Sometimes I have an urge. Now, before you get alarmed and quickly press that mouse button to search Google for that salacious bit of tripe you heard while in the restroom at work concerning the Kardashian sisters and that Chihuahua from those old Taco Bell commercials, calm down and perk up your ears for a minute or two and I will explain. The urge is that I occasionally need to revisit the television shows of my youth. There! I said it! I am unabashedly proclaiming my right to wallow in my rosy view of my own personal youthful nostalgia. And that is embodied by the television that I viewed, when I was about, say, ten years old or thereabouts.
This usually has the tendency to shuttle me directly to those Saturday nights when I was allowed to stay up until eleven or a little past that. Hey! I was only ten. Not quite a small child and yet not a teenager. It’s kind of a limbo dimension in our lives but, one in which the fond memories are formed and seem to stay with us. Well, at least it did in my case! And Saturday nights were THE CBS comedy nights! I would look forward all week to the family getting together and popping some corn and during holidays or Summer Saturdays, which were somehow different and ranked above the regular Saturdays; there was Root Beer Floats for us kiddies! Awesome! Our own A and W root beer floats at home with that carton of Foremost Vanilla ice cream!
Anyway, I have digressed, and Saturday nights on the old ‘eyeball’ network are now part of the halcyon days of television comedy. The lineup included ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’, ‘The Bob Newhart Show’ and then the ‘Carol Burnett Show’, not a bad assemblage to be entertained by on a Saturday night. A few comedy programs would be added here and there but, they never did seem to last all that long on the network. I remember ‘Bridget Loves Bernie’ as one of those short fill in types that just did not catch on.
But, there is just something about Mary. In her show, Mary Tyler Moore was, the quintessential woman of the 1970’s, smart, career minded, had a feminist point of view, and yet was sweet and vulnerable in a way that just made her the perfect friend and co-worker. This show is about life and how to live it, even though you have absolutely no idea what to do in the situations or with the characters that come your way. Mary is open to this learning, to the serendipitous discovery along the journey of life that is often humorous and always in some way absurd. Mary is supported by a fine cast of actors, Ed Asner, Gavin MacCleod, Ted Knight, Cloris Leachman, Betty White, and Valerie Harper, all of whom played characters that in effect became her friends, despite their initial differences, intolerant attitudes or social status; and her extended family by the final episode of the show.
Next on the network was ‘The Bob Newhart Show’ and it was my favorite of the night. Bob Newhart started his show business career as a stand-up comedian after being an accountant for many years. Newhart’s comedy album; yes, they used to have comedy records that we would put on a record player machine, was one of the first comedy albums to sell in the millions. If you have never heard it, Google ‘The Button Down Mind of Bob Newhart’ on the nets, it’s worth a listen. Anyway, Bob’s comedy is low key and even gentle in its application. This made him perfectly suitable for the prime time of the mid-seventies. Newhart portrayed a psychologist; as the areas of self-help and psychoanalysis were recently becoming popular in the United States and much of the humor came from the minions that were his patients. Mr. Carlin, though wealthy, could not or would not relate to other humans in a civil way without taking advantage of them. The character of Mr. Peterson, was a man suffering from low self-esteem and always afraid of his wife and in fact everything else in life. How could mental illness be funny? I would bet that today this show idea would be axed before the pilot was made! But, that is the magic of Newhart’s humor. It was mild and forgiving of the foibles of human existence while exposing them and only stopping to softly nudge you in the ribs occasionally. Bob had a wife, played by the irresistibly lovely Suzanne Pleshette, and at first she was the perfect wife, cute, shy, caring, devoted, kind, and very supportive of her husband’s career. As the show continued, her character grew, from a meek wife to a substitute teacher, to a confident assertive professional principal of an elementary school. The honesty of the show is apparent in how Bob and Suzanne approached their characters and portrayed how a couple could grow and increase in their love for one another through these changes in life. Thus rejecting the notion that everyone grows apart and that this results in divorce as other network programs would depict in later years on television. The show was populated with an exceptionally gifted cast of supporting players. Each one with their own distinct point view that often came with some form of emotional baggage, from Bob’s pals at the office, Jerry the Dentist and Carol his snarky and smart receptionist to the next door neighbor Howard the airline pilot and divorced dad, all pitched in to create some of the best in television humor.
Ahhh! And now to the jewel of the Saturday night! The indomitable Carol Burnett and her cast of supporting comedians, Harvey Korman, Lyle Waggoner, Tim Conway, and Vicki Lawrence, on the ‘Carol Burnett Show’. What can I say about this show? I apologize in advance because, I was ten years old and this show was one continuous laugh for me for the entire one hour on Saturday night! Carol’s humor was multifaceted as the show was a variety hour of skits and songs along with a guest star. Sure, there was the basic slapstick that made me laugh but, there was also a darker adult humor lurking underneath that façade of such regular skits as ‘Mama’s Family’. In the ‘Mama’s Family’ skit, the humor was often instigated by one of the family, probably as a memory from childhood, which was hurtful when it initially happened but, in the end became ridiculous when the issue was torn into its constituent parts by the other family members. All was forgiven, and the family survived though it might be somewhat different for the experience. I was at the correct age to sort of get most of that. For many people, Lucille Ball is the epitome of television comedy. Perhaps that is true but, I would disagree, as Carol Burnett, in my opinion is one of the true geniuses of the television comedy-variety show art form.
Whether there was a conscious effort of the CBS network programmers, a happy serendipity, or that possibly we were not as jaded in that period as we are now, the Saturday night programs reflected the perceptions of a generation in the 1970’s. All of these programs had much in common and I think this is why I am still charmed by them today. They were gentle and funny and they encouraged growth both emotionally and intellectually. They also showed us how the family supported one another through tough times and that you could make your own family from the friends that you gathered around you. And most importantly, to be optimistic and that we should laugh more often, and not just at others but, at ourselves and our own mortality, because we humans are merely funny monkeys!
So, I will leave you with the immortal words of Ms. Burnett:
“I’m so glad we had this time together.
Just to have a laugh or sing a song.
Seems we just get started and before you know it.
Comes the time we have to say, so long!”
It’s okay to sing it out loud! I know you have the urge!
As for me, I'm off to build a root beer float and pop some corn.
