consumerism and morality in the U.S. - and was reminded of <i>America and Americans</i>, a collection of essays and the last book of his published while he was alive. <br />
<br />
There was also a very cool exhibit about <a href="http://wasabipress.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-steinbeck-journey-videos.html" target="_blank">a group that recreated the Joads' journey</a> from Oklahoma to California to mark the 75th anniversary of <i>The Grapes of Wrath</i>; they collected oral histories from workers, activists, and other people, some of which are shared in the exhibit. (You can find more info about it <a href="http://www.steinbeck.org/pages/wherever-theys-a-fight-by-patricia-wakida" target="_blank">here</a>, too; although it says the exhibit ended in July, they must have decided to extend it). <br />
<br />
But the center was also disappointing and odd: if you were unlike me and were mostly-<i>in</i>formed about Steinbeck, there's little offered that you won't already know; the main exhibit is large and contains a lot of information, but there's no commentary, let alone analysis, that seeks to puzzle out themes, arcs, or evolutions in his life or work or tie them to contemporary issues. (The possible exception is a collection of "Steinbeck in the news"-type clippings, but it was dominated by stories of the recent <a href="http://www.broadway.com/shows/mice-and-men/" target="_blank">big-name Broadway revival of <i>Of Mice and Men</i></a>). And in some cases, there are frustrating, gaping holes: a display of Steinbeck's college correspondence names the recipient but nothing about who she was.<br />
<br />
What's also odd is the museum's apparent desire to satisfy both adults and children; there are a lot of interactive features, some of which can cross generations. (For example, the <i>In Dubious Battle</i> section includes two candlestick telephones; you pick up the receiver to hear dialogue from the book). But others, such as a red pony that children can climb onto, well, not so much. I've never read <i>The Red Pony</i>, but a cursory glance at some search results reveals that it's generally taught at the 6th grade level or higher. But the museum pony seems aimed at much younger kids (or middle schoolers who want to - wait for it! - horse around). It's great to try to get kids excited about literature, but at what point are book-related activities made so accessible to young ages, the "related" part stretched so thin, that the book itself is lost? When kids have a chance to practice braiding a rope, are they learning about a book or about…braiding a rope? Meanwhile, the adults among you are wondering, <i>Who was that woman he wrote the letters to?! </i><br />
<br />
I'm a sucker for the interactive as much as the next person; when I see a question in a big font asking, "How did Lennie want his beans?" and the instruction, "Lift the can," I lift the can. (Spoiler alert: there's a bottle of ketchup under them thar can). Then later in my trip, when I'm reading an educational display in Redwood National and State Parks about what makes redwoods so resilient, and it ends with the question, "What do you think is the biggest threat to redwoods today?", my first thought is, <i>What do I lift to find the answer?! </i><br />
<br />
Then I think: <i>oh, right. Humans.</i> LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-23262629378625284622014-09-12T17:12:00.003-07:002014-09-12T17:13:04.479-07:00Outside the National Steinbeck CenterJust got back from a great trip, which included a stop in Salinas, CA. I'm tired now, but maybe I'll write more about it later.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP7x7Zco5w7M4KtLh_9gQa97Kt_yJmhy3PtqPu7hzAt0xa1AxmS2LUhD6Gm-f3pD5RJ8VheKqGOoPbSjDTWaVpr81Yxr4lvOXw_g8-kF3HBFfkSz7wGgahGUV3_yQG0EBlJPYn_dUsYyAi/s1600/20140908_150459.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP7x7Zco5w7M4KtLh_9gQa97Kt_yJmhy3PtqPu7hzAt0xa1AxmS2LUhD6Gm-f3pD5RJ8VheKqGOoPbSjDTWaVpr81Yxr4lvOXw_g8-kF3HBFfkSz7wGgahGUV3_yQG0EBlJPYn_dUsYyAi/s1600/20140908_150459.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-54281635317479697022014-09-04T22:50:00.000-07:002014-09-05T10:45:32.563-07:00Amendments, Corrections, and Recommendations: A Final Family Ties Post*<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm94zjfF2y5YvJXO82JG74tPHRu9NqckQ_Nt7tRzMM6tdpMtFp3BHyDPclyjp-xqprNcciZ6lBzJqe68Zuqd2sUAa7V19Pz27Gdt6BV5LCr_1Ucu15jCpqPEeDFyuY71PtanB33a_rbL5u/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+5.41.08+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm94zjfF2y5YvJXO82JG74tPHRu9NqckQ_Nt7tRzMM6tdpMtFp3BHyDPclyjp-xqprNcciZ6lBzJqe68Zuqd2sUAa7V19Pz27Gdt6BV5LCr_1Ucu15jCpqPEeDFyuY71PtanB33a_rbL5u/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+5.41.08+PM.png" height="238" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
Before I get to some episode recommendations and suggestions for further reading, here are a few updates, in no particular order:<br />
<ul>
<li>I <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/where-they-were-calling-from.html" target="_blank">wondered if the Keatons had an answering machine</a>; well, they do get one in season four, and the kids spend one episode changing the outgoing messages on each other, but then it never really figures in the plot again. (It seems to physically disappear, too, but don't quote me on that).</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizs7kA6Oub7ko1bJQpz4iJVwOTAPudMiAoCaFAPq3HnGxQHgJUQEHvv8lJR5B9AChhc6RmS34Lr7eZrBj9BHHPd8DhqvE847S-5VJS0PLkFFvpGRW-2g7of87lTi-TdyEQr0UZU0rrylxc/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.57.11+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizs7kA6Oub7ko1bJQpz4iJVwOTAPudMiAoCaFAPq3HnGxQHgJUQEHvv8lJR5B9AChhc6RmS34Lr7eZrBj9BHHPd8DhqvE847S-5VJS0PLkFFvpGRW-2g7of87lTi-TdyEQr0UZU0rrylxc/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.57.11+PM.png" height="293" width="320" /></a><br />
<ul>
<li>I wrote that <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/the-clothes-make-continuity.html" target="_blank">we never see the Obecks</a> - the Keatons' neighbors until they move out and the <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/still-working-on-that-solid-rock-of.html" target="_blank">Thompsons move into that house</a> - or Chrissy, Jennifer's best friend, but neither of those claims turned out to be true. We do meet one Obeck, daughter Liz, in the episode "The Big Fix" in season five. At the end of season five we also meet Chrissy, in a two-part episode about Jennifer trying to change to fit in with a popular crowd. </li>
</ul>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7qNNtg_QwFEutzKBVsAEXhCb7d1iQCSxXcNNTAT8sUM9G1x4gMNOxcs4jSoM5w9KW1UJv1eSDACfUbAfm92C76wtzVAkZy_Lsaauz6SvCXGWNSkwU4PHWE3co9iKV-zDkBkt1bowy87y7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.25.26+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7qNNtg_QwFEutzKBVsAEXhCb7d1iQCSxXcNNTAT8sUM9G1x4gMNOxcs4jSoM5w9KW1UJv1eSDACfUbAfm92C76wtzVAkZy_Lsaauz6SvCXGWNSkwU4PHWE3co9iKV-zDkBkt1bowy87y7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.25.26+PM.png" height="208" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
"It's My Party" is a great example of a strange and not-great phenomenon on <i><a href="http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Ties" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>: airing episodes out of order. Characters, especially Jennifer and Andrew, are clearly younger in "Party" than they have been for the entire season, and Alex's girlfriend Ellen is still around, even though <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/only-onscreen-ending.html" target="_blank">she left for Paris</a> ages ago. This episode was filmed in season four but - saved? forgotten? deemed subpar but trotted out to fill scheduling needs? It's unclear. (Which is not to say it doesn't have its great moments, my favorites being when Ellen gives Jennifer an old Mondale and Ferraro shirt for her birthday and when the parents try to decipher a note Jennifer has left them; it's a minefield of "like" and "okay?").<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMQ5GFM8HNr0iKznEWbuiM28QozwQI0l9ZDpF1cJ2Cda7I1Y__H0ZFawjiM99q3Kuf7CZBdzqKbLwWtIMBffZQ7GuuSP35LzMhbN86faLmg1NY-BynZ6TUxtITiWRz_wHtYomPENcyoANG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.23.49+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMQ5GFM8HNr0iKznEWbuiM28QozwQI0l9ZDpF1cJ2Cda7I1Y__H0ZFawjiM99q3Kuf7CZBdzqKbLwWtIMBffZQ7GuuSP35LzMhbN86faLmg1NY-BynZ6TUxtITiWRz_wHtYomPENcyoANG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.23.49+PM.png" height="187" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What can I say? I'm a sucker for political t-shirts...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRELcWTaBX0KITP7Z1DK-dSrp-KxwOnq0lzHh-qDsm2-Cd2EjBt8Roi3qvWfOLM0mqhZv-KAfdTrSuRPuu1U6WlMKhY9SCZxiHb4nAQRLPR1oHALIPrybOdvgNOtvhcRIYCglrfhrSS24i/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.42.34+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRELcWTaBX0KITP7Z1DK-dSrp-KxwOnq0lzHh-qDsm2-Cd2EjBt8Roi3qvWfOLM0mqhZv-KAfdTrSuRPuu1U6WlMKhY9SCZxiHb4nAQRLPR1oHALIPrybOdvgNOtvhcRIYCglrfhrSS24i/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+2.42.34+PM.png" height="285" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">…and textual analysis.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<ul>
<li>One more update before we move on: I speculated that one reason the show <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/greg-and-trudy-i-hardly-knew-ye.html" target="_blank">creates a friend for Alex only to kill him off</a> might have been because the actors who had played his established friends were not available. I don't know if the writers or casting director considered killing off Timothy Busfield or Jeffrey Joseph's characters for "A, My Name is Alex" in 1987, but maybe you've heard of a little thing called <i>thirtysomething</i>? That started airing in 1987, as did <i>The Popcorn Kid</i>, a TV series that Joseph had a recurring part in. So these actors were a little busy. (Plus, Busfield had already been assigned double duty on the show; in addition to being Alex's friend, he was also cast in an episode's flashback sequence as one of college-age Steven's friends. But then again, <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/some-faces-of-hardworking-1980s.html" target="_blank">what's two roles for the same actor?</a> The show went higher for others). </li>
</ul>
<br />
<ul><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYxlBb0bLmRxcnl-Kx86hwQC_hRHrbZHoyxHjH04MAhcqe27qTpFiKKGxfGSe8Rek48BVQ44YsmT5IBUJS4m4xM2ZhKOIflM0WXICi_nmP_57IZnBJIFFR1ZnYQG2jJRwcntafDyNGot5k/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-04+at+5.50.32+AM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYxlBb0bLmRxcnl-Kx86hwQC_hRHrbZHoyxHjH04MAhcqe27qTpFiKKGxfGSe8Rek48BVQ44YsmT5IBUJS4m4xM2ZhKOIflM0WXICi_nmP_57IZnBJIFFR1ZnYQG2jJRwcntafDyNGot5k/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-04+at+5.50.32+AM.png" height="243" width="320" /></a></div>
</ul>
<div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiX5Vdn6fXteJATVgY6Dd5Y1_Co6TfWxODcmJaNCk-NFz5bIj4lSUIgpEiAUF2FpYZ47sgtAnAhyphenhyphen7N3y7j1h_XKzQRBDmxoBxLkrzxk73D4NOjj1XmlKllA4tPpefuZP_d5y_2YoiO7wio/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.50.09+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiX5Vdn6fXteJATVgY6Dd5Y1_Co6TfWxODcmJaNCk-NFz5bIj4lSUIgpEiAUF2FpYZ47sgtAnAhyphenhyphen7N3y7j1h_XKzQRBDmxoBxLkrzxk73D4NOjj1XmlKllA4tPpefuZP_d5y_2YoiO7wio/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.50.09+AM.png" height="188" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Both Timothy Busfield (top) and Jeffrey Joseph (above) appeared as Alex's friends in two episodes. <br />
That amounted to close friendship in the <i>Family Ties</i> universe. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Now for some recommendations! Let's start with a few individual scenes and then go to whole episodes. Of course, it depends on what you're looking for:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Are you looking for some feminist education for little boys? Look no further than "The Way We Were" in season six, which opens with Alex coming home to find his parents asleep on the couch and Andy playing garage. Alex sees a Barbie doll and picks it up. "What's she doing here?" he asks.</li>
</ul>
"That's Barbie," Andy says. "She owns the garage."<br />
"Barbie owns the garage?"<br />
"Really she's in Congress, but on weekends she's a mechanic."<br />
"I think I see mom's influence here," Alex says.<br />
"She also won the Nobel Prize in Physics," Andy adds.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpjCaKi_bBX6ZBpPsktKvmnXPcVkKyNHv-vh86Nclofn-MZ-z4ADEIdi7TIq_mbJxD5fln6DvgFNSjjzbZdqecfGb0ZdQEN2fwmnHNmsE7WsHl-PIJzhSkdYm6sO360LyDdrTmGunbo1p4/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-04+at+6.27.13+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpjCaKi_bBX6ZBpPsktKvmnXPcVkKyNHv-vh86Nclofn-MZ-z4ADEIdi7TIq_mbJxD5fln6DvgFNSjjzbZdqecfGb0ZdQEN2fwmnHNmsE7WsHl-PIJzhSkdYm6sO360LyDdrTmGunbo1p4/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-04+at+6.27.13+AM.png" height="216" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The debate about Barbie's identity devolves into a tug of war. <br />
These three actors are routinely great together.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<ul>
<li>Or maybe you feel stifled on the set and you want to see footage filmed outside? This happens rarely on the show, and the first such images don't occur until the end of season three in the two-part episode "Remembrance of Things Past." Steven and the family return to his childhood home in Buffalo; his father has died and his mother is thinking about selling the house. Steven visits his father's grave.</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivIwzsVDT6NWEfjnwdx_VA8hEtxzerVeFYrDNIi5RlLasNEc2a8nvH9_nMjJnbxxVxHtrFrW4XS0v3_xy5hg3bB4m1gYc2I0H0KMQM4KXPsmUfJZJAGMqVgqWYcRKjF4NYgm3CZN2mFJFY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+9.58.17+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivIwzsVDT6NWEfjnwdx_VA8hEtxzerVeFYrDNIi5RlLasNEc2a8nvH9_nMjJnbxxVxHtrFrW4XS0v3_xy5hg3bB4m1gYc2I0H0KMQM4KXPsmUfJZJAGMqVgqWYcRKjF4NYgm3CZN2mFJFY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+9.58.17+PM.png" height="223" width="320" /></a><br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Or perhaps you long for some good old-fashioned miming. When Jennifer gets her learner's permit in the season seven episode, "My Best Friend's Girl," Steven insists on giving her driving lessons. This includes a simulation in the kitchen, during which he says she ran a red light. Jennifer counters that there's a cop behind them. "I'm gonna try to lose him," she says. <span style="text-align: center;"> </span></li>
</ul>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg22Jj4zrEwzGKbxPFuZqi85wFq0ZRMrIw027Y8PCoeMFXDoZzhSHx1e0A-2-dLYwkfq3IPRovRWzJb5V8jVBEvyTwyeK7eL0dccwumEuw8KtTSaDHpyHzSiO8sGYNWjJ3TKE0iqC1Jsq6n/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.36.33+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg22Jj4zrEwzGKbxPFuZqi85wFq0ZRMrIw027Y8PCoeMFXDoZzhSHx1e0A-2-dLYwkfq3IPRovRWzJb5V8jVBEvyTwyeK7eL0dccwumEuw8KtTSaDHpyHzSiO8sGYNWjJ3TKE0iqC1Jsq6n/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.36.33+PM.png" height="207" width="320" /></a> <br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcNTjCB7oHN52Mv5r5Wyj1V8LWU9jCzlUKhmh6Pma7k-j2Sxp1pgbLeU3orsp8-bcJQa27xlXkZ9Vta_7Ksyn78379LwYXvxtRhR1yIowXlFRK-3EBef3xVmdVkwh3JVuXLh_24mKcRpS0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.37.45+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcNTjCB7oHN52Mv5r5Wyj1V8LWU9jCzlUKhmh6Pma7k-j2Sxp1pgbLeU3orsp8-bcJQa27xlXkZ9Vta_7Ksyn78379LwYXvxtRhR1yIowXlFRK-3EBef3xVmdVkwh3JVuXLh_24mKcRpS0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.37.45+PM.png" height="201" width="320" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyCht0nK0jjHlGjxbwU8sxYgB-1oq4_pZzLJGClMpl2xcD9JLy0FICljO57aL6ZTV8lnN8qGMckDX4AI1ZmvyzYYpLj5Ek3O3booYHlq4aKTia8HjeWW6Q0cwDtqn8vdVFsNWRq_ahQykw/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.38.09+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyCht0nK0jjHlGjxbwU8sxYgB-1oq4_pZzLJGClMpl2xcD9JLy0FICljO57aL6ZTV8lnN8qGMckDX4AI1ZmvyzYYpLj5Ek3O3booYHlq4aKTia8HjeWW6Q0cwDtqn8vdVFsNWRq_ahQykw/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+4.38.09+PM.png" height="203" width="320" /></a><br />
<br />
As for whole episodes, that also depends on what you're looking for. But I will say that if you're a teacher or interested in education, you might find the episodes that center around teachers notable.<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>"Little Man on Campus" in season three is about Alex starting college and struggling: he considers dropping American Government because he got an F on his first paper - he doesn't think he can hack it in that class. (Notice how it doesn't occur to him to blame the teacher or make excuses for himself). But when he goes to drop the class, his teacher questions him until he gets Alex to understand how to make an original argument. And it's not an abstract discussion - it's a conversation, and argument, about Eugene Debs and Oliver Wendell Holmes. </li>
<li>"Paper Chase," the final episode of season four, is about how Mallory nearly flunks her history class and doesn't graduate from high school. But with the encouragement of her family, boyfriend, and teacher, she passes her oral exam and graduates after all. Her requests for extra credit are rebuffed; her only recourse is hard work, and it works. (It's also fun to see the oral exam, which people such as Rebecca Schuman have <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/life/education/2013/12/college_papers_students_hate_writing_them_professors_hate_grading_them_let.html" target="_blank">tried to revive</a>, in messy, Socratic action). </li>
</ul>
<br />
<ul><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjSTh8QjkWBXwqlE9Uvik6Wql3xsPPVQ23PQU5SDs-aSw91VUuBz5RJUhURixyIS32U1ql2yYAJiPZxeRvoeMldg569YNYWhoBDhriCSgRk4IN3x2e51F-D8VyTAC-cpeOUD1arzAOBCG2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.35.15+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjSTh8QjkWBXwqlE9Uvik6Wql3xsPPVQ23PQU5SDs-aSw91VUuBz5RJUhURixyIS32U1ql2yYAJiPZxeRvoeMldg569YNYWhoBDhriCSgRk4IN3x2e51F-D8VyTAC-cpeOUD1arzAOBCG2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.35.15+PM.png" height="190" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Skippy graduates too!<br />How could I get this far with only the merest nods at Marc Price, <br />who plays neighbor Skippy Handelman?</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</ul>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRDio5DFGZqSCZmz8aCP8DP1RQuVjc3Le20nuJ9B2d2-TaQ90EjVB1nLsFwzp_HZtLXgDy-K4br3mFOtFDdyY7NxwZ7YvFvTPotSRbSU-sZomsBHLx6O-3ipAKGxhD9TDuPhqadJ_NyZCT/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+7.08.10+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRDio5DFGZqSCZmz8aCP8DP1RQuVjc3Le20nuJ9B2d2-TaQ90EjVB1nLsFwzp_HZtLXgDy-K4br3mFOtFDdyY7NxwZ7YvFvTPotSRbSU-sZomsBHLx6O-3ipAKGxhD9TDuPhqadJ_NyZCT/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+7.08.10+PM.png" height="276" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">For instance, this shirt: starting in season five and continuing until the end of the show, <br />
you cannot swing a dead cat without hitting Skippy in this shirt. <br />
I still haven't figured out what that woman in the blue dress is doing.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<ul>
<li>There's "Paper Lion" in season five, which I mentioned in my discussion of Mason Adams in the <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/in-memoriam.html?m=1" target="_blank">in memoriam</a> post. It's an interesting story: he's a longstanding, well-regarded economics professor, but he feels pressure to publish from the administration, so he pretends the data in his latest work isn't flawed. Alex calls him out on it, and the professor ultimately comes clean. "I am a teacher," he declares from the pulpit at an awards ceremony. "And in a college, there's nothing more important than that." <i>Aw, sweetie</i>, you want to say, reaching across the screen and back through time. <i>What a lovely thought. </i></li>
<li>And finally, there's the two-part episode "Read It and Weep" in season six. Jennifer wants to do her book report on <i>Huckleberry Finn</i>, but the school board has banned it (and a number of other books). She refuses to change her book and is suspended. Her teacher is afraid of supporting her publicly, thinking he'll lose his job, but after hearing her speak up at a community meeting, he and other teachers decide that they're going to stage a walk out to protest her suspension. This episode, like "Paper Lion," points toward the challenges teachers face, but although it also features someone proclaiming, "I am a teacher," it seems less enamored of the lone individual as role model; it suggests that an answer can be found in collective action. </li>
</ul>
There's some fairly stilted dialogue in "Read It and Weep," including references to Supreme Court cases and characters reading aloud from <i>Huckleberry Finn</i>, but it's also an interesting portrait of censorship at the high school level and <a href="http://www.yalsa.ala.org/jrlya/2011/02/the-school-library-versus-the-school-board-an-exploration-of-the-book-banning-trend-of-the-1980s/" target="_blank">the school board overreach that was not uncommon in the 1980s</a>. <br />
<br />
The vision of teaching on the show is lecture-driven, overwhelmingly male (of the aforementioned teachers, only Mallory's is female), and entirely white. So there are very real limitations to and problems with it - and there were in the '80s, too. But it makes for an interesting artifact with some still-applicable lessons.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On a different note, I'll also recommend "Heartstrings" from season seven, which was the only three-part episode in the show's run. Steven has a heart attack and undergoes surgery. There are flashbacks, but unlike with a clip show, they are to scenes we've never seen before, and they add to the story. Three episodes gives the narrative enough space to move from sadness and fear to humor and strength without feeling cramped or rushed.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAArg5bY_wJsm5_-k-QWjOqGuSoS9OiB1kH5nf71071L12VPSWkFLk4977KF3LsM7hx2zvDcm9c0AY-n-qhQuI6087D83kNEgdWsQgjjYVzGN0ANFUzBsH3R_VJbhmRBSspIXTHlaBij9P/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.56.34+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAArg5bY_wJsm5_-k-QWjOqGuSoS9OiB1kH5nf71071L12VPSWkFLk4977KF3LsM7hx2zvDcm9c0AY-n-qhQuI6087D83kNEgdWsQgjjYVzGN0ANFUzBsH3R_VJbhmRBSspIXTHlaBij9P/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.56.34+PM.png" height="211" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Finally, some recommendations for further reading: </div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>The 2013 <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/news/michael-j-fox-the-toughest-man-on-tv-20130926" target="_blank"><i>Rolling Stone</i> interview with Michael J. Fox</a> gives a comprehensive, introspective overview of his life and career and where he is now.</li>
<li>The <i>New York Times</i> Style section profiled <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/fashion/weddings/a-finish-worthy-of-hollywood.html?mabReward=relbias:w,{%222%22:%22RI:13%22}&_r=0&adxnnl=1&module=Search&pagewanted=all&adxnnlx=1409893753-i+iE6mZbzfj0PVXvDRL9xA" target="_blank">Meredith Baxter's wedding</a> last year, at which Michael Gross gave a toast.</li>
<li>Also in the <i>Times</i>, a great piece in July by Eric Schulmiller about <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/13/magazine/the-future-sure-looks-better-from-the-past.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Aw%2C%7B%222%22%3A%22RI%3A13%22%7D" target="_blank">anticipating catching up with the timeline from <i>Back to the Future</i></a> and the difference between our future as we imagined it and as we live it. </li>
<li>And show creator Gary David Goldberg's <a href="http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/06/25/arts/television/gary-david-goldberg-creator-of-family-ties-dies-at-68.html?pagewanted=all" target="_blank">obituary</a> (he died last year).</li>
</ul>
* I <i>think</i> this will be my last post about the show. Thanks for reading! </div>
</div>
</div>
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-76187223561166574072014-09-03T15:20:00.000-07:002014-09-03T15:42:22.905-07:00Thankfully Not Lost to the Movies<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5McCSlwkb_lxbj7-0cSXuLAkGl69ckN7jazxgqxDp79RMh2ikAf73yW9_LzfdYVRUjPkP8_yud1jZDkUjFazkO4moBf6gyC2PNV9XucjkLRvtz2jDxTM1PavchpNKxW3QzY8v_sZtTrup/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+6.59.12+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5McCSlwkb_lxbj7-0cSXuLAkGl69ckN7jazxgqxDp79RMh2ikAf73yW9_LzfdYVRUjPkP8_yud1jZDkUjFazkO4moBf6gyC2PNV9XucjkLRvtz2jDxTM1PavchpNKxW3QzY8v_sZtTrup/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+6.59.12+PM.png" height="254" width="320" /></a><br />
<br />
Leaving a TV show in order to pursue movie roles is not unusual; to give just one example, <a href="http://www.mscl.com/scripts/dvdinterview.html" target="_blank">Claire Danes did this</a> with <i>My So Called-Life.</i> (Although in that case the second season was hypothetical and, alas, not to be). Given how understandable this career move is, it's kind of amazing that Michael J. Fox didn't make it himself after <i>Back to the Future </i>was released<i> </i>in 1985.<br />
<br />
Obviously I don't know the details of Fox's contract, but I do know that <i><a href="http://www.cbs.com/shows/family_ties/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> creator Gary David Goldberg initially had some concerns about Fox taking the part on <i>Back to the Future</i> because he was afraid he'd <a href="http://www.michaeljfoxdatabase.com/about-michael-j-fox-2/michael-j-fox-biography/" target="_blank">"lose him to film-stardom."</a> Instead Fox filmed <i>Family Ties</i> during the day and <i>Back to the Future</i> at night and continued on <i>Family Ties</i> for four more years.<br />
<br />
When I first read about this, I was surprised that he'd stay on a sitcom where he was frequently subjected to things like being crawled on by kittens…<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6bDJMOsKth2NOB3prR_dFAHKRrGZPALNe_2blRbQKuE9V4-YgdbOE1b9-B7YP89Jn9fjHhafQt8EBk73SoEu7o530wJ3YJlFQe4XSyMTpRAwivObGsfMYduWlOvcAR_50psHNlS1KlSCw/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.14.51+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6bDJMOsKth2NOB3prR_dFAHKRrGZPALNe_2blRbQKuE9V4-YgdbOE1b9-B7YP89Jn9fjHhafQt8EBk73SoEu7o530wJ3YJlFQe4XSyMTpRAwivObGsfMYduWlOvcAR_50psHNlS1KlSCw/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.14.51+PM.png" height="240" width="320" /></a><br />
<br />
…playing poker with babies…<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivV-9BZrCEtnZXHrzt5XJorru7DT3mGNsdXlXFD32dQ1UInNCQ_ZYm0YadJ-FRFcd1y1hhnCQwTKq7MJdU7SE3WXP2jLiVmkZro6UfUXqMU07L51msVfi5RnVujg2d9hyphenhyphenZrtnYlaJhbp2z/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.17.24+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivV-9BZrCEtnZXHrzt5XJorru7DT3mGNsdXlXFD32dQ1UInNCQ_ZYm0YadJ-FRFcd1y1hhnCQwTKq7MJdU7SE3WXP2jLiVmkZro6UfUXqMU07L51msVfi5RnVujg2d9hyphenhyphenZrtnYlaJhbp2z/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.17.24+PM.png" height="274" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
…dressing himself and others like Abraham Lincoln...</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYWWoJsW2DqS1gfgzXX2xtea8Mx2F3smU5c-HWcK3P858EQG7Xp63Z6MViI2jpVpv9zHyaPKpyUGN2hjIX5hidra3qGnmUnKFgOP3AmGwYgD8gU82Eq7GNHixQvrq3K5IXQCBdgDCnxFg2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.25.41+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYWWoJsW2DqS1gfgzXX2xtea8Mx2F3smU5c-HWcK3P858EQG7Xp63Z6MViI2jpVpv9zHyaPKpyUGN2hjIX5hidra3qGnmUnKFgOP3AmGwYgD8gU82Eq7GNHixQvrq3K5IXQCBdgDCnxFg2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.25.41+PM.png" height="168" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0o9OBnRPsolGG0YeiJ-xAVc79ZaBaeElQ3zLh8Drqw1nLrb9eBC7Rh6ZqvssCoGoJzfK5mzEPX22eczBvr_0zyzlYSDWi0p_74znd8qIaCBF9bKsS6m9zHP4JzvUyBRCb5W36cxVJVXQb/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.26.07+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0o9OBnRPsolGG0YeiJ-xAVc79ZaBaeElQ3zLh8Drqw1nLrb9eBC7Rh6ZqvssCoGoJzfK5mzEPX22eczBvr_0zyzlYSDWi0p_74znd8qIaCBF9bKsS6m9zHP4JzvUyBRCb5W36cxVJVXQb/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.26.07+PM.png" height="242" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
…and having a photograph of himself eaten by a chimpanzee.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9ChyYu_LpPr-FbVQ5f6B4d0rKZtcvmMAaGHkAe6ABF8yyN6XDXvZN1Zk1mF-n3g20c5OJ1oI8Jk0AjYtzu92EHGdbwkLkJgitImNJJfuhfnlDwlP580wW-zpEwLCvhaXak8L_K4d_T-7U/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+3.27.41+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9ChyYu_LpPr-FbVQ5f6B4d0rKZtcvmMAaGHkAe6ABF8yyN6XDXvZN1Zk1mF-n3g20c5OJ1oI8Jk0AjYtzu92EHGdbwkLkJgitImNJJfuhfnlDwlP580wW-zpEwLCvhaXak8L_K4d_T-7U/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-20+at+3.27.41+PM.png" height="262" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
But it didn't take much reflection to see how obviously <i>fun</i> all of that would be. It's fun to be a mall Santa and promise little girls 100 shares of Aramco Petroleum...<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoAhNSgm_tXN17d4c5P1RNWj6TRjKha6wUycCFJSJhmNfSMKZ92nbjuWB5_BFSFLlXbqRtZ3qiY-kJLY1P6ibIORWbPQH_HnRGA3MMbrj8ri_AF_o8IHKWGRXCYVSgzOaYR9wzNvnY3RVH/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+3.04.09+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoAhNSgm_tXN17d4c5P1RNWj6TRjKha6wUycCFJSJhmNfSMKZ92nbjuWB5_BFSFLlXbqRtZ3qiY-kJLY1P6ibIORWbPQH_HnRGA3MMbrj8ri_AF_o8IHKWGRXCYVSgzOaYR9wzNvnY3RVH/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+3.04.09+PM.png" height="209" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
…or talk to a dog in a vets' waiting room...</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCwCVLm4J4IjCL6pZyEV0QFfAxlOPWOiqv6MBxJXD6fM8QLBv30he0Pko_PE81S33477AufCz_J6yUp2j9yrfrdv8Q7J44ZYjrigInYi3oYMA-nLzi9SYuAJzskVvUZegmSU71QlHRlwcU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.17.00+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCwCVLm4J4IjCL6pZyEV0QFfAxlOPWOiqv6MBxJXD6fM8QLBv30he0Pko_PE81S33477AufCz_J6yUp2j9yrfrdv8Q7J44ZYjrigInYi3oYMA-nLzi9SYuAJzskVvUZegmSU71QlHRlwcU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.17.00+PM.png" height="244" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
…or wear a bowler hat...<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibI98zUn_5KQi7GDabT9-HDRKf-3Gz836sHsuHHR4IhmjgexAHBEoCiFffI4swnYYLVI4Ggy4iy5Vpsbv2Rh5V444jAGH3rYiXzW9QGktsZHJyZYaoUlEEtd-1QQ_6opbHK-KHcL03yd3c/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+3.19.29+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibI98zUn_5KQi7GDabT9-HDRKf-3Gz836sHsuHHR4IhmjgexAHBEoCiFffI4swnYYLVI4Ggy4iy5Vpsbv2Rh5V444jAGH3rYiXzW9QGktsZHJyZYaoUlEEtd-1QQ_6opbHK-KHcL03yd3c/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+3.19.29+PM.png" height="288" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
…or dress up as a molar.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYZv18Fay1Xkx4NXJhTbsCU6bZ40_es0IRBvF-LGdAo8dXBWkAKFKYgsEB4QVVSPT2GIhnJzMZ_lUfSkntXAepElbZmIxyYyvDHa22j1xQiVaEJnKH2kWVErYRZbt_4SbBieCbvtUTe-6X/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-28+at+3.06.16+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYZv18Fay1Xkx4NXJhTbsCU6bZ40_es0IRBvF-LGdAo8dXBWkAKFKYgsEB4QVVSPT2GIhnJzMZ_lUfSkntXAepElbZmIxyYyvDHa22j1xQiVaEJnKH2kWVErYRZbt_4SbBieCbvtUTe-6X/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-28+at+3.06.16+PM.png" height="188" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
In any one film, do actors often get such varied opportunities? There are many limitations to sitcoms, but within all the hijinks there's the gift of getting to inhabit a giddy range.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-52934229351269657202014-09-02T12:30:00.001-07:002014-09-03T15:23:40.862-07:00All the Presidents' Sitcom<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl-XxFfxwx8gFiwLkX8g8bwyFHX3EOnd2ZqazYAULevlm_HguU2zFiyZND9svRNtBRt47sb2Pp2MvyPJCr9pgpG7SBJystsnfAjBgXMtIYA9wiqHBEsBQulfUOv439fZ3oO5eq7wmDT1o9/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+5.11.31+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl-XxFfxwx8gFiwLkX8g8bwyFHX3EOnd2ZqazYAULevlm_HguU2zFiyZND9svRNtBRt47sb2Pp2MvyPJCr9pgpG7SBJystsnfAjBgXMtIYA9wiqHBEsBQulfUOv439fZ3oO5eq7wmDT1o9/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+5.11.31+PM.png" height="320" width="246" /></a></div>
<br />
When I wrote about the <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-visible-bridge-or-what-was-nixons.html" target="_blank">transition from Nixon to Reagan</a>, reference-wise, on <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083413/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, I thought that there <i>was</i> a transition, a gradual diminishing of the former and ascendancy of the latter; that was how it seemed in season four, which aired from September 1985-May 1986. But now that I've finished re-watching the show, it would be more accurate to say that Nixon and Reagan co-exist, and over time the treatment of Reagan becomes sharper, moving beyond parody into moments of critique.<br />
<br />
I started noticing the shift in season six. Elyse's aunt Rosemary shows up unannounced and exhibits signs of Alzheimer's. The doctor says, "Rosemary, you didn't remember who the president of the United States was" as an example of her memory loss. Rosemary (played by the wonderful Barbara Barrie) says, "I know Ronald Reagan is president. I just can't accept it."<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKkN9mwSMMJD1WAgGwBeRkKK8GFH2ewRbHQHn6-kGCrqImr5TN9EKu4yLITLS7bjeQ-GjVyqw7MNHynock0fYQNi8p4gB0LaBWSv6Ryh77V-dkccRqNrKj7dajG49zLpx7CDxqSq-pfEUq/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-21+at+3.51.45+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKkN9mwSMMJD1WAgGwBeRkKK8GFH2ewRbHQHn6-kGCrqImr5TN9EKu4yLITLS7bjeQ-GjVyqw7MNHynock0fYQNi8p4gB0LaBWSv6Ryh77V-dkccRqNrKj7dajG49zLpx7CDxqSq-pfEUq/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-21+at+3.51.45+PM.png" height="320" width="254" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Barbara Barrie; her most recent work was a small role on <i>Enlightened.</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Then, when Alex takes over Skippy's job as a mall Santa, a girl says she doesn't believe in Santa and wants to know why, if he's the real one, there are Santas at other malls, too. Alex answers, "I have some of my elves, uh, dress up like me to pick up the slack. It's the same way that President Reagan can't be everywhere, so he sends his assistants in his place."<br />
<br />
"I don't believe in him, either," the girl replies. <br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi483sxsTjulYSWFYCYFkR3UkIA_eCZzgWaezIA62vaHE_VaRIofhAcCqvSsrPpsxTZe-ojojQn_0EBrz-fWJ5nA1v4_2UrTGFYL4miO4nMPUzeQoaddMbbwbdxCNuK_vSXdHBBfi2HUBoJ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-02+at+9.15.56+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi483sxsTjulYSWFYCYFkR3UkIA_eCZzgWaezIA62vaHE_VaRIofhAcCqvSsrPpsxTZe-ojojQn_0EBrz-fWJ5nA1v4_2UrTGFYL4miO4nMPUzeQoaddMbbwbdxCNuK_vSXdHBBfi2HUBoJ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-02+at+9.15.56+AM.png" height="181" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Audiences might have recognized Ellen Hamilton Latzen from <i>Fatal Attraction</i>.<br />
Here she's not asking for a rabbit, though.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
These episodes aired in November and December 1987, respectively. By the end of the season, in May 1988, the Reagan jokes have grown in substance from denial and disbelief to biting commentary. Andy is making a popsicle stick bread box as a gift for Nick to thank him for teaching the children's art class at the Y. But Alex has other ideas; he wants to make Nick the Reagan Ranch out of popsicle sticks: "I even have plans for a little pop-stick Ron and a little pop-stick Nancy."<br />
<br />
Elyse, listening in, asks, "How about a pop-stick jail for his Cabinet?" The studio audience laughter quickly builds to applause and cheers - one of the most enthusiastic reactions in the show's entire run.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaYE7hRPejYgYpcYjss7x1UUK4s_BSvyJQfw5syOCupx2F8lEj_BtZ_NmgZurgyaN6yqy0pBwvj8KE974jUduKGO99JO1hvJjEKeQfkuNhsswbWNW7Z4RjAmLpk6kJop0cfnHby_TiBput/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-02+at+9.43.24+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaYE7hRPejYgYpcYjss7x1UUK4s_BSvyJQfw5syOCupx2F8lEj_BtZ_NmgZurgyaN6yqy0pBwvj8KE974jUduKGO99JO1hvJjEKeQfkuNhsswbWNW7Z4RjAmLpk6kJop0cfnHby_TiBput/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-09-02+at+9.43.24+AM.png" height="218" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alex goes ahead and makes his own Reagan Ranch anyway.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
What happened? I've got one phrase for you: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair" target="_blank">Iran-Contra affair</a>. By May 1988, the Tower Commission and Congressional committee reports have been released and Reagan has given speeches, but Casper Weinberger, the Secretary of Defense, has yet to be indicted, and Oliver North is not yet on trial. It's also the middle of a presidential campaign, and many people have questions about George H.W. Bush's knowledge of and involvement in Iran-Contra.<br />
<br />
Bush quickly becomes fodder for jokes on the show; the very next episode, the first of season seven, opens with the words, "All right, who did this?" It's late October 1988, and the family has defaced Alex's campaign poster of Bush.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoF_WqO5Z7fjIINEc6H7YRtwkgv8yUwOz6F47LdcV2PaVGNxdH_FBSAHyZvN91MK0Dwet2GIaDx97Vkm8T-ciURr7CHS4FDeKo_lkwpLj2926d-a8Rg-HxXvwnXYs2ZSos3XXa7XouBkLv/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.26.02+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoF_WqO5Z7fjIINEc6H7YRtwkgv8yUwOz6F47LdcV2PaVGNxdH_FBSAHyZvN91MK0Dwet2GIaDx97Vkm8T-ciURr7CHS4FDeKo_lkwpLj2926d-a8Rg-HxXvwnXYs2ZSos3XXa7XouBkLv/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.26.02+PM.png" height="265" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
And a few minutes later, Alex's girlfriend Lauren brings up Iran-Contra directly. "I'm not gonna vote for Bush," she tells Alex. "For one, I've never fully accepted his explanation of his involvement in the Iran-Contra affair." (We never get to hear her other reasons because Mallory turns to her father and asks excitedly, "Bush had an affair?")<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieRyL9SQ-Msa05uzUG6gV6AvRWx0OcciVBqCf_Xp0ovZeavmUGSX8TN9VzR91XyS3CYel9555ao_0fXlOCI84kWmKPvWA270TUSQtgloxO2zZxyVWuJfo3cNGCOja58daLTSKYJ6kAAwWE/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.29.46+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieRyL9SQ-Msa05uzUG6gV6AvRWx0OcciVBqCf_Xp0ovZeavmUGSX8TN9VzR91XyS3CYel9555ao_0fXlOCI84kWmKPvWA270TUSQtgloxO2zZxyVWuJfo3cNGCOja58daLTSKYJ6kAAwWE/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.29.46+PM.png" height="320" width="166" /></a></div>
<br />
In between this episode and the election, <i>Family Ties</i> fits in one more Reagan dig. Alex is reading <i>Robin Hood</i> to Andy, but in the grand tradition of reading aloud to young children, he's changed the story. "It was about Robin Hood, how he stole from the poor and gave to the rich," Andy reports.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9rTaIrpHKw41GFvBKxwRV4QXJA1TYdjz0pcYrrvz_MpQu9eiZaZNGnZ-57JrZAOFVeSB_-Rt0S1ndFW3WJESjB5WGnE3KMli14U7nHveO8p8DF3IW-Uiu5U4v0nw9r4WPVR9tHTKBdoz7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+4.35.47+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9rTaIrpHKw41GFvBKxwRV4QXJA1TYdjz0pcYrrvz_MpQu9eiZaZNGnZ-57JrZAOFVeSB_-Rt0S1ndFW3WJESjB5WGnE3KMli14U7nHveO8p8DF3IW-Uiu5U4v0nw9r4WPVR9tHTKBdoz7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+4.35.47+PM.png" height="229" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
"No, no, that's not Robin Hood, Andy," Steven says. "That's Ronald Reagan." (This is greeted by the studio audience with both laughter and, not boos or groans, but low sounds of moderate disapproval. The same mixture of sounds occurs when Alex tells Andy in a later episode, "You know how lucky you are, Andy? Born under Reagan, raised under Bush. I mean, with any luck at all, you will have a completely Democrat-free childhood." I really want data on the political makeup of the <i>Family Ties</i> audience).<br />
<br />
Election morning dawns at the Keatons with some seriously depressed Democrats (this episode aired on November 13, five days after the actual election). <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUXPDUp1qTKsybfPqGFZgDmmkY-XkAMfhvqFSO0AxCmIH8kORAStl2aUYDnk8m-WYPX7YVsZhw_IxFRwphCUbVfZn-knWAN5X9yVo2qaG_txVwi9RguIwXXHGuzUpDpPsjB2c02JFlQjar/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+4.59.54+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUXPDUp1qTKsybfPqGFZgDmmkY-XkAMfhvqFSO0AxCmIH8kORAStl2aUYDnk8m-WYPX7YVsZhw_IxFRwphCUbVfZn-knWAN5X9yVo2qaG_txVwi9RguIwXXHGuzUpDpPsjB2c02JFlQjar/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+4.59.54+PM.png" height="235" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
"In August, Dukakis looked like a shoo-in," Elyse says.<br />
<br />
"Yeah, that was before he got into the tank," Jennifer notes, flashing her own newspaper.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhldKRTJ8pWo0whyHGG0xJ3-1XJP3GCQt9V-epSXVjzm_eWG04iV29jCB7_F6FFzkH1pv0vM5k08t0iSY-UWOcM3vsJ4i1jeCOfpKqguvio8csupZq6bATq_Hc7g9OZ-Q_AXbnTkJ4iCKJ7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+5.00.12+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhldKRTJ8pWo0whyHGG0xJ3-1XJP3GCQt9V-epSXVjzm_eWG04iV29jCB7_F6FFzkH1pv0vM5k08t0iSY-UWOcM3vsJ4i1jeCOfpKqguvio8csupZq6bATq_Hc7g9OZ-Q_AXbnTkJ4iCKJ7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+5.00.12+PM.png" height="320" width="251" /></a></div>
<br />
But this is about as current events-y as <i>Family Ties</i> gets, and the tone of occasional critique dissipates in the final season; in fact, Bush is largely ignored. The show returns to Nixon when Jennifer writes a play about him for her history class and Alex tries to influence her script. Nixon is still an emotional flashpoint for the characters, but he's also a denatured joke; (the episode features Alex delivering a speech as Nixon, an extended impersonation).<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggmg8R9SIyTgztFPqUU8BWp0DlZdmahaxqHipTErFMk0gay7kjdoxgR_tO0RxAMC2dBt-9wXAHUT8jXRKKcUZZ0YgeDGGkQAeUX3j7TUGuTLoyN5NaUGX6d6EaKSuB7n4sjpUzXbStd8bl/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+5.12.29+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggmg8R9SIyTgztFPqUU8BWp0DlZdmahaxqHipTErFMk0gay7kjdoxgR_tO0RxAMC2dBt-9wXAHUT8jXRKKcUZZ0YgeDGGkQAeUX3j7TUGuTLoyN5NaUGX6d6EaKSuB7n4sjpUzXbStd8bl/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+5.12.29+PM.png" height="320" width="156" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;">
<i>Nixie</i>, the Nixon fan magazine: one of many fake texts featured on the show. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Others include the <i>I Love Republicans</i> pop-up book that Alex gets for Andy and,</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
my personal favorite, Shirley MacLaine's <i>There Must be a Higher Power in the Universe if I'm Making So Much Money Doing What I'm Doing</i>, which Steven brings home for Mallory. </div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
And Nixon is almost sentimentalized in the final episode; when Elyse goes into Alex's room one last time before he leaves home to take a job on Wall Street, it's Nixon's face that is visible out of the darkness. We feel Elyse's loss of Alex and feel nostalgic, and Nixon gets all wrapped up in those emotions. But then Elyse turns on the light, sits on the bed, looks at the picture, and abruptly turns it face down. It's a humorous break in an otherwise serious moment, and it reminds us that, <a href="http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/1988-09-26/lifestyle/0070170232_1_politics-taboo-family" target="_blank">although others at the time had difficulty separating the politics from the person,</a> these characters were consistently able to do so. The mother loves the son, not the 37th president. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibSIgay4S7C0BIv2uXxOo28kkwM2cT5YtoNmt9T0_amWW_ZU2G1wyJO3CsasyxtxeJdb8G5NhFHoe3MLXgD7_h6CeFyN_bPkQxnJ1SClvYk8Zoz-peo5HfswJS5y6XHn16OlbRyPfdAOFc/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-28+at+3.07.09+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibSIgay4S7C0BIv2uXxOo28kkwM2cT5YtoNmt9T0_amWW_ZU2G1wyJO3CsasyxtxeJdb8G5NhFHoe3MLXgD7_h6CeFyN_bPkQxnJ1SClvYk8Zoz-peo5HfswJS5y6XHn16OlbRyPfdAOFc/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-28+at+3.07.09+PM.png" height="320" width="290" /></a></div>
<br />
Research shows that we've become more politically polarized in the years since <i>Family Ties. </i>The June 2014 Pew Research Center report <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2014/06/12/political-polarization-in-the-american-public/" target="_blank">"Political Polarization in the American Public"</a> notes: "Three-out-of-ten (30%) consistent conservatives say they would be unhappy if an immediate family member married a Democrat and about a quarter (23%) of across-the-board liberals say the same about the prospect of a Republican in-law." Watching <i>Family Ties</i> has made me look at those numbers differently - I see the flip side more easily: that's 70 and 77 % of conservatives and liberals who would be OK with a family member marrying someone from another political party, not insignificant figures. I also think: what's so bad about unhappy? Steven and Elyse aren't happy that they raised a son who very early in life decided he was a Republican, but that's the son they have. And I wonder, how many Keaton families exist today - or even existed back in the '80s? My conservative brother raised conservative daughters; my more liberal brother is raising liberal children. Leaving aside all the similarities between the two major political parties today, do parents raise politically different children? And if they do, where can we find them on TV?LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-56182215050147437132014-08-31T20:01:00.003-07:002014-08-31T20:03:45.745-07:00In Memoriam<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Of the many ways we could categorize the actors and actresses who were on <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Ties" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> and are no longer living, here are a few: the grandparents; the guest stars who carried an episode; the scene stealers; the ones who were more voice than body; those who died too young and those who were older. Of course there is some overlap, and of course more than 30 years after the show began, there are <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/still-working-on-that-solid-rock-of.html" target="_blank">more</a> <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/greg-and-trudy-i-hardly-knew-ye.html" target="_blank">departed</a> than I have room to mention here. Here are a few profiles and highlights:</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="color: black;">The Grandparents </span></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoo_HUZ2gXK-DSdwtOjxGPi54N9Y6XoliD2mgfiXkrxjbpxCRSoyWW6rS91IOdlkP0xTlPKgA91_iPuzfYC92upy2bQoY1WK83Q6uYdIZEoCE_aeBlMtz5tQ7fjlT6urIILzjy9CpDrOa7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.10.11+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoo_HUZ2gXK-DSdwtOjxGPi54N9Y6XoliD2mgfiXkrxjbpxCRSoyWW6rS91IOdlkP0xTlPKgA91_iPuzfYC92upy2bQoY1WK83Q6uYdIZEoCE_aeBlMtz5tQ7fjlT6urIILzjy9CpDrOa7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.10.11+AM.png" height="184" width="200" /></span></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1339kyDUEJpW2j6BQiMiOM7-10_6mxFP_hZF1HkA9heIbI9JBRa8KgGAXMWp2XW9wL316ZJq4TmBOspCcXsMlqDSiiqTST0_ctAvXM9uxviUS2ZtKdUZjp1B3vfpUpFhsK33csbiSKECk/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.19.12+AM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1339kyDUEJpW2j6BQiMiOM7-10_6mxFP_hZF1HkA9heIbI9JBRa8KgGAXMWp2XW9wL316ZJq4TmBOspCcXsMlqDSiiqTST0_ctAvXM9uxviUS2ZtKdUZjp1B3vfpUpFhsK33csbiSKECk/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.19.12+AM.png" height="200" width="196" /></span></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVLCxYt1nDYgBQpHex9fW5ZQWS_Wb4vEXTMXNnMxnl8elWpggTSKOWI1REpLItEdWQj9hmaYcpOE5zfVK6Ufm9CVWCcIi5PWwE77IUXhXZ8Z1YSiomKZzsPOIbbnPFHfMVPwIbS9XSgjgB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.18.03+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSVRFYjRuoY7kfLjCV1vU2qb73f_NgcjRYz8XnA2fDgH-4K7URwzRis8WbXWIU__HZcKinRWgjDVsmgaMsfAGjgdOKPzMfgULL5pv1sCloCuwryjY4LcjEB_IOWIo8JZx-cJY1MekDuSJ6/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.25.58+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSVRFYjRuoY7kfLjCV1vU2qb73f_NgcjRYz8XnA2fDgH-4K7URwzRis8WbXWIU__HZcKinRWgjDVsmgaMsfAGjgdOKPzMfgULL5pv1sCloCuwryjY4LcjEB_IOWIo8JZx-cJY1MekDuSJ6/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.25.58+AM.png" height="164" width="200" /></span></a> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVLCxYt1nDYgBQpHex9fW5ZQWS_Wb4vEXTMXNnMxnl8elWpggTSKOWI1REpLItEdWQj9hmaYcpOE5zfVK6Ufm9CVWCcIi5PWwE77IUXhXZ8Z1YSiomKZzsPOIbbnPFHfMVPwIbS9XSgjgB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.18.03+AM.png" height="182" width="200" /></div>
<br />
(Clockwise from top left: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0709907/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">John Randolph</a>, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0786800/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Anne Seymour</a>, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0765102/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Dick Sargent</a>, and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0606317/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Priscilla Morrill</a>). Only Morrill, who played Elyse's mother, appeared in more than one episode, but the others turned in memorable performances, particularly Randolph as Steven's conservative father. He delivers both great smiles like the one above and a stinging rebuke of Steven's '60s ways. Seymour's long career stretched back to 1944 and included appearances on <i>The Motorola Television Hour</i>, <i>The United States Steel Hour</i>, and <i>The Alcoa Hour</i> - affiliations the character Alex would have no doubt admired. <a href="http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19940709&slug=1919431" target="_blank">Sargent came out late in life</a>, in 1991, just three years before his death from prostrate cancer.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: black;">The Guest Star</span></b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: white;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0kMoetIkZCuuIpuDiAy_64aY9kb0YI8-wrg2PCL4-td-MTkJseDUk1atXkuU_7pMkG_v-jqXpI-2kvzCR_32PXj8-hA71_h5-A_ELO_jfLYl1BZUf6eoXmibyfj13_ob85aTol2VBLczz/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.31.04+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0kMoetIkZCuuIpuDiAy_64aY9kb0YI8-wrg2PCL4-td-MTkJseDUk1atXkuU_7pMkG_v-jqXpI-2kvzCR_32PXj8-hA71_h5-A_ELO_jfLYl1BZUf6eoXmibyfj13_ob85aTol2VBLczz/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.31.04+AM.png" height="200" width="143" /></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijNo3Kq-rxPwfVTnSOIOaiKeHRm368KVwhc6H96Bh6sADQzFrN3gpb1lHGaR7ZKVK-bQ9UG8gd4bSrKSPAT8rC7HmTfBjqBPDUVuvavCJGrCMNzvdM7Dqvofh7u9OmTYNfvlhYTS6AFpwA/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+3.58.01+PM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijNo3Kq-rxPwfVTnSOIOaiKeHRm368KVwhc6H96Bh6sADQzFrN3gpb1lHGaR7ZKVK-bQ9UG8gd4bSrKSPAT8rC7HmTfBjqBPDUVuvavCJGrCMNzvdM7Dqvofh7u9OmTYNfvlhYTS6AFpwA/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+3.58.01+PM.png" height="200" width="156" /></a></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi21hp3A4B8eoffNzNIhekHxU1U2Wk5WO_wcShvv-Gs8ZHw5a419DGsE1r9Gr2oOTIWHyWjV4N3P8hPOaDOKYi30oHjjFsKWa-eEJpWK4B2PoWcU82JxOwNxLbQbaL7pQ8PE7CE-Np5_6vi/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.38.14+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi21hp3A4B8eoffNzNIhekHxU1U2Wk5WO_wcShvv-Gs8ZHw5a419DGsE1r9Gr2oOTIWHyWjV4N3P8hPOaDOKYi30oHjjFsKWa-eEJpWK4B2PoWcU82JxOwNxLbQbaL7pQ8PE7CE-Np5_6vi/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.38.14+AM.png" height="168" width="200" /></span></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6ci-sxMHqHDdToBXhyphenhyphenbffw-hYAjRYbYYHdBRf6C5yTHyodxiLvQNPMWujBj_CnZ5XB6cxshEJaIQeCm7pD6p5PQ2iXN8HHtVX6kvrGZcVp_xSMrOgKaCsU0AkxOmd2T-f-OukYLmNu7l7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+6.09.45+PM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6ci-sxMHqHDdToBXhyphenhyphenbffw-hYAjRYbYYHdBRf6C5yTHyodxiLvQNPMWujBj_CnZ5XB6cxshEJaIQeCm7pD6p5PQ2iXN8HHtVX6kvrGZcVp_xSMrOgKaCsU0AkxOmd2T-f-OukYLmNu7l7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+6.09.45+PM.png" height="148" width="200" /></span></a></div>
<br />
<br />
(Clockwise from top left: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0813755/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Jack Somack</a>, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000203/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">River Phoenix</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownie_McGhee" target="_blank">Brownie McGhee</a>, and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0011199/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Mason Adams</a>). If you're of a certain age, Phoenix is the one who stops you in your tracks; he shows up in that argyle sweater to tutor Alex in Advanced Non-Euclidean Geometry in season four. He's a 13 year-old math whiz, a graduate student already, and he falls for Jennifer only to discover that she, like, actually likes 13 year-old things and not attending tenure parties. Neither Phoenix nor Somack are given much to do in their roles - Somack plays a sweet small business owner and Alex's boss in season one - but they are fun to watch. In contrast, the show revolves around Adams and McGhee when they guest star in seasons five and six, respectively. McGhee was a blues musician with a long career who had started acting in the late '70s, and he plays a musician-turned-bus driver who Alex convinces to come out of retirement for a performance. Adams is one of Alex's economics professors; you may know him from <i>Lou Grant</i>. I'll write more about his performance when I post about recommended episodes, but for now I'll just say that the portrait he paints of higher ed in 1986 feels alternately eerily prescient and like a beautiful object lifted from a time capsule.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: black;"><b>The Scene Stealers </b></span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk-TkK-kZddBiZoSX_nW0GO2aOFTfxjvj4FM7eGEaEgjPzVlMQ2wuDartKMgICRHOrssWntPA61RkuyCx-DKRzaMwxK1S0XOCUAherS2zrwQysu1pasgOBG0zxlARPjdiiADPuXEtxfrQI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.32.48+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk-TkK-kZddBiZoSX_nW0GO2aOFTfxjvj4FM7eGEaEgjPzVlMQ2wuDartKMgICRHOrssWntPA61RkuyCx-DKRzaMwxK1S0XOCUAherS2zrwQysu1pasgOBG0zxlARPjdiiADPuXEtxfrQI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.32.48+AM.png" height="199" width="200" /></span></a>(Left: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0413839/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Mary Jackson</a>; below, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0438682/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Ron Karabatsos</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001649/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Anne Ramsey</a>). Jackson sells the Keatons a gun in season
one after their home is robbed; (they decide to get rid of it by the end of the episode, which is titled charmingly, "Have Gun, Will Unravel"). Ramsey you might recognize from <i>Goonies</i>; she's yet another nanny/housekeeper candidate. She thought the advertised salary was a "misprint" and lambasts germs during her interview. Karabatsos is the plumber who lends his truck to Steven during the two-part "Birth of a Keaton" episode where Elyse goes into labor at PBS during a pledge drive - and a blizzard. He's a genial, bearish presence during all the stress.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk-TkK-kZddBiZoSX_nW0GO2aOFTfxjvj4FM7eGEaEgjPzVlMQ2wuDartKMgICRHOrssWntPA61RkuyCx-DKRzaMwxK1S0XOCUAherS2zrwQysu1pasgOBG0zxlARPjdiiADPuXEtxfrQI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.32.48+AM.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></a>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk-TkK-kZddBiZoSX_nW0GO2aOFTfxjvj4FM7eGEaEgjPzVlMQ2wuDartKMgICRHOrssWntPA61RkuyCx-DKRzaMwxK1S0XOCUAherS2zrwQysu1pasgOBG0zxlARPjdiiADPuXEtxfrQI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.32.48+AM.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><span style="color: white;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgznObfWgdc88kRcDGrYY4SWKtveMqGbTd16T9bXC5f8aTndz-I7H46pYKOcId-BkCytPQn30ec1VCRQY7Oksu8p17NDN_yvf2iG3Pvu_lcM3kR6d7ANpot9yPZi5oRrF3eDKklcjKXxtKC/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.16.19+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgznObfWgdc88kRcDGrYY4SWKtveMqGbTd16T9bXC5f8aTndz-I7H46pYKOcId-BkCytPQn30ec1VCRQY7Oksu8p17NDN_yvf2iG3Pvu_lcM3kR6d7ANpot9yPZi5oRrF3eDKklcjKXxtKC/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.16.19+AM.png" height="320" width="214" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6JvI51Ww6DyChZOLGE5-xRHD175ryvD5X1M3KARJLu7AlpHgZO-dTaCGPJdBbOrMs5IXePq0dXXtP5fiHX50HgI5kb4ImOwgao79XXKdGCXskFAbYQLM8G3rbk4RGUerMpxEOpDugnGo-/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.06.16+AM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6JvI51Ww6DyChZOLGE5-xRHD175ryvD5X1M3KARJLu7AlpHgZO-dTaCGPJdBbOrMs5IXePq0dXXtP5fiHX50HgI5kb4ImOwgao79XXKdGCXskFAbYQLM8G3rbk4RGUerMpxEOpDugnGo-/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.06.16+AM.png" height="281" width="320" /></a></span></div>
<br />
<span style="color: white;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="color: white;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="color: black;"><b>More Voice than Body</b></span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYdio9W0uDf2COHc7Plj_EH1oVZDUX4MACBBnvJBNToHrNRwYqGIStJtTtTseac7C99uKCtHS1Lt3dLY5_o2eKd3n5y3j79LdaA43lj3v90fqq78rDFg8FbRPsWzcrUDmLBjAhkoeSqWOy/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.58.37+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYdio9W0uDf2COHc7Plj_EH1oVZDUX4MACBBnvJBNToHrNRwYqGIStJtTtTseac7C99uKCtHS1Lt3dLY5_o2eKd3n5y3j79LdaA43lj3v90fqq78rDFg8FbRPsWzcrUDmLBjAhkoeSqWOy/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.58.37+AM.png" height="209" width="320" /></span></a><span style="color: white;"></span><br />
We never see Bill in the season three episode where Alex and his friend James (played by <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0430617/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Jeffrey Joseph</a>, still very much alive!) work at a student help hotline, but we hear him loud and clear: he's looking for a reason to live. Alex and James are new to the hotline and scramble trying to help the suicidal Bill. There are a lot of moments like the one pictured, where they look at speakers, and it's a testament to the script and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0924196/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Sam Whipple</a>'s voice that we feel as captivated as Alex and James. Whipple actually shows up in the next episode, but his role is far more minor in the flesh than it is as the confused, vulnerable, but ultimately hopeful Bill. Whipple himself died of cancer at 41.<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibQspvQL_c_HmmRAYWq8sVIBFfFI0QPOTqeP-ebdF6y-e9y0inLgPyEbluXGn_C_vJ32W9xvLlKHx7f6Y3cbU5Z1nyVY3yYR1dS3qKIw1Ueve3J24HEqo5K_2dyOOR_otlzKs835ETrl0a/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+12.41.20+PM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibQspvQL_c_HmmRAYWq8sVIBFfFI0QPOTqeP-ebdF6y-e9y0inLgPyEbluXGn_C_vJ32W9xvLlKHx7f6Y3cbU5Z1nyVY3yYR1dS3qKIw1Ueve3J24HEqo5K_2dyOOR_otlzKs835ETrl0a/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+12.41.20+PM.png" height="200" width="320" /></span></a><br />
<br />
There are better images of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0943816/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Meg Wyllie</a> in the season five episode where Alex meets with a psychiatrist to talk about <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/greg-and-trudy-i-hardly-knew-ye.html" target="_blank">the death of his friend, Greg</a>. But we quickly learn that her power is in her voice. The lights come up behind that window and we simultaneously hear Wyllie's chirping, prodding voice saying, "I'll bet Alex knows the answer." We're in his memory of being seven years old with his teacher's voice repeating "Alex knows, Alex knows" separating him from his classmates socially, putting pressure on him to succeed. Wyllie's back is turned to us most of the time; she does so much with just her voice. Her scenes in this episode reminded me of <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-geranium-on-the-windowsill-just-died-but-teacher-you-went-right-on-albert-cullum/1003695083?ean=9780825205002" target="_blank"><i>The Geranium on the Windowsill Just Died But Teacher You Went Right On</i></a>, published in 1971, around the time Alex would have been seven. (If I'm remembering correctly, Albert Cullum dedicates his book to "all those who died in the arms of compulsory education."Alex, of course, survived).<br />
<br />
<span style="color: black;"><b>The Young </b></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGsC8TzP2GQV2-Djlcln3b1kREkV-JOxAjh8UQkHafPWnBh9QHyNjJM_J2ZrG2lP8mO0fVr09QKoZTTbZrws4B40df1S2B_A3h9l7YaY3UPUeRt2cfK6ucjhR9_gp5Cu8gptOUYwwRLfCP/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.35.53+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGsC8TzP2GQV2-Djlcln3b1kREkV-JOxAjh8UQkHafPWnBh9QHyNjJM_J2ZrG2lP8mO0fVr09QKoZTTbZrws4B40df1S2B_A3h9l7YaY3UPUeRt2cfK6ucjhR9_gp5Cu8gptOUYwwRLfCP/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.35.53+AM.png" height="320" width="225" /></span></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOOFF9EWutJjUXBTHYBFBj8iWJi4UXHJtnEjvp2WMLJDQfMivBIj-mQ7kxG33lbZ3Iy8hBA98AdKWGoms5isllsbjyiqseg-eC7I8BMevBSNuahyiPskIpOMS3uZkwwoV9t5_6fJNBv0Rs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.48.56+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQ1qFGixNLgtaCy50e28A99qGW8gim-wjVe60pfJkQCk6f1cFrF6_cU07dkY4oL3ygq9iyM1qfDqMhZjXKY3iYMHfyBoulaKcwdZMgoLZ-_j1n6TJbvDCflkuv55ypgGsmezyJmbEVgTfs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.21.51+AM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><br /></span></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Kiy03G5UVEjDGO9A0hIu5DH-eafS2AyovBJmO27RAWzbzo6-vAqQQ3-CP33402Tc4L0AJTWkMD3WHwAxNhJCNTZdZomB8pnbjgeGMSjRY6RK8PPfqJRkG-jMpBNmyLSmPc0lPlPJ0eaI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.26.12+PM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5Kiy03G5UVEjDGO9A0hIu5DH-eafS2AyovBJmO27RAWzbzo6-vAqQQ3-CP33402Tc4L0AJTWkMD3WHwAxNhJCNTZdZomB8pnbjgeGMSjRY6RK8PPfqJRkG-jMpBNmyLSmPc0lPlPJ0eaI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.26.12+PM.png" height="200" width="186" /></span></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBPCqMfcmFlPP0ePblxf2XrFABdzm16W9o5YJeZOF2WR-1_YheOvm-yW82B_AKxVRLUNb6ww_DsgLkfiWiUzlVR_oMyn0gCx2eo0lyW93tKwm3YRuHP4wFJPMeGDZcODtOZvT1lvGZiz5G/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+6.51.21+PM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBPCqMfcmFlPP0ePblxf2XrFABdzm16W9o5YJeZOF2WR-1_YheOvm-yW82B_AKxVRLUNb6ww_DsgLkfiWiUzlVR_oMyn0gCx2eo0lyW93tKwm3YRuHP4wFJPMeGDZcODtOZvT1lvGZiz5G/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+6.51.21+PM.png" height="200" width="121" /></span></a></div>
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-dvF9XGRNgnOr3gUS6-Pow1zbzrshsONRTYhw4hK3ua9iJ7POVMF0shnAL1OP2FikZI8iORrj6l4d2WdecR-UrIx2_zzCyk8zWi9FRt95SoJgQwerXVLfWMhMHUor7UdnDBISKOS4BzYB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.59.08+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-dvF9XGRNgnOr3gUS6-Pow1zbzrshsONRTYhw4hK3ua9iJ7POVMF0shnAL1OP2FikZI8iORrj6l4d2WdecR-UrIx2_zzCyk8zWi9FRt95SoJgQwerXVLfWMhMHUor7UdnDBISKOS4BzYB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.59.08+AM.png" height="200" width="169" /></span></a><br />
(From top to bottom, left to right: <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0026106/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Bridgette Andersen</a>, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0068690/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Diana Bellamy</a>, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000935/?ref_=nv_sr_1" target="_blank">Bibi Besch</a>, and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0498280/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Stephen Lee</a>). The line between "young" and not, when it comes to death, can get subjective after a certain age, so to throw my subjective two cents in, I feel like anyone younger than 70 can count as "young." Andersen, who played kid-Mallory in a season one flashback, reportedly died of a drug overdose at age 21. (She's possibly best known for <i>Savannah Smiles</i>, a movie I loved as a kid). Besch (who plays Jennifer's steely high school principal in season six) was 56; Bellamy was 57 (she plays a warm, encouraging therapist who leads a group that Alex and his girlfriend Lauren attend). Both women died of cancer. Stephen Lee was Jennifer's aggrieved manager at Chicken Heaven, a fast food restaurant; Jennifer's friend and co-worker wreaks havoc, including spraying water all over the prep area and Lee, the boss. Lee died just a few weeks ago of a heart attack; he was 59. <br />
<br />
<span style="color: black;"><b>The Older Ones</b></span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOOFF9EWutJjUXBTHYBFBj8iWJi4UXHJtnEjvp2WMLJDQfMivBIj-mQ7kxG33lbZ3Iy8hBA98AdKWGoms5isllsbjyiqseg-eC7I8BMevBSNuahyiPskIpOMS3uZkwwoV9t5_6fJNBv0Rs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.48.56+AM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOOFF9EWutJjUXBTHYBFBj8iWJi4UXHJtnEjvp2WMLJDQfMivBIj-mQ7kxG33lbZ3Iy8hBA98AdKWGoms5isllsbjyiqseg-eC7I8BMevBSNuahyiPskIpOMS3uZkwwoV9t5_6fJNBv0Rs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.48.56+AM.png" height="200" width="165" /></span></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQ1qFGixNLgtaCy50e28A99qGW8gim-wjVe60pfJkQCk6f1cFrF6_cU07dkY4oL3ygq9iyM1qfDqMhZjXKY3iYMHfyBoulaKcwdZMgoLZ-_j1n6TJbvDCflkuv55ypgGsmezyJmbEVgTfs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.21.51+AM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQ1qFGixNLgtaCy50e28A99qGW8gim-wjVe60pfJkQCk6f1cFrF6_cU07dkY4oL3ygq9iyM1qfDqMhZjXKY3iYMHfyBoulaKcwdZMgoLZ-_j1n6TJbvDCflkuv55ypgGsmezyJmbEVgTfs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.21.51+AM.png" height="200" width="131" /></span></a><br />
<br />
<span style="color: white;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0067497/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Doris Belack</a> (left) had acting credits that included the film <i>Tootsie</i> and TV that ranged from <i>The Patty Duke Show</i> to <i>Law & Order</i> (she had a recurring role as a judge). On <i>Family Ties</i> she was Mallory's boss at a clothing store. <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0364915/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Julie Harris</a> (right) also had credits that went back to the 1940s; she played Mallory's older college classmate who Mallory discriminates against because of her age. (We'd call Harris's character "non-traditional" now, though demographically she's becoming far more traditional). </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: white;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0408834/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">John Ingle</a> (below left) is the justice of the peace who nearly marries Mallory and Nick in season five. Alex rushes in to break up the wedding but interrupts another young couple by accident; they decide to listen to him anyway. Ingle delivers his best lines with gusto: "This is a first for me: two marriages wiped out with one objection. A nuptial double play." He shakes Alex's hand and says, "Congratulations." His screen career began relatively late, in the early '80s, but he worked prolifically until his death in 2012. </span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZxhsOAvFFeIMNe1bCApH1DDoACNHusRwRI7CdGTt2-J-RbI054oYeNuvqt-H0_STvSdT7CvfuzEm_4K4srdylP82omsg8cDpsCReCrJL10ong_StvLWyJ0HOHkfkYJNx6N-4jz8O5CQpM/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.27.57+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZxhsOAvFFeIMNe1bCApH1DDoACNHusRwRI7CdGTt2-J-RbI054oYeNuvqt-H0_STvSdT7CvfuzEm_4K4srdylP82omsg8cDpsCReCrJL10ong_StvLWyJ0HOHkfkYJNx6N-4jz8O5CQpM/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.27.57+AM.png" height="200" width="198" /></span></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMzwQo6tFuK5tDBIahdYnhQOJMy2ybf3Vbg2x7aKK4PDnJwVWqSTngVdrSswRyU-SGwt2WaKD1lmDnzbRpACBzlpXwlaWaQKhFyIT6PvJ6UTYFTtSrLUF0AgLf4n2ggGsaKhhV2h-5wOa2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.53.41+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMzwQo6tFuK5tDBIahdYnhQOJMy2ybf3Vbg2x7aKK4PDnJwVWqSTngVdrSswRyU-SGwt2WaKD1lmDnzbRpACBzlpXwlaWaQKhFyIT6PvJ6UTYFTtSrLUF0AgLf4n2ggGsaKhhV2h-5wOa2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.53.41+AM.png" height="150" width="200" /></span></a></div>
<br />
<span style="color: white;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0775623/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Peter Schrum</a> plays the real deal Santa Claus in season six; (Alex has a job playing Santa at the mall). Like Ingle, he began acting later in life and continued almost until his death in 2003. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: white;"> </span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo6l0dQ1nzkjHqYh4CF2pXUrUEyIY23bEL7JTjLZEKt4zmuzFuzDje9WJyKtqGgMoC1ixhG_nLh-k-5JYK5i2866y1Pt7KczE_uHa0Xh7jYjke0eo7yKyhdM1kFleJ2NRna3jHshJBPjcR/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.58.44+PM.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: white;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgo6l0dQ1nzkjHqYh4CF2pXUrUEyIY23bEL7JTjLZEKt4zmuzFuzDje9WJyKtqGgMoC1ixhG_nLh-k-5JYK5i2866y1Pt7KczE_uHa0Xh7jYjke0eo7yKyhdM1kFleJ2NRna3jHshJBPjcR/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+6.58.44+PM.png" height="200" width="172" /></span></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="color: white;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0476369/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Richard Kuss</a> (left) plays a man whose wife has had a heart attack, and he's one of the people who befriends the Keatons when Steven suffers a heart attack himself and undergoes surgery in season seven. He had been acting since the 1950s.</span><br />
<br />
Finally, season seven's "Get Me to the Living Room on Time," features Andy befriending a couple at a retirement home during a class visit. The couple (played by <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0780528/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Douglas Seale</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0219315/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Marie Denn</a>, below right) decide to marry in the Keatons' living room. In addition to screen work, Seale acted on the stage and did voice work; one of his last roles was to voice the Sultan in the movie <i>Aladdin</i>. Denn had appeared on <i>The Brady Brunch</i>, <i>The Rockford Files</i>, and other TV shows and movies. The wedding episode is full of great old actors, including <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0791206/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Joshua Shelley</a> (below left) as a jokey resident at the retirement home. After a career that began in the late 1940s, this was one of his last roles; he died the next year, in 1990. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7lz-KsD9_cto_isZ-TM8447tE1s5iVvFefFKHQkaoXCF6YaxrbDJT6CVpw9P89JfC2GOfSg55Lf3pnQ-4zY0Xa_ycT60Y8JTaVtParPH9zZ_6Z4aXyQiVrOsIgPgIv_QOdeUYLjdPUIgh/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.49.36+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7lz-KsD9_cto_isZ-TM8447tE1s5iVvFefFKHQkaoXCF6YaxrbDJT6CVpw9P89JfC2GOfSg55Lf3pnQ-4zY0Xa_ycT60Y8JTaVtParPH9zZ_6Z4aXyQiVrOsIgPgIv_QOdeUYLjdPUIgh/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.49.36+PM.png" height="130" width="200" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaoSQewAPjj2xc4eEtKabha6JhlgTvMteEySkFVN_lqPijVFcg2OrHuvr2DcCVeRYx43kROXKElEjMRrmb3Mjf1K4rqp0qzszh927HjxChX4Kbliw5LtVjBWHpXmNxXx_GqpQQyoPY1aBX/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.58.26+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaoSQewAPjj2xc4eEtKabha6JhlgTvMteEySkFVN_lqPijVFcg2OrHuvr2DcCVeRYx43kROXKElEjMRrmb3Mjf1K4rqp0qzszh927HjxChX4Kbliw5LtVjBWHpXmNxXx_GqpQQyoPY1aBX/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+2.58.26+PM.png" height="133" width="200" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-dvF9XGRNgnOr3gUS6-Pow1zbzrshsONRTYhw4hK3ua9iJ7POVMF0shnAL1OP2FikZI8iORrj6l4d2WdecR-UrIx2_zzCyk8zWi9FRt95SoJgQwerXVLfWMhMHUor7UdnDBISKOS4BzYB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.59.08+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
<!-- Blogger automated replacement: "https://images-blogger-opensocial.googleusercontent.com/gadgets/proxy?url=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F-zluDbUWWCkw%2FVAN9xPbl0vI%2FAAAAAAAAEzI%2F4nY3VRb3Ef4%2Fs1600%2FScreen%252BShot%252B2014-08-31%252Bat%252B11.59.08%252BAM.png&container=blogger&gadget=a&rewriteMime=image%2F*" with "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-dvF9XGRNgnOr3gUS6-Pow1zbzrshsONRTYhw4hK3ua9iJ7POVMF0shnAL1OP2FikZI8iORrj6l4d2WdecR-UrIx2_zzCyk8zWi9FRt95SoJgQwerXVLfWMhMHUor7UdnDBISKOS4BzYB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.59.08+AM.png" --><!-- Blogger automated replacement: "https://images-blogger-opensocial.googleusercontent.com/gadgets/proxy?url=http%3A%2F%2F4.bp.blogspot.com%2F-RAOs0Pijpno%2FVAN4HPL2poI%2FAAAAAAAAEyI%2FS-NUSBe7VRc%2Fs1600%2FScreen%252BShot%252B2014-08-31%252Bat%252B11.16.19%252BAM.png&container=blogger&gadget=a&rewriteMime=image%2F*" with "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgznObfWgdc88kRcDGrYY4SWKtveMqGbTd16T9bXC5f8aTndz-I7H46pYKOcId-BkCytPQn30ec1VCRQY7Oksu8p17NDN_yvf2iG3Pvu_lcM3kR6d7ANpot9yPZi5oRrF3eDKklcjKXxtKC/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+11.16.19+AM.png" --><!-- Blogger automated replacement: "https://images-blogger-opensocial.googleusercontent.com/gadgets/proxy?url=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-7d2mjbBPXSc%2FVAN3CAqQFPI%2FAAAAAAAAExQ%2F3XeN_2NH8hw%2Fs1600%2FScreen%252BShot%252B2014-08-31%252Bat%252B10.25.58%252BAM.png&container=blogger&gadget=a&rewriteMime=image%2F*" with "https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSVRFYjRuoY7kfLjCV1vU2qb73f_NgcjRYz8XnA2fDgH-4K7URwzRis8WbXWIU__HZcKinRWgjDVsmgaMsfAGjgdOKPzMfgULL5pv1sCloCuwryjY4LcjEB_IOWIo8JZx-cJY1MekDuSJ6/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-31+at+10.25.58+AM.png" -->LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-59689234350783954522014-08-29T14:16:00.001-07:002014-09-03T15:23:57.379-07:00Lobsters, Sculptures, and the Trouble with "Normal"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8qvN0i7Kc0o9fS5k4qDE8aObyOem_yO-fxN9oKS-RNVqJk6JCeyJQ08456dl7hRk_pcUZWi9fLeWtWdGceqKgCVaX9VnXNaQf9lINqd4L1ccBFuBGszwGqlFlHNUjkw7AoafZLldKMn6s/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+5.50.11+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8qvN0i7Kc0o9fS5k4qDE8aObyOem_yO-fxN9oKS-RNVqJk6JCeyJQ08456dl7hRk_pcUZWi9fLeWtWdGceqKgCVaX9VnXNaQf9lINqd4L1ccBFuBGszwGqlFlHNUjkw7AoafZLldKMn6s/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+5.50.11+PM.png" height="264" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Nick Moore, played by Scott Valentine, becomes Mallory's boyfriend in season four of <i><a href="http://www.cbs.com/shows/family_ties/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, and their relationship lasts for the remainder of the series. Nick wears an earring and a leather jacket, drives a motorcycle, and greets everyone with an elongated, "Hey-yyy." He often gets dumb lines (which makes him a great match for how Mallory's character is often written), but he's a likable, talented sculptor and eventual art teacher, and he always treats Mallory well. But the way <i>Family Ties</i> treats <i>him</i> makes the show nearly unwatchable at times. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Alex and Steven (and occasionally other family members) make fun of Nick's intelligence, joke that he's a criminal, and never become truly comfortable with him dating Mallory. In one episode, we learn that Nick lives with his aunt, and it's implied that they don't have much money; (we see the fridge, and it's nearly empty). In short, class, education, and appearance are all conflated, by the show and the characters, into a great big ball of ugly elitism, played for laughs. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The episode that both engages with this the most and comes closest to acknowledging it is probably "Mr. Right," from season four, early in Mallory and Nick's relationship. Nick joins the Keatons for dinner at a restaurant but doesn't understand that he's supposed to select a lobster from the tank; instead he sets them all free. Nicks sees that he's upsetting the family and not fitting in, and he asks Alex for help: "I'm always getting in trouble around your parents. I mean, it really upsets Mallory, and I don't want to put her through it anymore.... I gotta be more acceptable to your parents, but I don't know how."<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN1aVoFGBeBkZuiTmgu3Do1oQdlcuAROlkm4m6SZnKJETsNmDomgOGREr4n8k5se7OHRyYsmoDlBNOIIeZUKI_VvX7Y_lXQH0mkIMUFz5m3IXigCBd-PL7zK5asF7kYa0FuopRuBWspVUs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+9.56.10+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN1aVoFGBeBkZuiTmgu3Do1oQdlcuAROlkm4m6SZnKJETsNmDomgOGREr4n8k5se7OHRyYsmoDlBNOIIeZUKI_VvX7Y_lXQH0mkIMUFz5m3IXigCBd-PL7zK5asF7kYa0FuopRuBWspVUs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+9.56.10+AM.png" height="320" width="310" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Keatons take home the lobsters that Nick freed; <br />
Alex catches one that "tried to make a break for it."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Nick gets "in trouble" for an unlikely accident and an honest mistake, but the show doesn't acknowledge that not everyone eats lobster or would know how to act at a restaurant that serves them. Basic familiarity differences, and the class issues that surround this particular kind of difference, are not addressed; the Keatons act like eating lobster is everyone's normal. Normal is also invoked in Alex's advice to Nick: "If you want to fit in here at all, you have to learn how to make normal conversation, okay? No more monosyllabic grunts….See, you got to know things. You got to read the newspaper. You got to get a job. You have got to change, Nick."<br />
<br />
So Nick cuts his hair, puts on a suit, stops making art, and gets a job at a shoe store, but the only people who like this version of him more are Alex and Steven; Mallory hates it. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgihbYPHGHA4e1sqKLyaBMxOV5hT9QB3NbbY-x6u_fH1fiUOu-DvLIUPeSTMtrcx9NVrI9AizR-Z1KC_R9NPXpp_4VaWdw_7491eyol95HaxNFQylUUZ3zLtQG9pLeIKLN9KO98OxGD5IFF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+8.10.31+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgihbYPHGHA4e1sqKLyaBMxOV5hT9QB3NbbY-x6u_fH1fiUOu-DvLIUPeSTMtrcx9NVrI9AizR-Z1KC_R9NPXpp_4VaWdw_7491eyol95HaxNFQylUUZ3zLtQG9pLeIKLN9KO98OxGD5IFF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+8.10.31+AM.png" height="213" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Steven, seeing how unhappy Mallory is, convinces Nick to go back to the way he was. His whole speech is played for laughs; the shoe store manager thinks Steven and Nick are lovers.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipWCAg-SlCBo8hP87u2GMM6n-M5rlX1q4_8gt_oQd5jME76IqcQNbh7j0rCRE2nV65ZubuLBaYMUvTB39OHv9_XFO2QW5YexyQM8sw3YJ53FZJ9wGTpA-srk_vMA0ZOaBJ7JB9h0zaRbXB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+9.20.51+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipWCAg-SlCBo8hP87u2GMM6n-M5rlX1q4_8gt_oQd5jME76IqcQNbh7j0rCRE2nV65ZubuLBaYMUvTB39OHv9_XFO2QW5YexyQM8sw3YJ53FZJ9wGTpA-srk_vMA0ZOaBJ7JB9h0zaRbXB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+9.20.51+AM.png" height="237" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yes, that's <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/some-faces-of-hardworking-1980s.html" target="_blank">Alan Blumenfeld again</a>!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Steven says, "Whatever our problems are, we can work them out. Our relationship has to be based on mutual trust and respect. I love what you tried to do for me. But it was wrong, Nick. Don't change for me." The studio audience laughs and laughs.<br />
<br />
That misunderstood-for-gay speech is unfunny now, very 1985, and false to boot; (it's not until the penultimate episode - more on that later - that Steven tries to work out his problems with Nick). The blatant linking of respectability to job status, attire, and conversational skills also feels uncomfortably outdated. (I'd love to read something on the evolution of the leather-jacket-wearing TV boyfriend and social class, if anyone has any recommendations).<br />
<br />
The episode does nod at how boring "respectability" can be, as when Nick puts people to sleep with his discussion of the differences between rubber and leather soles, or how civic-mindedness is absurd when taken to its limits, as when Nick engages Steven in conversation by wondering, "Scientists say the earth is going to self-destruct in two billion years. Now, what can we as citizens do?"<br />
<br />
The show and the characters do grow to respect Nick's art more, though Alex really only appreciates the sculptures when he sees how much money Nick makes selling them. And while the action literally stops when Elyse picks up a guitar, Nick's art is never treated with such reverence. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgknU0EPChlilEz0w0txqhlGUgcie3CiqS3n_VWFlhTtoR_hwRQjX9l7a5T0eC3runHloUXNHhu_V2VQYoNtAt7LWXaYdHX8IPlK-Xdz9JlOdbjlT2vmZ-QRYHASUeg8iV99sRX9g4jZg36/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+5.35.08+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgknU0EPChlilEz0w0txqhlGUgcie3CiqS3n_VWFlhTtoR_hwRQjX9l7a5T0eC3runHloUXNHhu_V2VQYoNtAt7LWXaYdHX8IPlK-Xdz9JlOdbjlT2vmZ-QRYHASUeg8iV99sRX9g4jZg36/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-24+at+5.35.08+PM.png" height="280" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
<br />
The parents occasionally recognize what they have in common with Nick; more than once, Elyse says that Nick reminds her of Steven when he was young. "You know, it's funny," she says near the end of one episode. "If we were in college right now, we'd be more likely to be friends with Nick than with Alex."<br />
<br />
"Well, we'd never get to meet someone like Alex," Steven replies. "Unless we were working for him."<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd9k-lQfNe9wu7nGH2qf9oZzZ0TODWTDDLUoz5gTvfLz3X9J4ySqMg9IMrtueH3dEMEkftDcFZL-E2HdIa21IJlJsJsr9GKfMic1JqDEQDj_nhtth8cAEL9GXM31nRefzbuteIfin9cyXe/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+6.34.07+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd9k-lQfNe9wu7nGH2qf9oZzZ0TODWTDDLUoz5gTvfLz3X9J4ySqMg9IMrtueH3dEMEkftDcFZL-E2HdIa21IJlJsJsr9GKfMic1JqDEQDj_nhtth8cAEL9GXM31nRefzbuteIfin9cyXe/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+6.34.07+PM.png" height="221" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br />
As for Alex, he helps Nick pass an English test and get his GED (in part by associating the parts of speech with the parts of a motorcycle).<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjnbk7kU5nNAvIKCEhNusBOm1jM4a6m7pV0fxAGqW36gHtBYZBi9EyB3e_XuWPMrLRC3EYqVUvt1xggtRtqrK-zBtRfPnzdsse5y2HkXrMbcTqsSvP6Ssp63t9kQom4nf3ergbyQmFl6nd/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+5.47.58+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjnbk7kU5nNAvIKCEhNusBOm1jM4a6m7pV0fxAGqW36gHtBYZBi9EyB3e_XuWPMrLRC3EYqVUvt1xggtRtqrK-zBtRfPnzdsse5y2HkXrMbcTqsSvP6Ssp63t9kQom4nf3ergbyQmFl6nd/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+5.47.58+PM.png" height="243" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Now Nick can get his dream job teaching art to kids at the YMCA. But, as with so many character advancements on sitcoms, Alex's investment and Nick's diploma and job don't change the central jokes about Nick's abilities; the next season, we see Nick reading <i>The Little Engine that Could</i> with Andy, and it's the latter who's presented as the better reader. Like the shoe store moment, it's painfully unfunny.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuF4_kn2KxWGUYpiuH3IwXdreS5pjh6cmCKEu0MRwIzJKx7Cy1LEqYCbgaNgjs8vdVZk18ydZCvCilcYvdwRsL10qrRLb2LWv1c2TG0PkMbnAoUyilDm9j0xptlvLgCkIKnejXVD-NSJTD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+12.17.35+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuF4_kn2KxWGUYpiuH3IwXdreS5pjh6cmCKEu0MRwIzJKx7Cy1LEqYCbgaNgjs8vdVZk18ydZCvCilcYvdwRsL10qrRLb2LWv1c2TG0PkMbnAoUyilDm9j0xptlvLgCkIKnejXVD-NSJTD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-29+at+12.17.35+PM.png" height="237" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
In season six the show introduces us to Nick's estranged dad (the great <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000445/" target="_blank">Dan Hedaya</a>), a used car salesman who left the family when Nick was 11, and the two reconcile. But in the end, the show seems most interested in a reconciliation with a different father figure. In the penultimate episode of the series, Nick stays with the Keatons while his apartment is being painted. He's in Steven's way, and Steven reacts rudely. Later, he apologizes: "I realize I've made things pretty unpleasant for you these last few days."<br />
<br />
"Years," Nick corrects him. There's no studio audience laughter this time.<br />
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC0_fFVxO98niyIwggvMqdknSnRHdfd-LXuI6GrgOzv4mlaQj-hxScfTvFWfmGLFzxiMS25izimUkH9sI7ikRWiJXHJ6hXB8cLMFyvkd22fC7jcecxEu2EmvwdB2HOWCzhB_6iQV_WuJv_/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.21.56+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC0_fFVxO98niyIwggvMqdknSnRHdfd-LXuI6GrgOzv4mlaQj-hxScfTvFWfmGLFzxiMS25izimUkH9sI7ikRWiJXHJ6hXB8cLMFyvkd22fC7jcecxEu2EmvwdB2HOWCzhB_6iQV_WuJv_/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-25+at+3.21.56+PM.png" height="320" width="169" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Isn't this a great shirt? </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
***</div>
<br />
OK folks, here's my plan now that I've finished the series: I'm going to write one more post about how U.S. presidents are portrayed on the show; I'm going to give you that in memoriam post I know you've been dying to read (sorry, couldn't resist the pun); I might write something about Michael J. Fox staying on the show even after the <a href="http://boxofficemojo.com/alltime/adjusted.htm" target="_blank">crazy amazing success of <i>Back to the Future</i></a>; and I'll definitely end with recommendations for further reading - and for watching the show itself. For all the reasons I've written about and more, this isn't a show I'd recommend most people watch in its entirety, the way I did, but there are some great nuggets I'll point you toward. If there's any other aspect of the show you want me to cover, let me know, but do it soon: to paraphrase Rod Stewart, with the quarter system, by late September I'll be needed back at school :)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div>
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
</div>
</div>
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-68879984045567402572014-08-27T19:03:00.000-07:002014-08-27T19:05:21.268-07:00Still Working on that Solid Rock of BrotherhoodWell, I've finally done it - no, I haven't quite finished re-watching <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083413/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, but I have arrived at the last season's two-part Very Special Episode "All in the Neighborhood" where the Keatons rediscover racism. The VSE was TV centered around one issue, and like any sitcom episode, viewers got closure at the end - the difference being, the VSE offered closure about something complex, like racism. Emily Nussbaum wrote a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/13/arts/television-radio-reruns-when-episodes-could-still-be-very-special.html" target="_blank">great piece</a> about the phenomenon of the nearly-vanished VSE and "All in the Neighborhood" when it aired as a rerun on Nickelodeon in 2003; 11 years later, it's all worth revisiting.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiusD8c02FrrA504C_Rgn5npKSqhTvzRaOCWZlZVcyPH-dgEgEOhQrvcZeGfeIRe-7KfyZceznG6Y0ypPrpk4NwgAwQR0IYk2_qGCxBsK4hfUaVCuuPQyXTdGq0nZcDUeGDhA6wkd2cWNr5/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.19.18+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiusD8c02FrrA504C_Rgn5npKSqhTvzRaOCWZlZVcyPH-dgEgEOhQrvcZeGfeIRe-7KfyZceznG6Y0ypPrpk4NwgAwQR0IYk2_qGCxBsK4hfUaVCuuPQyXTdGq0nZcDUeGDhA6wkd2cWNr5/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.19.18+PM.png" height="223" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gus, played by the great John Hancock. <br />
I guess I like images of characters on landlines, huh?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
First, the gist: Gus Thompson works with Steven at PBS. (We've met Gus before in previous episodes; more on that in a bit). The Thompsons - Gus, wife Maya, and son-home-from-Harvard Michael - decide to move into the house across the street from the Keatons. The Thompsons start receiving threatening mail and phone calls; the Keatons call a neighborhood meeting, which quickly turns sour when a neighbor says that his family is going to move because property values are sure to go down now that a black family has arrived in the neighborhood; other neighbors seem likely to follow suit. Faced with such animosity, Maya and Michael want to move; Gus doesn't want to cede literal or moral ground to the bigots. Then their home is broken into, trashed, and vandalized.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy17wrNwrK9rO_Fn6-rV_XZpmxS2ThOPY6LjY_bAQl_4LAFU77AD6w6gzInWKe8ske4c_uMYYLuP51gJ123aqlBC5uVzAyz_V1EQ6MisrZhUCUFbHpMHo2x9JtWtSzeCVNY_FvVQs7ZIoD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.46.01+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy17wrNwrK9rO_Fn6-rV_XZpmxS2ThOPY6LjY_bAQl_4LAFU77AD6w6gzInWKe8ske4c_uMYYLuP51gJ123aqlBC5uVzAyz_V1EQ6MisrZhUCUFbHpMHo2x9JtWtSzeCVNY_FvVQs7ZIoD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.46.01+PM.png" height="208" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">As Nussbaum notes, the Thompsons' home is graffitied "rather politely."<br />
The misspelling is turned into a joke.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
During the clean up, Michael's mind is changed about moving as he reflects on a picture of his parents at the March on Washington and what Dr. King would do in their situation. "You and your friends fought long and hard to win us certain basic rights," Michael tells his parents. "And now it's my turn to fight for them."<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimBDhD37ubrHHSq0UQtZ_v3pWGyEAM7yl-OmQPr9w5Hlv42igitJejXbwPV41boAIUE_0b_ajtBnvgHKWN13RqhhmOukt8eeLvkdfnog_J-J6gLi_CS8nCYhYcAV8kM3GW8yf4iIIXzPw2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+11.21.48+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimBDhD37ubrHHSq0UQtZ_v3pWGyEAM7yl-OmQPr9w5Hlv42igitJejXbwPV41boAIUE_0b_ajtBnvgHKWN13RqhhmOukt8eeLvkdfnog_J-J6gLi_CS8nCYhYcAV8kM3GW8yf4iIIXzPw2/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+11.21.48+AM.png" height="189" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Keith Amos is the son, Michael</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The episode ends with other white neighbors arriving to help clean up - property concerns kept them silent, but violence shames them into action - and with Steven altering the offensive graffiti.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBjc0d96-XjD5Skw66CqMVgj7raq12jJR9kGAvX9x2VkC_SUvEDnMqSJQTMWP-zGME8U8N-sos4AIixmKlFgqknqYc0Xi9STt4I_d0r464fm1y7tRFtHURZLw_7zY5EMdTuI9YreE_NNgM/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+7.00.39+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBjc0d96-XjD5Skw66CqMVgj7raq12jJR9kGAvX9x2VkC_SUvEDnMqSJQTMWP-zGME8U8N-sos4AIixmKlFgqknqYc0Xi9STt4I_d0r464fm1y7tRFtHURZLw_7zY5EMdTuI9YreE_NNgM/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+7.00.39+PM.png" height="253" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"You could have this man arrested for defacing your property," Alex tells Gus.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Nussbaum notes:<br />
<br />
for a flashing moment, the episode threatens a critique from within: the Keatons<br />
are called on the carpet for their smugly self-congratulatory white liberalism. But<br />
as always in the V.S.E., the conflict quickly dissolves.<br />
<br />
She is describing the scene where Steven and Elyse go over to the Thompsons to apologize for the neighborhood meeting. "And even though it didn't work out here," Maya says, "we still appreciate everything you did for us."<br />
<br />
"Oh yes" Gus adds, "especially the part where you encouraged us to move into this bastion of racial equality."<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaDdMq3cAlGD3XQUL-_oK0VH66JuMkPaQxwvx2qqCfJeaajISacbEer6h2kTlt4fV9Qdl09LLNzwdkI_XLcCw1g6u11oqoySdKltL_mSMNbF5KMFAgXAb068mMON7FU3DwKRHYmkJhe2y7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+3.15.22+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaDdMq3cAlGD3XQUL-_oK0VH66JuMkPaQxwvx2qqCfJeaajISacbEer6h2kTlt4fV9Qdl09LLNzwdkI_XLcCw1g6u11oqoySdKltL_mSMNbF5KMFAgXAb068mMON7FU3DwKRHYmkJhe2y7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+3.15.22+PM.png" height="254" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rosalind Cash plays Maya</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Steven and Elyse worry that the Thompsons blame them for the racism they encountered; they tell them no, and Maya reassures Elyse that they're "so pure of heart that it never occurs to you that others aren't," and it's clear that we're supposed to share this view. Really? These seasoned '60s activists are that innocent?<br />
<br />
While I agree with Nussbaum that the "critique from within" is short-lived, I think she overlooks a few other moments in the episode that have resonance. For example, Alex calls Gus to warn him that Steven and Elyse are headed over after the meeting. "They've been singing some of those white protest songs," Gus reports to his family. "Let's make a run for it," Michael responds, and his parents nod, but they don't get very far before the doorbell rings. "I work with the guy," Gus sighs. "You two save yourselves." Here the audience is let in on how these black characters feel about white characters' "self-congratulatory white liberalism," and because the interaction takes place away from the white characters, no reassurances to them mitigate it. <br />
<br />
We're also invited to laugh at Steven and Elyse when the Thompsons first discuss the possibility of moving in and want to know the racial makeup of the neighborhood. Gus expresses concern that there are no black families there, and Steven says, "I want you to know this neighborhood is not like that. We've lived here 15 years and there's never been one racial incident." The studio audience laughs, and then Alex adds, "That's a pretty impressive record for a one-race neighborhood."<br />
<br />
But this a Very Special Episode, and a sitcom, and so there are limits to its examinations. When Jennifer asks why they live in an all-white neighborhood, Elyse says that it didn't used to be; when they moved in it wasn't, and that was one of the things the family appreciated about it. No one notes that the Keatons possibly contributed to the racial change, that their presence helped make it that much whiter. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2RfyH4Jdb95h6V_Z7T13yh8k-qy3H-ujGksJ-lBGbTXveHZ5jkCJ68FNN_RmGYBe3YudOhaj3rq2Xls-jdACZ6hrEb0xRv9dpWzf3O9tmFlQ6elHb5wCP7fPweML5DIuBxzZYP6o_-H6N/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.39.28+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2RfyH4Jdb95h6V_Z7T13yh8k-qy3H-ujGksJ-lBGbTXveHZ5jkCJ68FNN_RmGYBe3YudOhaj3rq2Xls-jdACZ6hrEb0xRv9dpWzf3O9tmFlQ6elHb5wCP7fPweML5DIuBxzZYP6o_-H6N/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.39.28+PM.png" height="245" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These two sing "Blowin' in the Wind" to the annoyance of everyone around them.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
So what does this particular VSE have to offer us 11 years after Nussbuam's article and 25 years after it aired? For one, TV shows still try to mix humor with critique when discussing racism, but now we're much more likely to find that mix in a comedy news show than a sitcom - and we're more likely to see a figure like Jon Stewart as a <a href="http://www.salon.com/2014/08/27/must_see_morning_clip_jon_stewart_finally_gives_fox_the_takedown_weve_been_waiting_for/" target="_blank">font of insight and guidance about these issues</a> than we ever were Michael Gross or Meredith Baxter-Birney. But if we're "waiting" for Stewart to "give Fox News the takedown," does that mean that when his 10 minute monologue is over, we'll feel that we've achieved a resolution? And will that resolution feel more or less tidy than the ending of "All in the Neighborhood"? Regarding Stewart's piece about coverage of the Michael Brown shooting, a <a href="http://mediacommons.futureofthebook.org/imr/2012/08/22/politics-funny-nothing-laugh-daily-show-and-its-limits" target="_blank">friend of mine</a> wrote in an email, "He really showed them, now back to his delightful interview with the star of <i>Guardians of the Galaxy</i>." To be fair, Stewart's guest that night was <a href="http://thedailyshow.cc.com/guests/david-rose" target="_blank">more substantial</a>, but Sudeep's point is still valid: like the VSE, our comedy sources dip into the difficult and damning issues of our time only to leap back to lighter fare; the difference now is that <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2012/09/27/section-4-demographics-and-political-views-of-news-audiences/" target="_blank">we look to our comedies for news, too</a>.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIZ5uRd6GGkNlw3yiedQ0bujfTDAf7KDxPGNIl8CcB9OV-CSOwReEYXXv23ECc6BA9yFR0IjA3bBL6Hyrt7xt-1QK6m2sc2p463oJxqIxoVmoSNgiDvVmaQyKIY8YEv8QcDUCdEsSuKp38/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.54.11+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIZ5uRd6GGkNlw3yiedQ0bujfTDAf7KDxPGNIl8CcB9OV-CSOwReEYXXv23ECc6BA9yFR0IjA3bBL6Hyrt7xt-1QK6m2sc2p463oJxqIxoVmoSNgiDvVmaQyKIY8YEv8QcDUCdEsSuKp38/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.54.11+PM.png" height="199" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
This <i>Family Ties</i> episode also relates to the Ferguson, MO, story in the ways Gus is made palatable to white audiences. Gus and Alex share musical tastes: they both love polka and Lawrence Welk, and Alex is particularly upset to see that Gus's Welk records have been destroyed in the vandalism. It can't be a writerly accident that Gus's affinities align with those of the white man who happens to be the most popular character on the show. The actor John Hancock was a large man; for viewers unfamiliar with Gus from earlier episodes, polka and Welk offer reassurance that this large black man is not dangerous. Jelani Cobb wrote of such signs of reassurance in a <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/world-ferguson?src=mp" target="_blank">recent piece</a> for <i>The New Yorker</i> about Michael Brown:<br />
<br />
I was once a linebacker-sized eighteen-year-old, too. What I knew then, what<br />
black people have been required to know, is that there are few things more<br />
dangerous than the perception that one <i>is</i> a danger….I sometimes let slip that<br />
I’m a professor or that I’m scarcely even familiar with the rules of football, minor<br />
biographical facts that stand in for a broader, unspoken statement of<br />
reassurance: there is no danger here.<br />
<br />
The difference of course is that Cobb is a real person who has chosen which biographical facts to share (even if, having shared them, he feels "a sense of having compromised"). Gus isn't given enough of a story for us to know if he's emphasizing minor biographical facts to better fit in with the Keatons; his likes are attached to him with no sense of agency.<br />
<br />
Gus is given so little agency, in fact, that even though he's been around since season two, he has a whole new family for "All in the Neighborhood"! Here they are in the season three episode where the PBS station has a pledge drive:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDS8Q_HLxo2GIcZo84cVBIJEu-tpLQHtFPHcnR4NP8bEHUI7tkLnC74Bi_UdbTe-4dn6HCVqMqXlYokNfIuM2BrORP5reOsRMeW3ZI_eKe1sOKwqiE5gYbg2FpeoUwyOCpM8gaSPK63WlI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+10.29.21+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDS8Q_HLxo2GIcZo84cVBIJEu-tpLQHtFPHcnR4NP8bEHUI7tkLnC74Bi_UdbTe-4dn6HCVqMqXlYokNfIuM2BrORP5reOsRMeW3ZI_eKe1sOKwqiE5gYbg2FpeoUwyOCpM8gaSPK63WlI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-27+at+10.29.21+AM.png" height="189" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Not only is the son played by a different actor, but also in season three he has a different name - Bill - and the daughter, Judy? Well, she's totally gone by season seven. (The actress who plays his wife is seen so quickly that she doesn't get a name or a credit). I've written about the show's <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/the-clothes-make-continuity.html" target="_blank">continuity</a> <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/some-faces-of-hardworking-1980s.html" target="_blank">issues</a> before, so it's not like these casting irregularities surprise me. But they add to the impression that Gus is underdeveloped and the actor John Hancock underused.<br />
<br />
And this underutilizing is doubly sad because Hancock died of a heart attack only three years later, in 1992. I've been checking guest actors' bios on imdb because I want to write an in memoriam post about some of the ones who have died, and I've tried not to be biased in favor of the old by assuming that they're the only ones who could have died in the past 25-plus years. But I was shocked to discover that all three of the main guest actors in "All in the Neighborhood" have died: Hancock in '92; Rosalind Cash of cancer in 1995, and Keith Amos of chronic asthma in 1998. The parent actors were only in their 50s; the son, in his 30s. It's so obvious, but it still bears saying: there's so much they never got to experience, on TV and in life, and so much they were spared seeing unchanged.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfQ4PIePVdzsjH1ixMxtxrE-LlUPRbGrXH0nJvV1nSsznf2XokMyl95oLVJPgpfLJiat1JC_j9u8nyKzZbS3kLWfRv05iVndiYX0lbPpeTzM66irUXYMeuUxJZ_O4ocZl_mukVTNlqe2UY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.29.21+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfQ4PIePVdzsjH1ixMxtxrE-LlUPRbGrXH0nJvV1nSsznf2XokMyl95oLVJPgpfLJiat1JC_j9u8nyKzZbS3kLWfRv05iVndiYX0lbPpeTzM66irUXYMeuUxJZ_O4ocZl_mukVTNlqe2UY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-26+at+6.29.21+PM.png" height="239" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-21344053733679848852014-08-22T08:53:00.000-07:002014-08-22T08:55:45.168-07:00Remembering the LocalsThis is my mother. Isn't she cute? 35 years ago today, she was giving birth to her third and final child - me. In thanks for that, and in honor of her recent visit, I thought I'd showcase her here. (Thanks to you too, Dad).<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2y-yjH4yLwckzt5hMlTHavrJwp5jrh3lqPi_FLgCPPOWVRTbu_iF4p6qvudZDjPtZyMU3syePGuNWiVilBap5lGOypvpjaNNcIZ7VvQBirSfI18KkgSPco20-l3ykwyCqf9smJ_C_x1Ed/s1600/20140814_172842.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2y-yjH4yLwckzt5hMlTHavrJwp5jrh3lqPi_FLgCPPOWVRTbu_iF4p6qvudZDjPtZyMU3syePGuNWiVilBap5lGOypvpjaNNcIZ7VvQBirSfI18KkgSPco20-l3ykwyCqf9smJ_C_x1Ed/s1600/20140814_172842.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">If you're interested in the painting, you should contact <a href="http://thehubrestaurants.com/" target="_blank">The Hub</a>.<br />
Maybe it's still for sale. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
We had a great visit, and I learned new things about her. I'd already known that she got her first job, at the newspapers in Sturgis, SD, by pestering them until they'd hire a 16 year-old farm girl. (In the late 1950s, Sturgis had a one-sheeter called the Black Hills Press and a paper called the Sturgis Tribune, both of which were produced at the same place). But I hadn't known that she'd been assigned the Locals - the section that recounted the goings-on of residents - or that such a section had even existed. The job consisted of calling people up and asking things like, "What did you do last weekend?" and then typing, "Last weekend Mrs. Smith visited her sister in Rapid City."<br />
<br />
Isn't that cool? I love community news like that, and I hope there are still some small papers or radio stations where you can find it. In 2009, on a trip to Devil's Tower in eastern Wyoming, I found a radio program that announced a missing collie and a man's birthday party, complete with date, time, address, and invitation. "Everyone is welcome," the announcer said. I hope that program is still airing.LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-52364092885489584882014-08-21T11:39:00.000-07:002014-08-21T11:58:51.632-07:00"The Okies of the Great Recession"I finished <i>The Grapes of Wrath</i> and the next day when I bought a copy of <i>Harper's,</i> I found <a href="http://harpers.org/archive/2014/08/the-end-of-retirement/" target="_blank">this story</a> about retirement-age adults who live in RVs and travel the country following seasonal work. Jessica Bruder writes:<br />
<br />
They call themselves workampers, travelers, nomads, and gypsies, while<br />
history-minded commentators have labeled them the Okies of the Great<br />
Recession. More bluntly, they are geriatric migrant labor, meeting demands<br />
for seasonal work in an increasingly fragmented, temp-driven marketplace.<br />
And whatever you call them, they're part of a demographic that in the past<br />
several years has grown with alarming speed: downwardly mobile older<br />
Americans.<br />
<br />
I highly recommend reading this piece; if you're like me and had no idea about this group of people, you'll find it informative, frequently mind-boggling, and yet also an expected extension of economic and social trends. Just as the Joads find community in some places and (when there is work) hard work for little pay almost everywhere, the people Bruder interviews create communities at RV camps yet work long, exhausting days at Amazon warehouses and other sites. But one difference is that there are no Jim Casys in the 2014 story, no workers on strike.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-54702497205270800182014-08-19T16:40:00.000-07:002014-08-21T11:40:09.676-07:00Only an Onscreen Ending<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd5ZVK8EmZQs7Waerj078lD4ptJcdQNBNeo-s30QGkHD2LfujqY5hBE87amINgQRNTuqiftQtwSxW7WchUAYzyUCwGbmgGmM0yd9q5r5cSp4Z1FCCEquJtA9u8q48jkgI2cEUj-ukKsRRK/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+10.47.49+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd5ZVK8EmZQs7Waerj078lD4ptJcdQNBNeo-s30QGkHD2LfujqY5hBE87amINgQRNTuqiftQtwSxW7WchUAYzyUCwGbmgGmM0yd9q5r5cSp4Z1FCCEquJtA9u8q48jkgI2cEUj-ukKsRRK/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+10.47.49+PM.png" height="320" width="317" /></a></div>
<br />
No discussion of <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Ties" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> would be complete without looking at Tracy Pollan, the actress who played Alex's girlfriend, Ellen Reed, in season four, and who would marry Michael J. Fox a few years later. I do remember the character of Ellen from when I originally watched the show as a kid, but I had imagined that her goodbye was much more emotional than it seems now. For one thing, although the whole second episode of season five is devoted to Ellen's absence, we don't actually <i>see</i> Ellen leave; we join the story after she's already accepted a dance scholarship in Paris, and we see the aftermath with Alex trying to date again. And we don't get any flashbacks in that episode, either, or montages of Alex and Ellen's relationship. It's an interesting choice, especially since we saw a montage when they first got together, and the show has already begun the process of using clip shows, or flashback-based episodes. (The first use of the clip episode was with Ellen, actually, near the end of season four - the family sits around in the living room telling her stories about Alex's past antics - two episodes' worth, in fact. Maybe I'll write more about the use of the clip show later, but for now I'll just say that it's a shock of self-awareness - this family remembers its own past and sees connections between seemingly disparate events! - that goes beyond mere attention to continuity. Too bad it feels only like an easy way to deliver new episodes and pointless, narratively).<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNWJnUDE3rzkjsa_sKpUYr0XPDRdVOpwMcQtlLHmewIrkoOTR8si3HBG8Z9G7ra2DCje9YCjZSh57EE2b4rHAd-QUiEn0OORk8P_7tQ-28C3-8BU8vvAFaFdTDu4KXZXFnVvpRT4BjyA98/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+6.29.09+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNWJnUDE3rzkjsa_sKpUYr0XPDRdVOpwMcQtlLHmewIrkoOTR8si3HBG8Z9G7ra2DCje9YCjZSh57EE2b4rHAd-QUiEn0OORk8P_7tQ-28C3-8BU8vvAFaFdTDu4KXZXFnVvpRT4BjyA98/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+6.29.09+PM.png" height="278" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Is this great old tech or what?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
This lack of flashbacks and montages is doubly surprising because without them the show relies uncharacteristically on audience memory. For example, at the campus snack shop juke box, Alex selects the Billy Vera & The Beaters song "At This Moment," which played during the school dance where Alex and Ellen first kissed. But the show doesn't replay that scene, and it doesn't have Alex remark on his choice - "This was our song," or the like - perhaps simply trusting that viewers would remember the earlier, pivotal scene, which took place 25 episodes before. (Or perhaps recent summer episodes reminded viewers; the Ellen's-gone episode, "Starting Over," <i>was</i> only episode two of a new season). The show rarely seems to expect us to remember anything about the characters beyond the most important biographical details or relationships, so if it was expecting viewers to remember Alex and Ellen's song, that would indicate a storyline that was unusually popular and therefore memorable.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhqrsKtxuGmxIXnBW7-RJUeEu5bdZto7Z6sWCJmR_W-RDVa4rbyz_Sa14NS6O4xtk5B2TFHFWVQl_DAzsFiDEKN3I4qudCUYMLKok83zeM7w90XORLNjnD3XJ4R6t6RxPS-sGhRkHFPEkQ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+1.10.01+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhqrsKtxuGmxIXnBW7-RJUeEu5bdZto7Z6sWCJmR_W-RDVa4rbyz_Sa14NS6O4xtk5B2TFHFWVQl_DAzsFiDEKN3I4qudCUYMLKok83zeM7w90XORLNjnD3XJ4R6t6RxPS-sGhRkHFPEkQ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+1.10.01+PM.png" height="320" width="315" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Another <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/08/enormous-changes-not-at-last-minute.html" target="_blank">example of a makeover</a>, btw. <br />
Mallory and Jennifer helped Alex look "hip" for a date.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
My own memory of this storyline does suggest that it was notable, but then my memory seems to have given it an extra gloss of romance, probably influenced by Pollan and Fox's real-life romance. For example, I remembered the scene where Alex sits at the kitchen table and writes Ellen a letter, but again, I'd remembered it as being more emotional, a plea to return to Ohio that went unanswered or denied. But that's not the case at all; he's telling her that he's moving on and he wishes her well. He considers several joke closings - "Your pal," "Your son" - before choosing "Love." Alex is not over her yet - that date, with Sharon (played by Haviland Morris, who would have been familiar from 1984's <i>Sixteen Candles</i>) did not go well, mostly because he kept trying to get her to order her food, look, and smell like Ellen. But ultimately he accepts that Ellen is gone.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlpyfHdHeUKIWEiH6VlrclqQzqMme4_gVOLTFuw5y9G-wqobQJwMONJ7OS5hLJ8_xZHUYsNObmkalYQAW4YAqiAZC9ADdQ18U4WxVvLH4nguZRbW-6Xnz2jLwPvRRpZff_0t0UBnMjNPj8/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+2.37.58+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlpyfHdHeUKIWEiH6VlrclqQzqMme4_gVOLTFuw5y9G-wqobQJwMONJ7OS5hLJ8_xZHUYsNObmkalYQAW4YAqiAZC9ADdQ18U4WxVvLH4nguZRbW-6Xnz2jLwPvRRpZff_0t0UBnMjNPj8/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+2.37.58+PM.png" height="203" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Spraying your ex-girlfriend's perfume on your date? A no-no.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Although the love story didn't end the way I remembered it, there's a lot to like about the ending. The show gives Ellen a good reason for leaving, a reason that fits with her character as an artist. When we meet her, we learn that she's a painter, and in later episodes we see her as a dancer, too. I might write a post specifically about how art is represented on the show - Elyse is a singer; Nick is a sculptor, etc. - but for now I'll just say that I think it's cool that Ellen pursues her art, which she was shown to be committed to, even if it takes her away from her serious boyfriend. She's not gone from the picture because of some other possible reason - her rich father doesn't fall sick, for example. Characters leave to tend to sick relatives all the time, but that kind of reason would have been inorganic to her character.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBFErr3l4tTjlgWANYbhPXyYrUM3R8ZcXjka0IVEictI3kMOTPzLZ5tlARoQLgS3UMPV75vWHqCcdrxP9NViGfDTzxBNaeC0xGiUb0SlpO599viOnTgRMKK2Q8_kx6CWSgXxtiw_3fX6-l/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+3.12.39+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBFErr3l4tTjlgWANYbhPXyYrUM3R8ZcXjka0IVEictI3kMOTPzLZ5tlARoQLgS3UMPV75vWHqCcdrxP9NViGfDTzxBNaeC0xGiUb0SlpO599viOnTgRMKK2Q8_kx6CWSgXxtiw_3fX6-l/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+3.12.39+PM.png" height="288" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiekUxVabEPQ950RdpiUSriktd_upVNPGlUkct_vnqWcFTjNEh605As4IC7uC9PkaZyUP7jbN1T7LVyZ8ktIFXqIJBG-UNVpA61ClsA8zlvfH6_iqYee1lmYzwoDP6KFOQveUygxEEaZAtI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+3.17.05+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiekUxVabEPQ950RdpiUSriktd_upVNPGlUkct_vnqWcFTjNEh605As4IC7uC9PkaZyUP7jbN1T7LVyZ8ktIFXqIJBG-UNVpA61ClsA8zlvfH6_iqYee1lmYzwoDP6KFOQveUygxEEaZAtI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-19+at+3.17.05+PM.png" height="282" width="320" /></a></div>
<span id="goog_1653946845"></span><span id="goog_1653946846"></span><br />
I also like that she's gone, period. Don't get me wrong; I love the character, Tracy Pollan is great, and the chemistry between her and Michael J. Fox is so good that I find it hard to believe that <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/05/arts/she-memorizes-and-he-improvises-family-ties-on-spin-city.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Ar%2C%7B%221%22%3A%22RI%3A8%22%7D" target="_blank">they didn't actually become romantically involved until they reunited on the set of <i>Bright Lights, Big City</i></a>. (I recommend reading that <i>New York Times </i>story about Tracy Pollan's guest appearance on <i>Spin City</i>; in addition to the Fox-Pollan information, it's worth reading to catch the before-he-was-famous reference to Michael Pollan). What I mean is, I like that the writers didn't make Ellen stick around just for the sake of Alex having a girlfriend or transform her into the kind of person who would stay in spite of a scholarship offer because she is loyal to him, can't bear to leave him, etc. Of course, Pollan herself <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095916/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_17" target="_blank">may have had other commitments</a>, which could explain why the character was written off the show, but whatever the reason, I like the way the writers handled it.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi18qDRjAvSPLnas2CYkAplz81dtedZB8_oMqykq5Ze1SmhhXHFHOg68Bi4qHPGEcHjTewit9kS_GgNT61pM562kpGJE8cVSvANM_BkFFL_ZKnlSCayItn3Djcsi9FbM4WdZD24Ptit_pCU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+3.55.15+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi18qDRjAvSPLnas2CYkAplz81dtedZB8_oMqykq5Ze1SmhhXHFHOg68Bi4qHPGEcHjTewit9kS_GgNT61pM562kpGJE8cVSvANM_BkFFL_ZKnlSCayItn3Djcsi9FbM4WdZD24Ptit_pCU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+3.55.15+PM.png" height="191" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
George Eliot has this <a href="http://www.victorianlondon.org/etexts/eliot/middlemarch-0015.shtml" target="_blank">great passage in <i>Middlemarch</i></a> where she writes that we don't often discuss how people - well, she's focused on <i>men</i>, but I'm expanding the range for my purposes - find their vocations, even though arriving at work we're passionate about that can make an impact on the world requires "industrious thought and patient renunciation of small desires" in the same way that arriving at love does. But instead, Eliot writes, it's love that is the focus of our narrative energies: "We are not afraid of telling over and over again how a man comes to fall in love with a woman and be wedded to her, or else be fatally parted from her." Onscreen, vocation wins out over romance for Ellen, which feels like a triumph, writing and gender-wise; offscreen, acting and love could co-exist. This impulse to recount a love story seems like it would be particularly pronounced with two people like Pollan and Fox, who met in what turned out to be breakout work for both of them and are still together more than 26 years later. We love love stories, and we admire love stories that last.<br />
<br />
I once read an interview with Kate Hudson where she talked about how fun it was to watch movies like <i>Overboard</i> to see her mom, Goldie Hawn, and Kurt Russell when they were young. I hope that Fox and Pollan's four children get a similar kick out of seeing their parents on <i>Family Ties</i>, a show that ended up as a home movie of sorts, offering the earliest images of them together.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh_vLH2o80h5judwSKDTb_VVJWfWavbfW818lb2JrxXhTlva42rPZPG7uYilDw3fOrrTRhi9KHRhcvrwFwTG6-1vl0GAM1DmsHOvyRIeM2mdZntQyvrkm9I0Tv_hbkprSYGpL_Yynp_ftr/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.57.34+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh_vLH2o80h5judwSKDTb_VVJWfWavbfW818lb2JrxXhTlva42rPZPG7uYilDw3fOrrTRhi9KHRhcvrwFwTG6-1vl0GAM1DmsHOvyRIeM2mdZntQyvrkm9I0Tv_hbkprSYGpL_Yynp_ftr/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.57.34+PM.png" height="229" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiBTqHhz1Sc11vAYEKTSyVjzsh9Jo08RHg9LkQ0vIitLH_jd18Y82o-YpdqsOttvhuhLMbjBcCHs15DTuSX-0ge58vmmrXfLjpdKKXN2aa50rWwof0kCVb1ltYDhHq06XRXuqMI1bPqtZG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+10.39.26+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiBTqHhz1Sc11vAYEKTSyVjzsh9Jo08RHg9LkQ0vIitLH_jd18Y82o-YpdqsOttvhuhLMbjBcCHs15DTuSX-0ge58vmmrXfLjpdKKXN2aa50rWwof0kCVb1ltYDhHq06XRXuqMI1bPqtZG/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-29+at+10.39.26+PM.png" height="203" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-73854874591500375242014-08-11T19:26:00.000-07:002014-08-21T11:41:58.600-07:00Greg and Trudy, I Hardly Knew Ye<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ0WK2LnmTZSO3Zhu8uaEyGWic71_Auq0XbGxBtXGa5z4tepkc99n5XqfxSaeD6dR2FH0I4nPFP7jaJZ350C1Zh0Q_dKyhPkSRb_tCJCWsQYnbbx8TsJnryTkUezdteiEmpGAneDT8DkAo/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.31.51+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ0WK2LnmTZSO3Zhu8uaEyGWic71_Auq0XbGxBtXGa5z4tepkc99n5XqfxSaeD6dR2FH0I4nPFP7jaJZ350C1Zh0Q_dKyhPkSRb_tCJCWsQYnbbx8TsJnryTkUezdteiEmpGAneDT8DkAo/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.31.51+PM.png" height="304" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It's the ordinary things we miss about the dead: hemming a skirt...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTuGvJqMI1ndumS-P2WRfS7rmksdezkWGBVLx16Q4WDBH_Nmh0W8hyphenhyphen8OirEhWy1zjvH74wWxIaGd-ZID13f8K23DfKG2bNAJrYq8RmLRmEKf82ZatGwJJAvnqD25-qmsKiKL-z2iuIK_q7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+5.09.01+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTuGvJqMI1ndumS-P2WRfS7rmksdezkWGBVLx16Q4WDBH_Nmh0W8hyphenhyphen8OirEhWy1zjvH74wWxIaGd-ZID13f8K23DfKG2bNAJrYq8RmLRmEKf82ZatGwJJAvnqD25-qmsKiKL-z2iuIK_q7/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+5.09.01+PM.png" height="217" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">…or singing along to "Light My Fire."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
If <i><a href="http://www.cbs.com/shows/family_ties/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> and other shows had a phenomenon opposite the recurring-actor, different character one, it was probably the episodes that dealt with death. Here characters are introduced only to die - as with Mallory's beloved Aunt Trudy - or are never actually introduced in life - as with Greg, Alex's friend who dies in a car accident; (the episode opens with the family returning from his funeral - we see Greg only as Alex imagines and remembers him).<br />
<br />
Just as the choice to bring back an actor for a different part now can seem strange (no matter how great the actor), these death episodes can seem strange for how they ask us to care about people we've never met. Not to sound crass, but why not kill off one of Alex's friends whom we actually knew? I mean, I'm not suggesting anything extreme - I don't think they should have killed Skippy Handelman, the next door neighbor - but why not one of the four or five guys who had recurring same-actor, same-character parts? Maybe because only one or two of those characters had a close relationship with Alex; maybe because audiences weren't expected to remember story lines across seasons; or maybe simply because those actors had moved on to other roles. Whatever the reason, we have no ties to Aunt Trudy or Greg, and we're only given a few details: she loved to dance, he loved the Cleveland Indians (<a href="http://www.si.com/mlb/2014/08/07/cleveland-indians-mascot-state-legislation" target="_blank">only one of those loves would probably be written for a character, now</a>).<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
Still, within these limitations Justine Bateman and Michael J. Fox give heartfelt portraits of grief. He won the Emmy, in part for emotional scenes not previously given to his character. But I was actually more moved by a moment in a scene where he is visited by Greg's ghost, who starts to leave so Alex can study. Alex pulls Greg to a chair and pushes his textbooks off the kitchen table. His movements may seem dramatic, but his tone is almost matter-of-fact. "This is meaningless," he says. What's the point of studying, he wonders, when he could die at 21 like his friend?<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4miW1mkpLnmAnU0Uv_ndZGi64c6YFK9rDIJlCNhbyEdaO0hJ6r-xT5a1r2OkHSoPLa8ffuKEK31qlwsQSspjpZbL4V63dVT1VtFR1ZZAeXssR6IpueHPDQnTPBtfXG6ENm6iSfw2XlrKm/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+4.33.10+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4miW1mkpLnmAnU0Uv_ndZGi64c6YFK9rDIJlCNhbyEdaO0hJ6r-xT5a1r2OkHSoPLa8ffuKEK31qlwsQSspjpZbL4V63dVT1VtFR1ZZAeXssR6IpueHPDQnTPBtfXG6ENm6iSfw2XlrKm/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+4.33.10+PM.png" height="204" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Justine Bateman's funeral home scene is Emmy-worthy too; she gives an impromptu eulogy where she yells, sobs, and laughs, and each of those emotions - and the speed with which she cycles through and back to them - feel true.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBzEjbMEkGtVlilHBcg6_bO8EoHb1Te7GoWJBkmVbwIuGZJcb3_JlhFmZ-3ZeDgKY-OXjDZgznDNn15D5uleD_kpI6WDBmwadjUCuHC0A26HJbh9K6Ct3weuHv8vP5jfLoeC8Od5YA_CjU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.46.34+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBzEjbMEkGtVlilHBcg6_bO8EoHb1Te7GoWJBkmVbwIuGZJcb3_JlhFmZ-3ZeDgKY-OXjDZgznDNn15D5uleD_kpI6WDBmwadjUCuHC0A26HJbh9K6Ct3weuHv8vP5jfLoeC8Od5YA_CjU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.46.34+PM.png" height="306" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
The Aunt Trudy story is in some ways more poignant because the actress who played her, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0041138/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1" target="_blank">Edith Atwater</a>, had a long career and died the following year. I want to write a post about the actors and actresses on this show who have since died, but my mother is flying in to visit tomorrow, and so it'll be a little while before I write again. In the meantime, if there's something from <i>Family Ties</i>, <i>The</i> <i>Grapes of Wrath</i> or another long-ago-and-far-away work you'd like me to post about when I come back, let me know!<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXmUb9Wqdu2i1tOMI_k_d6gbkYs0ARW9_HnFFrqi2mpdm0VsC1pJLcBAYQ9Sfo2L_Bjv-0TxJyfZ1OeLJ_vqNDktc9hHnRRISH7SW3To_Q-7pQEsVyC7ZzP7CzyP8ldCA9m_yc56OzCrjh/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.24.46+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXmUb9Wqdu2i1tOMI_k_d6gbkYs0ARW9_HnFFrqi2mpdm0VsC1pJLcBAYQ9Sfo2L_Bjv-0TxJyfZ1OeLJ_vqNDktc9hHnRRISH7SW3To_Q-7pQEsVyC7ZzP7CzyP8ldCA9m_yc56OzCrjh/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-11+at+6.24.46+PM.png" height="320" width="285" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-15063348107005066572014-08-10T12:01:00.001-07:002014-08-21T11:40:55.161-07:00Some Faces of the Hardworking 1980s <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1-VUT2eSUxdBVZfTZetCDWkYh5fuFy11EjamO0-VpC3xHz2vu04R7kBq_JVJDfXnZYemcLeOu1HjjC2lbrs-IkAHdDf3YlE7cfm4d2QmO7XpJQK7AKwhVGgCHOwk-QHPvLOx7jSdwhibk/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+10.46.15+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1-VUT2eSUxdBVZfTZetCDWkYh5fuFy11EjamO0-VpC3xHz2vu04R7kBq_JVJDfXnZYemcLeOu1HjjC2lbrs-IkAHdDf3YlE7cfm4d2QmO7XpJQK7AKwhVGgCHOwk-QHPvLOx7jSdwhibk/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+10.46.15+AM.png" height="200" width="123" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWYt-2qUpEXR7Uk6RAip5ZxfuF8e-_dIJB2xEf9ENmJwswGGx9SiSWDHU4K4bKbLoltQDXJkC2ewfQ0DbCbpGMy87lc001c43V0DFzxUReplS08EKldxFYCq-QRoz3ymltOQT3npKQPJON/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+7.14.31+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWYt-2qUpEXR7Uk6RAip5ZxfuF8e-_dIJB2xEf9ENmJwswGGx9SiSWDHU4K4bKbLoltQDXJkC2ewfQ0DbCbpGMy87lc001c43V0DFzxUReplS08EKldxFYCq-QRoz3ymltOQT3npKQPJON/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+7.14.31+PM.png" height="200" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Another aspect of <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Ties" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> that fascinates me is how some actors have repeat appearances as different characters. This phenomenon is not unusual or new, of course, but it does seem to have had its heyday: in all the cases described in this 2013 <a href="http://mentalfloss.com/article/53689/15-actors-brought-back-play-different-roles-same-show" target="_blank"><i>Mental Floss</i> article about the practice</a>, for example, none occur after 2005. And the sheer number of actors reappearing on <i>Family Ties</i> at times threatens to turn the casting choices into part of the story - not quite eight actors playing all the parts in <i>Angels in America</i>, but distracting nonetheless. </div>
<br />
I already wrote about <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/the-clothes-make-continuity.html" target="_blank">Earl Boen's appearances</a>. I haven't finished the series yet, but other notable repeaters include Belita Moreno (a member of Elyse's anti-rezoning group in season one; Jennifer's history teacher in season four), John Petlock (a reverend, Elyse's boss at the architectural firm, a bank manager, AND, in the pilot episode, a member of a restricted country club), and Alan Blumenfeld, pictured above (a night club owner, a shoe store owner, and an interior designer, among other roles). But my favorite is probably Robert Costanzo.<br />
<br />
He interviews for the nanny/housekeeper job:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9-OC_JgWI2mJdVkKA7a5Z9YKBGm3z9MzcFdgN_G0CP-oLTp-khx7Yd2yZsADYNYqAwMyyheJpIssPgFFVUmnCpcQreSSJTKNQeLhkfm5n_fg4D6T6ZZ55up_PNPVi_OZbqMm6WNhc3uaB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+9.53.02+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9-OC_JgWI2mJdVkKA7a5Z9YKBGm3z9MzcFdgN_G0CP-oLTp-khx7Yd2yZsADYNYqAwMyyheJpIssPgFFVUmnCpcQreSSJTKNQeLhkfm5n_fg4D6T6ZZ55up_PNPVi_OZbqMm6WNhc3uaB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+9.53.02+AM.png" height="284" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sorry, but you're no match for Geena Davis.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
He delivers room service at a hotel in D.C. when Steven is on a business trip and serves as a waiter at the family's favorite local restaurant:<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitCzoI2_tFLPYyUsnmdrNXxLx82i1CAVbJU2yt_OuwZpB_1GgUnzj6BFQGkTjYfP_EhLUOfu8flZWmvVJUfm29zQjas1CP9BIhxsE6rzTc8JDZUk-JMDYZyrDbm_UlXkp2qiaevCLjolC_/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.02.57+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitCzoI2_tFLPYyUsnmdrNXxLx82i1CAVbJU2yt_OuwZpB_1GgUnzj6BFQGkTjYfP_EhLUOfu8flZWmvVJUfm29zQjas1CP9BIhxsE6rzTc8JDZUk-JMDYZyrDbm_UlXkp2qiaevCLjolC_/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.02.57+PM.png" height="320" width="195" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhjX26HP2_5LA4YbvD9tx8GN5Gv49RMLk2rKNqiquotf5mXFfrhknZH_wNm1bKpAj1y5sR8pkYusLeVFitchgd2aYlSa4li8YXUjWOwx6Km-tFyKPtVEp7KMtsZ_MWvNLlhtgeoTIvdI1/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+11.14.47+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhjX26HP2_5LA4YbvD9tx8GN5Gv49RMLk2rKNqiquotf5mXFfrhknZH_wNm1bKpAj1y5sR8pkYusLeVFitchgd2aYlSa4li8YXUjWOwx6Km-tFyKPtVEp7KMtsZ_MWvNLlhtgeoTIvdI1/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-10+at+11.14.47+AM.png" height="320" width="113" /></a></div>
<br />
He's also the auto mechanics teacher in the season four episode where Elyse and Alex learn car repair:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_V-rgTPB086rahRkBkYas_LxTnZRagItBChqCg747vwu2-AusQZGe6CRF8mT3l2l4OfNCCjB_HNWtkoJMrtT0rTN2TPZRwZ1gihyphenhyphenjFMowgv5QmXMwd9XZqmH022CmFKhtPu4JGE4sb_J0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-02+at+4.51.42+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_V-rgTPB086rahRkBkYas_LxTnZRagItBChqCg747vwu2-AusQZGe6CRF8mT3l2l4OfNCCjB_HNWtkoJMrtT0rTN2TPZRwZ1gihyphenhyphenjFMowgv5QmXMwd9XZqmH022CmFKhtPu4JGE4sb_J0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-02+at+4.51.42+PM.png" height="254" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
There are only four episodes that separate that D.C. hotel worker and the mechanics teacher, by the way, which takes a viewer past "I've seen you before" to "Hello, again!"<br />
<br />
I wonder why this practice ended (or at least is far less common)? Is it because viewers increasingly demand an internal logic to a show's universe, and most universes wouldn't have a hotel worker in D.C. show up a short while later as your teacher in Columbus? Or did forces such as the increasing popularity of reality TV contribute to a TV landscape where small parts were fewer and competition for them greater? I imagine that a show like <i>Law & Order</i>, <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv-movies/law-order-hurt-people-show-boosted-new-york-actors-resumes-pockets-article-1.446615" target="_blank">famous for all the parts it provided for struggling actors</a>, offered as many recurring-yet-different opportunities as these older shows did, but do any of you know if that's actually the case? <br />
<br />
Also, on a different note, according to <a href="http://imdb.com/">imdb.com</a>, Elsa Raven only has one appearance on <i>Family Ties</i>, but I was so happy to see her that I'm going to share that happiness with you. (She plays the chairwoman of the Leland University Political Science Dept. - Alex's school - and officiator at a U.S.-Soviet Union chess match, at which Alex is - improbably - the U.S. player):<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEiPdrq7YvKYrtFZJGf7rMkkmhyphenhyphenNcO6eb4z6BpUtzHgRjwJWntfSvEaFAMNrlU8DXIUf_5-B3UgNQ1jSyBJa3SsMOxgU2vNzTm2SQyTL_c5kUdVRtRVb6vFmclVRfnWcRGRNuPLVyERqkU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-02+at+4.20.07+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEiPdrq7YvKYrtFZJGf7rMkkmhyphenhyphenNcO6eb4z6BpUtzHgRjwJWntfSvEaFAMNrlU8DXIUf_5-B3UgNQ1jSyBJa3SsMOxgU2vNzTm2SQyTL_c5kUdVRtRVb6vFmclVRfnWcRGRNuPLVyERqkU/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-02+at+4.20.07+PM.png" height="301" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Can she save U.S.-Soviet relations the way she helped save the clock tower?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-2584242628881844122014-08-09T07:41:00.000-07:002014-08-09T07:45:04.968-07:00One More Nixon Recommendation: Watergate SueIf you're geeking out over the many pieces about the 40th anniversary of Richard Nixon's resignation, let me add one more to your list: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/ref/magazine/funnypagesWatergate.html" target="_blank"><i>Watergate Sue</i></a>, a comic by Megan Kelso than ran in the <i>New York Times</i> from April 1 to August 9, 2007. It chronicles the pregnancy of a woman who was herself born on the day Nixon resigned, but it primarily covers her mother's own pregnancy and obsessive TV-watching of the coverage of Nixon's final months in office. It's got a lot of good stuff: family dynamics, verbatim dialogue from the hearings, reproductive issues, and even a bit of Seattle (where the family lived in 1974). <br />
LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-54551102061485534782014-08-08T10:37:00.000-07:002014-08-21T11:41:17.636-07:00Enormous Changes Not at the Last Minute<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu1GzWJ4M6foKiRwTa5Na0WtPKpsJOgEwqP5C95BgFSeRTGF-k7QpqseMZvvRAzNoo1aUfR9gXb3jjYqf8qwR40JzKCfm8RAqb3AvoVPJNx7if55XZtA6Bumnz3nW2g26VIyqn_86WQVZl/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.29.26+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu1GzWJ4M6foKiRwTa5Na0WtPKpsJOgEwqP5C95BgFSeRTGF-k7QpqseMZvvRAzNoo1aUfR9gXb3jjYqf8qwR40JzKCfm8RAqb3AvoVPJNx7if55XZtA6Bumnz3nW2g26VIyqn_86WQVZl/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.29.26+AM.png" height="200" width="152" /></a><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_iVS4r-dqE5wWBCr4hZZM35AvGIHC_o0-nmpMdL4KabddD-9WRuljA_e8O1yGjKQhp-k0GsS7ZfpIwb2muy9cwFq_2ufL1-XDs4dXwnihavOhBIVrUstiThorpcEbRxUWKB8hLNwFOqq0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.48.27+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_iVS4r-dqE5wWBCr4hZZM35AvGIHC_o0-nmpMdL4KabddD-9WRuljA_e8O1yGjKQhp-k0GsS7ZfpIwb2muy9cwFq_2ufL1-XDs4dXwnihavOhBIVrUstiThorpcEbRxUWKB8hLNwFOqq0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.48.27+PM.png" height="145" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alex sweaters shouldn't get <i>all</i> the love</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I've been thinking about continuity and clothes again on <i><a href="http://www.cbs.com/shows/family_ties/" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, and I think <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=UXW3AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA122&lpg=PA122&dq=discontinuity+in+acts+reveals+groundlessness&source=bl&ots=kF1nDeLABQ&sig=wFg0vSTuvTBcLPE4BRi3VgKViFg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=e-_kU8i0DZbcoASlw4HwBA&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=discontinuity%20in%20acts%20reveals%20groundlessness&f=false" target="_blank">Judith Butler</a> (yes, I went there) would be useful here:<br />
<br />
<i>If the ground of gender identity is the stylized repetition of acts through time and not a seemingly seamless identity, then the spatial metaphor of a "ground" will be displaced and revealed as a stylized configuration… .The abiding gendered self will then be shown to be structured by repeated acts that seek to approximate the idea of a substantial ground of identity, but which in their occasional </i>dis<i>continuity, reveal the temporal and contingent groundlessness of this "ground." </i><br />
<br />
The characters on <i>Family Ties</i> present gendered selves through the "stylized repetition of acts through time" - for example, they return to the same outfits, which conform to gender norms (even as some characters are understood to be more fashionable than others). But I would argue that the show uses the "occasional <i>dis</i>continuity" in characters' clothing, appearance, and behavior to solidify the "ground" of identity, gender and otherwise. In other words, on <i>Family Ties</i> there's no surer sign that a character is going through a phase than when he or she makes a big, physical change. All extreme transformations signal the temporary.<br />
<br />
Sometimes these transformations are chosen individually, as when Mallory scores higher than Alex on an IQ test and then dresses differently to rub it in:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfuoQwyYZ73i283KXhDYMsrazEW0JgAdkg_qieAQallPaoHdyZdJ81Twh-XvKSKs2l79yD4loNOWqXXKHzOYEfr2oBLmsAgfO-JTz8-EaUt-zcoVvc6wpoGgSR4PH8qO5YmMU36DYkfawF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.31.48+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfuoQwyYZ73i283KXhDYMsrazEW0JgAdkg_qieAQallPaoHdyZdJ81Twh-XvKSKs2l79yD4loNOWqXXKHzOYEfr2oBLmsAgfO-JTz8-EaUt-zcoVvc6wpoGgSR4PH8qO5YmMU36DYkfawF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.31.48+AM.png" height="320" width="181" /></a></div>
<br />
Or when Alex tries to be part of his girlfriend Ellen's world by auditioning for a dance company:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6AkxQhesd4AsZlPomZaAu-9e8ZFyhWqGD046OPad_R96feeJmq6Be9HhgIIm8ALYEcdMbwlvutweEwIcqufnqCtEiT9f307U9jpOPWdqCXjwI0GqCekW8q42I6CqTkzxwOiOr7wNHiMhY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.50.52+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6AkxQhesd4AsZlPomZaAu-9e8ZFyhWqGD046OPad_R96feeJmq6Be9HhgIIm8ALYEcdMbwlvutweEwIcqufnqCtEiT9f307U9jpOPWdqCXjwI0GqCekW8q42I6CqTkzxwOiOr7wNHiMhY/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-08+at+9.50.52+AM.png" height="320" width="133" /></a></div>
<br />
But more often than not, one character gives another a makeover, as when Alex helps Jennifer prepare for a history presentation on how a bill becomes a law and costumes her in the style of his brand of overachieving student:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1FlG2HdM8zmCK3YRC2sVScoulEWUfLafm1ih65oSevsh74w34FEoGyVdSNpHSlAsAuhJT79Hq3uELA7Jn3bJYxxQOZsK-vP6fFUzBqNlIHVVDPUb4rnTc6PYiVHChY4gfI7Gqv-XlbKkt/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.32.02+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1FlG2HdM8zmCK3YRC2sVScoulEWUfLafm1ih65oSevsh74w34FEoGyVdSNpHSlAsAuhJT79Hq3uELA7Jn3bJYxxQOZsK-vP6fFUzBqNlIHVVDPUb4rnTc6PYiVHChY4gfI7Gqv-XlbKkt/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-01+at+2.32.02+PM.png" height="320" width="303" /></a></div>
<br />
Or when Mallory and Jennifer take their little brother Andy shopping:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg5Fn_TMwekPucszqFOUg8Q2oAw5RRKVjyJKL3oo9MnqydiqWsZO_O6PmxNTmrRkmKNahyrPnvecas0IU12FAnf4B7F4YyD9GBAz-ZpuHVDEUnp90oXzAuqz-isVNICA31B_bCyUr3biui/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+6.06.46+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg5Fn_TMwekPucszqFOUg8Q2oAw5RRKVjyJKL3oo9MnqydiqWsZO_O6PmxNTmrRkmKNahyrPnvecas0IU12FAnf4B7F4YyD9GBAz-ZpuHVDEUnp90oXzAuqz-isVNICA31B_bCyUr3biui/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+6.06.46+PM.png" height="311" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Or, in the most problematic example of all, when Alex helps Nick change his style so he'll better fit in with the Keatons:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHm6KqbERPeQM-GWL33Ij0aH-xQoyjQ8SMrNWsU8ubsL27NZs17RPDYpbyXjK-HayBENhPk3n1Glbk7dfASqsGTDjE-y8lRjusdsYumRWwKGXHOt5BuFv6G2cBrQSo7txvrcnWHKvtR11E/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.08.18+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHm6KqbERPeQM-GWL33Ij0aH-xQoyjQ8SMrNWsU8ubsL27NZs17RPDYpbyXjK-HayBENhPk3n1Glbk7dfASqsGTDjE-y8lRjusdsYumRWwKGXHOt5BuFv6G2cBrQSo7txvrcnWHKvtR11E/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+4.08.18+PM.png" height="200" width="173" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl2b0_WjgiE3WPA-Q3n_xWimWI7qFL2qNQWRnwTtl38QypjLMJ0-fGc_PQzAMuShqUQ7WCepFu7Jpg-9yuJPb1BZrnLN5BWATeaMoXJROPglYHmNk1lh7zoQ4LlaOqsVwlG7FWfVKF4Dd3/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+4.33.20+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl2b0_WjgiE3WPA-Q3n_xWimWI7qFL2qNQWRnwTtl38QypjLMJ0-fGc_PQzAMuShqUQ7WCepFu7Jpg-9yuJPb1BZrnLN5BWATeaMoXJROPglYHmNk1lh7zoQ4LlaOqsVwlG7FWfVKF4Dd3/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+4.33.20+PM.png" height="200" width="116" /></a></div>
<br />
(I'll write a whole post about the show's treatment of Nick, but I want to finish the series first).<br />
<br />
On shows like <i>Family Ties</i>, discontinuities don't shake the solid ground of identity; they reveal an anxiety about our true selves and our relationships, concerns that are resolved playfully or seriously in a matter of scenes but that are always resolved in favor of the "real" person. Everyone dresses like themselves, again. In this way, the show flirts with alternatives but comforts its audience with a continued return to age, class, heterosexual, and other norms, all of which can be bought and worn. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLcyAfGsyyL_v_ZUrSDkKP4bFhiNeNXWRQXNSXCc5BKhy0kGzOGjQ5uq5oxBPoPQo64FucW3m3Vu1vfsAdesNamCfGnppre3ujSGkBejfDvPckpZOHRs35kM4kr5p04Xhx3vmjhp0Ofp9w/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+6.07.51+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLcyAfGsyyL_v_ZUrSDkKP4bFhiNeNXWRQXNSXCc5BKhy0kGzOGjQ5uq5oxBPoPQo64FucW3m3Vu1vfsAdesNamCfGnppre3ujSGkBejfDvPckpZOHRs35kM4kr5p04Xhx3vmjhp0Ofp9w/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-07+at+6.07.51+PM.png" height="320" width="198" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I do wish this store existed, though.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-46794534074697939292014-08-07T13:01:00.001-07:002014-08-21T11:42:18.245-07:00The Visible Bridge or What Was Nixon's Favorite TV Show?In the spirit of Rick Perlstein's <i><a href="http://www.salon.com/2014/07/30/rick_perlstein_ronald_reagan_absolved_americans_in_a_priestly_role_to_contend_with_sin_the_consequences_are_all_around_us_today/" target="_blank">The Invisible Bridge</a> </i>(which I'm totally asking my mom to get me for my birthday!),<i> </i>let's look at the transition from Nixon to Reagan on <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083413/?ref_=ttep_ep_tt" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i>, shall we? In season one, Steven's conservative father visits and when the subject of Nixon comes up during dinner, he says, "Nixon was framed, you know." Steven tries to calm down by excusing himself, but from the next room he yells, "HE WAS NOT FRAMED! HE WAS A CROOK!"<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWl_cNzI7nrQBtgjfosgO0AdQxj-aebjcIPtnmF0FAsmZzV2RvHTid0TskwcFrUFKBptiU0w5e6US_weKkISGnApQ9UERp0N2LfGID_mmDKK0kCRJEmjqRLfIZ94bbLdLhHW5T1YkI0K4W/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.10.25+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWl_cNzI7nrQBtgjfosgO0AdQxj-aebjcIPtnmF0FAsmZzV2RvHTid0TskwcFrUFKBptiU0w5e6US_weKkISGnApQ9UERp0N2LfGID_mmDKK0kCRJEmjqRLfIZ94bbLdLhHW5T1YkI0K4W/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-04+at+6.10.25+PM.png" height="303" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alex also had a House Un-American Activities coloring book.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="orphans: 2; widows: 2;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 15px;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="orphans: 2; widows: 2;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 15px;">T</span></span>he scene is played for laughs - Steven returns to the table and mildly asks someone to please pass the potatoes - but the indictment is not itself the joke. That episode aired on November 3, 1982, only eight years after Nixon's resignation, and in the early seasons of the show the serious lessons of Watergate share space with the humorous adoration Alex feels. Nixon is the political Rorschach test and sun; Reagan is practically a distant star. </div>
<br />
By season four, while the show hasn't abandoned its references to Nixon, they've increasingly become linked to objects, relics of Alex's childhood that serve as signifiers of his precociousness and early political affiliations. There's his Nixon lunchbox, his Nixon rattle. Reagan isn't totally immune from such treatment; Alex uses a framed photo of the president as an educational tool for his infant brother Andrew:<br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 15px; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; widows: 2;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg23nEfdDgmNE0niVm1qa1fxVN0AtdHnfVQmtgu1zD0U3VWA9rNq8dUr1VYCWHp5TGEifNgVHjuPyMkStg12RajpM6kMCgLo94AuCHC2EQrbH0N2t0YDy3LOmMkCfbO2CsVT4CtFxv93nML/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+2.35.49+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg23nEfdDgmNE0niVm1qa1fxVN0AtdHnfVQmtgu1zD0U3VWA9rNq8dUr1VYCWHp5TGEifNgVHjuPyMkStg12RajpM6kMCgLo94AuCHC2EQrbH0N2t0YDy3LOmMkCfbO2CsVT4CtFxv93nML/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-07-31+at+2.35.49+PM.png" height="248" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"74 years old, he still has his own teeth. I mean, this is everything you'd want in a president."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span></span><br />
(This world-leaders-education-for-babies joke would be used to great effect two years later in the film <i><a href="http://www.imdb.com/media/rm469795840/tt0092605?ref_=ttmd_md_nxt#" target="_blank">Baby Boom</a></i>. In that movie, the babies get actual flashcards!)<br />
<br />
But beyond such visual gags, by increasingly focusing on Alex and making him mostly likable, the show served to make Reagan more palatable, too. Alex liked Reagan; therefore we could, too.<br />
<br />
Yet while this conflation of character and president was occurring, the show nevertheless had an "ambivalent relationship with the value system of the Reagan era," as <a href="https://webapp4.asu.edu/directory/person/1271087" target="_blank">Bambi L. Haggins</a> notes in her essay "There's No Place Like Home: The American Dream, African-American Identity, and the Situation Comedy." Haggins also argues that <i>Family Ties</i> exhibited "self-conscious parodying" of these values.<br />
<br />
You can see some of that parody in this season four dialogue between Alex and Steven. Alex is watching CNN footage from a Reagan press conference:<br />
<br />
Alex: He was just talking about this new Star Wars defense system, Dad. It is great. We're going to build these, these space weapons that can shoot down Soviet<br />
missiles. Now, if the Soviets build space weapons that can shoot down our missiles,<br />
we're gonna build <i>bigger</i> space weapons to shoot down their space weapons. And<br />
if they build bigger space weapons to shoot down our space weapons, we'll build<br />
even <i>bigger</i> space weapons to shoot down their space weapons that shoot down<br />
our space weapons.<br />
<br />
Steven: Finally, something sensible is happening.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1lYk95tbx9jmOkfIitdxOhNvmZR5-LH6Uy2NseKMBvHNDdnC6AjcBV2a6DPh8e3tk4slyapemUnxAQlG303-1Ky36ehg-BDdbeMtxTNJ1lj5D2Dl_S8s-_TAATJyac918o1iqz1R2SllK/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.57.03+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1lYk95tbx9jmOkfIitdxOhNvmZR5-LH6Uy2NseKMBvHNDdnC6AjcBV2a6DPh8e3tk4slyapemUnxAQlG303-1Ky36ehg-BDdbeMtxTNJ1lj5D2Dl_S8s-_TAATJyac918o1iqz1R2SllK/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.57.03+PM.png" height="320" width="267" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Well, uh, either you got that bank job or Richard Nixon has re-entered politics."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Dialogue like this troubles the simple picture of the show delivering a sunny, good-looking White House proxy and makes it seem kind of incredible that <a href="http://www.museum.tv/eotv/familyties.htm" target="_blank">Reagan called <i>Family Ties</i> his favorite TV show</a> - did he actually watch it? Or was he just aware that it had an avowedly Republican character who was played by that actor who was in that cool time travel movie that also <a href="http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0001831/quotes" target="_blank">mentioned him</a>?<br />
<br />
It's also easy, re-watching this show, to forget that Nixon was still alive when it aired, that as much as Nixon the Character haunts and guides the lives of the show's characters as a figure from the past, a real man sat at home…<a href="http://www.denverpost.com/ci_23614428/nfl-blackout-rule-richard-nixon-hated-it" target="_blank">probably not watching this show</a>.LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4727341919710746798.post-8288158696045939502014-08-06T16:30:00.000-07:002014-08-21T11:42:37.497-07:00The Big Chill in ColumbusOK, I'm not done re-watching <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Ties" target="_blank">Family Ties</a></i> - I'm only to episode five, season five - but already there's plenty new to discuss, and I just couldn't wait. Because, of course, I am a nerd.<br />
<br />
In keeping with that nerdiness, I started doing research to see who else has written about the show, and one of the pieces, "The American Family on Television: From Molly Goldberg to Bill Cosby" from the <i><a href="https://soci.ucalgary.ca/jcfs/" target="_blank">Journal of Comparative Family Studies</a> </i>includes this passage:<br />
<br />
<i>In Family Ties, one of the few shows in which politics was even <br /> mentioned, political preference is much like having an occupation.<br /> The characters, especially Alex, talk about politics but hardly ever <br /> participate in the political process. Characters do not battle for<br /> social change. </i> <br />
<br />
Muriel G. Cantor does overlook the season one episode where the parents, Steven and Elyse, <a href="http://thereshouldbeanamefor.blogspot.com/2014/07/those-other-ties-beyond-family.html" target="_blank">go to jail for protesting nuclear weapons</a>, but I concede that there's a lack of engagement in subsequent episodes.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfWsH9dmLCM6KxqIL13xrVzYbmjaJLMslftCE9I6lQmeFWv_TuPsUcVibMLsBUP3ixq0vMb4w9ZLch6sIsfu1crjghja70dRCuZGJQsbYbQwixyzlQO8Gefn9jkcy1t2d0q7oL35mEYOjF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+2.05.02+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfWsH9dmLCM6KxqIL13xrVzYbmjaJLMslftCE9I6lQmeFWv_TuPsUcVibMLsBUP3ixq0vMb4w9ZLch6sIsfu1crjghja70dRCuZGJQsbYbQwixyzlQO8Gefn9jkcy1t2d0q7oL35mEYOjF/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+2.05.02+PM.png" height="221" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
There is <i>some</i> engagement: Elyse leads a group fighting a re-zoning law at the end of season one, and in season two Alex pretends to support the Equal Rights Amendment in order to get a girl to like him and goes to jail in the process, but in season five when Steven has the opportunity to be part of the revival of a political magazine named <i>Scavenger</i> that he and a friend started at UC Berkeley, he finds that he's no longer radical enough for his old friend Matt.<br />
<br />
There are fascinating details that emerge in this episode. For one, Steven expresses an aversion to being arrested, stating that "getting arrested is way down on my list now. Right below being shipwrecked." He does have a young child at home and more bills to pay - with two children in college and one in preschool - none of which he had in season one when he and Elyse were arrested, but it's still a telling shift. He's thinking ahead to the election in 1988 and which Democrats might run, an interest and investment in the two-party-dominated U.S. political system that his friend disdains; Matt is far more interested in anarchy.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9Vw431_DDxfLf-gDbsJ88THlnocZFp3lAHTPNmkyTTYK8OeFYP9QGgqi1TSlqadC8zGgW-sQ8KqIBtzQaBckIhgF9iM0U9FS1ALNIF0IkVu-_zCHbbys0LNaUiF83Ayu8fqqpsFMmkhIr/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.32.17+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9Vw431_DDxfLf-gDbsJ88THlnocZFp3lAHTPNmkyTTYK8OeFYP9QGgqi1TSlqadC8zGgW-sQ8KqIBtzQaBckIhgF9iM0U9FS1ALNIF0IkVu-_zCHbbys0LNaUiF83Ayu8fqqpsFMmkhIr/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+5.32.17+PM.png" height="309" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<i>Scavenger</i> seems like a misnomer for their venture; a scavenger feasts on the dead, but Matt and the other contributors clearly think that the two-party system is still in need of killing. One of them criticizes Steven in a meeting by saying, "you're suggesting that people actually go out and vote for one of the two prevailing political parties…the only vote that counts is a vote against the system." But Steven wants to be neither a vulture nor a hawk - not only in the political sense of being to the right, but also not in the general sense of wanting to hunt, to be an activist. He's in all ways a dove.<br />
<br />
Does this turn away from the <i>Scavenger</i> represent an actual shift in values for the character or the show, or a continuation? After all, we know from earlier episodes that Steven voted for McGovern in 1972, so the guy who wrote "The Two-Party System: Tweedledum and Tweedledee" for the original iteration of the <i>Scavenger</i> hasn't been around for awhile. While it may be a continuation that the character himself is only just now noticing, it does seem like a shift for the show, signaling that we won't have any repeat prison performances, or if we do, they'll be a joke, like Alex's, not a sincere extension of ideals. Steven may still voice his concern for nuclear disarmament and hang an old Ban the Bomb sign above the fireplace to welcome Matt, but it looks like Steven won't be going to jail for this cause, or any other, again.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifqKQvvtWfv8sfi1lRNIzy1yTS5BCUZqm23GigmSwk5v6vQ9Noe06pSq9p9FhdiJMs65zQvV8HwfTcyiey3cTWl963FYlZrMb7Sq8dL3MRfZsWipgxwexlKMWamInfBcI5BgHAx30Pwp3U/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+7.19.35+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifqKQvvtWfv8sfi1lRNIzy1yTS5BCUZqm23GigmSwk5v6vQ9Noe06pSq9p9FhdiJMs65zQvV8HwfTcyiey3cTWl963FYlZrMb7Sq8dL3MRfZsWipgxwexlKMWamInfBcI5BgHAx30Pwp3U/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-05+at+7.19.35+PM.png" height="159" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
There's a moment when it seems like the character and the show itself may be aware of this: when Steven asks Elyse if he's changed, she replies, "I think your social conscience has held up pretty well," and he laughs shortly and says, "Right. And the tax credit from Amnesty International proves it." Writing a check is different from other kinds of activism, the show observes. But then Elyse continues:<br />
<br />
You do make a statement, Steven. You make a statement by the way <br />
you live your life, by the way you raise your children, by choosing <br />
a job that doesn't compromise your principles. Those are political <br />
acts, as strong as anything you ever did back at Berkeley.<br />
<br />
Here we see a character endorsing an argument that politics can be lived primarily through the family. It's not quite a disavowal of the public sphere, but it does argue that raising kids and going to work are enough, and in that regard it seems to <a href="http://news.moviefone.com/2013/09/30/the-big-chill-at-30-how-the-boomer-nostalgia-classic/" target="_blank">join other works that seek to placate the idealistic young people of the '60s who have become the comfortably middle class parents of the '80s</a>. <i>It's OK</i>, the show says through the character of Elyse. <i>You're still a good person.</i> <br />
<br />
And in case that message wasn't clear enough or the messenger was suspect for being a fellow member of that generation, after Elyse leaves the room, Alex walks in to reassure his father as well. "Listen, Dad," Alex begins. "Over the years, you and I have searched for some common political ground. We searched…and searched…and searched" (studio audience laughs). "And even though we haven't agreed on anything yet, I really respect your ideals, you know? And the fact that you respect mine. You set a good example." The child absolves the parent.<br />
<br />
To be fair, raising children to be respectful, independent thinkers is no small thing; nor is having a job that reflects your values. There's also a point here to how people can change, how different we can be at 40 from 20, and research from Pew shows that <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/03/the-generation-gap-and-the-2012-election-3/" target="_blank">many older adults are more conservative than they used to be</a>. But it's impossible not to feel like the show is withdrawing politically at this point in the series, the protesting and getting arrested of 1982 replaced with the benign Reagan jokes of 1986. I'll write more about this is in a later post; in the meantime, I leave you with this great poster and some relevant <a href="http://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Equal_Rights_Amendment?rec=2056" target="_blank">Ohio ERA history</a>...because I'm guessing if you've read this far, you're a nerd, too:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNVzLqsm6FXiA83CvJ7KTPP0Of38olkA475iAEzKEzFJsheaFJqXY9le21yamA6flOqDAWv2ChyphenhyphenCFP9JvdinWApqQykcq92ujS9tt6iTq3mhqxyGqzHGQaJpi2BxDT8R9-ozb7Wf8UiPcI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+2.02.28+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNVzLqsm6FXiA83CvJ7KTPP0Of38olkA475iAEzKEzFJsheaFJqXY9le21yamA6flOqDAWv2ChyphenhyphenCFP9JvdinWApqQykcq92ujS9tt6iTq3mhqxyGqzHGQaJpi2BxDT8R9-ozb7Wf8UiPcI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2014-08-06+at+2.02.28+PM.png" height="300" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">He cares about the First Amendment, but, sadly, not this one.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />LeAnne LBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13098696931712908081noreply@blogger.com0