web hosting short URLs photo sharing

Sex, violence, nudity, and homosexuality are definitely adult topics. They are topics which should be presented gently and with care. Needless to say, some people feel great apprehension when dealing with these topics. Yet, in an average prime-time television show in 1997, at least one of these topics will almost certainly be mentioned. This has caused great concern among parents and religious groups who don't want to see these topics dealt with in front of a mass audience. Consequently, television has attracted much controversy in this last decade of the Twentieth Century. It has probably attracted more controversy this decade than in any other. There is good reason for this. The subject matter of an average television show, especially the television situation comedy (TV sitcom), is markedly more adult and risqué than the average show of the 1980s. The differences between the average television programs of these two decades are quite interesting, as are the reasons for the changes in television shows.

In 1980s America, family values were stressed strongly, and they were consequently presented on television sitcoms. Also, the idea of a nuclear family, which Webster's Dictionary defines as "a basic social unit consisting of parents and their children living in one household," was still held in high regard in the 1980s. Thus, this type of family was almost exclusively presented on television sitcoms A great example of a 1980s sitcom that employed traditional family values is the 1982-1989 National Broadcasting Company (NBC) half-hour series Family Ties. Family Ties revolved around an American nuclear family, the Keatons. The husband, Steven, and the wife, Elyse, were very happily married. The Keatons had three children. The oldest, Alex, was the intelligent one; the middle child, Mallory, was the ditzy one who loved shopping; and the youngest, Jennifer, who was the precociously cute one. There was a fourth child, Andrew, who was born during the 1984-1985 season; this child, too, turned out to be cute. In short, they were what every American family should strive to be, if they were not already.

Since it was a sitcom, episodes of Family Ties were played mostly for laughs. The series did have its share of episodes that dealt with serious topics, topics that most families will probably have to deal with at one time or another. In 1988, there was a three-part episode that dealt with Steven's heart attack. Probably the best known episode of Family Ties is, in fact, not a comedic episode, but a deadly serious one. In 1984, a special one-hour episode of Family Ties was aired, called "A, My Name is Alex." In this episode, Alex tries to come to grips with the death of one of his close friends. In an unusual move, this particular episode of Family Ties was played as a one-man show, starring nobody but Michael J. Fox as Alex. Again, this episode of Family Ties dealt with a topic that most families probably will encounter in their lifetime.

Not all TV sitcoms of the 1980s revolved around a traditional family unit, but they possessed traditional family values. An example of this type of show is the 1979-1988 NBC half-hour sitcom The Facts of Life. This series revolved around four students at an all-girls boarding school and their housemother, Edna Garrett. Edna and the four girls later moved out of the boarding school and into their own business. In The Facts of Life, Edna acted as the mother, while the four girls were all stereotypes of traditional children in a family. There was Blair, the wealthy, selfish one; Natalie, the chubby one with low self-esteem; Tootie, the cute one; and Jo, the tough, street-wise one.

Like Family Ties, The Facts of Life dealt with traditional family values, if not in as nuclear a family as the Keatons. Also like Family Ties, The Facts of Life dealt with problems that families usually encounter. Racism, hate crimes, and disability were just some of the subjects dealt with in The Facts of Life. Even sex was dealt with in one episode, as Natalie became the first of the girls to lose her virginity. It should be noted that, unlike sitcoms of the 1990s, this topic was not made into a joke and was presented seriously and with care. The Facts of Life, like Family Ties, was a show that families could watch together, without discretion.

Unfortunately, Family Ties and The Facts of Life probably could not make it as prime-time sitcoms in 1997. Sitcoms of the 1990s deal with decidedly more adult topics than their 1980s counterparts. Sex and sexual innuendo receive much attention on these sitcoms. A good example of this fact is the hit NBC series Friends. Friends, which debuted in 1994, revolves around six young adults trying to make it on their own in New York City. They are all best friends, and they all seem to have one goal in mind. They all want to find love, a quest, which more often than not is fueled by a need for sexual intercourse. Nary an episode of Friends goes by in which sex isn't referred to. Friends is indeed not family-friendly fare.

Another example of sitcoms being decidedly more adult than they were in the past is the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) series Ellen. Ellen, which debuted in 1994 under the title These Friends of Mine, is one of the most notorious television sitcoms in history. It attracted controversy not only because its star, Ellen DeGeneres, is openly gay, but because its lead character, Ellen Morgan, is gay as well. When the character of Ellen declared herself gay in a 1997 episode of Ellen, the series immediately attracted both positive and negative attention, the negative outweighing the positive. Religious groups encouraged boycotts of the series, believing that homosexuality was an unacceptable way of life and should not be flaunted before a mass audience. Corporations withdrew sponsorship of the show, not so much for moral reasons but because they did not care to deal with the inevitable controversy that this particular episode of Ellen would cause. Sponsors also withdrew due to threatened boycotts by various religious groups. Also, thousands of parents and politicians across the nation declared homosexuality immoral and unsuitable for presentation on a television show. No sitcom of the 1980s attracted that much attention, as homosexuality was rarely even mentioned. Aside from the homosexuality issue, Ellen, like Friends, abounds in sexual innuendo. The show was like that in previous seasons, and now, after Ellen came out, gay and lesbian sex have become issues. Because of the rather adult issues the show deals with, Ellen, like Friends, should not be watched with the whole family.

Language has become an issue as well. In almost all sitcoms on television today, profanity is used heavily. This has become as hot an issue in television as sex has. Whereas a decade ago only the words "damn" and "hell" could be used, now almost any obscene word could be used, from "ass" to "pissed" to even the strong "son of a bitch." Parents, politicians, and religious groups alike have argued that language such as this has no place in front of a mass audience. Nevertheless, the foul language is still commonplace, and it shows no signs of disappearing from television screens.

Television sitcoms are not the only types of programs that have changed since the 1980s. The television drama, a genre which has always been more adult than the sitcom, has also undergone a change since the 1980s. However, it should be noted that some of the television dramas of the 1980s also introduced a radical change from dramas of previous decades, and they greatly influenced television drama series of the 1990s. The two shows which perhaps best exemplified this change are Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere.

Hill Street Blues debuted in 1981 on NBC, and it remained on the air until 1987. The series was set at Hill Street Station, a police station in a run-down area of a large, albeit unnamed, city in the United States. However, this was not just another show about police officers. To quote television historian Alex McNeil, "Hill Street Blues stood apart from the pack for several reasons: its large cast of interesting characters, its skillful blending of humor with tragedy, and its cinematically realistic look" (McNeil 379). Unlike most police shows of the past, and even those of today, Hill Street Blues was not centered around two or three policemen. Instead, it was the first successful police show to have a large ensemble cast of characters, not one of which dominated the show on his or her own. There was, of course, a captain of Hill Street Station, Frank Furillo, but even he was not featured most prominently on the show. Also, unlike shows of the past set at the workplace, the officers at Hill Street Station did not always get along well.

Indeed, in many ways, Hill Street Blues was radically different from shows of the past. It was different not only in content but in the way the show was filmed. Hand-held cameras were frequently used on the show, to follow actors as they walked on the street. Background noise in shots was not, unlike in most shows, eliminated; it became a part of the show. Also used on the show was overlapping dialogue. This was achieved through some innovative editing, the likes of which had not been seen on television shows. Naturally, the critics raved about Hill Street Blues because it was so different, and the show became a hit. The show paved the way for another ensemble drama: St. Elsewhere.

St. Elsewhere debuted in 1982 on NBC and ran until 1988. The series has been often compared to Hill Street Blues. In fact, in critical descriptions of the show, as well as in NBC advertisements, St. Elsewhere was called "Hill Street Blues set in a hospital." Like Hill Street Blues, St. Elsewhere dealt with a large ensemble cast of characters who all worked at the same place. The series was set at a fictional hospital named St. Eligius in Boston. Its topics were what set it apart from other medical shows of the past. Stories continued from week to week, and the doctors at St. Eligius didn't always save the lives of their patients. In short, St. Elsewhere more closely resembled the workings of an actual hospital than other medical shows of the past. Yet, unlike other medical shows, St. Elsewhere focused more on the personal lives of the people of St. Eligius than the actual medicine being practiced there. Tom Fontana, co-producer of St. Elsewhere, perhaps summed the show up best when he said, "Medicine is the byproduct. We want to make good stories about human beings who just happen to be doctors and nurses and patients" (Stark 293).

Both Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere were dramas that changed the genre in the 1980s. The two shows played up to their audience, and gave television viewers credit for being intelligent. In short, Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere changed the way people watched television. Television had always been, and continues to be, viewed as a means of escape for the audience. These two shows encouraged audience to become engaged in the stories presented, not just entertained by them. Yet, though Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere influenced the creation of several dramas of the 1980s, the shows' changing of the genre did not successfully outlast the decade. Neither Hill Street Blues nor St. Elsewhere ever garnered especially large ratings during their respective runs on NBC. The reason they lasted as long as they did was that they played to such a high, almost elitist, level of thinking. Yet, as the 1990s dawned, television executives began to grow increasingly impatient with shows that did not boast high ratings almost immediately. Therefore, dramas were rarely given the chance to succeed, and there was not another successful show that resembled Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere until 1993, when NYPD Blue premiered on the ABC television network.

NYPD Blue is a drama series set, as the title says, in the New York Police Department. It was created by Steven Bochco, who created Hill Street Blues some twelve years earlier. The show bears other resemblances to Hill Street Blues as well. It, too, sports a large cast of characters whose stories continue from episode to episode. It is also technically innovative. Cameras follow the actors realistically, and give the viewer the feeling that he or she is watching the action live. However, unlike Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue is more of a star-driven show. The show originally centered on Detective John Kelly and his older partner, Detective Andy Sipowicz. However, after the initial 1993-1994 season of NYPD Blue, David Caruso, who played Kelly, chose to leave the show to star in movies. Thus, Sipowicz got a new partner, Detective Bobby Simone, in the fall of 1994.

Differences in characters are not the only thing that sets NYPD Blue apart from Hill Street Blues. In true 1990s fashion, NYPD Blue specializes in foul language and steamy sex scenes. It is the first show in the history of television to receive a "viewer discretion advised" label each week. The series has always pushed the envelope. In fact, it attracted huge amounts of controversy even before its September 1993 debut. Word leaked out about NYPD Blue's profanity as well as its sex and nudity, and fifty-seven ABC affiliate stations refused to air the show, simply not wanting to deal with it. Nevertheless, NYPD Blue, despite the fact that so many stations would not air it, finished nineteenth in the ratings that debut season. Part of this can be attributed to the fact that the show was praised by the critics, but a lot of its initial popularity is probably due to the fact that it was so controversial. As television executives discovered in droves in the 1990s, sex sells, and NYPD Blue was no exception. Viewers wanted to see sex and profanity, and NYPD Blue became the mainstream hit that Hill Street Blues never was. Now that Hill Street Blues had been sufficiently updated for the 1990s, the other great drama of the 1980s, St. Elsewhere, was due for an update of its own, and it found one in the new medical drama, ER.

ER debuted in 1994 on NBC and became an immediate hit. In fact, it finished second in the Nielsen ratings its debut season, becoming the highest-rated drama on television in over a decade. In many ways, the series is similar to St. Elsewhere. Set in the emergency room of Cook County General Hospital in Chicago, ER, like St. Elsewhere before it, has a continuing storyline that deals with the lives of the principal characters. Also like St. Elsewhere, and unlike NYPD Blue, ER's large ensemble cast has no real star. Each of the main characters is usually given equal prominence. However, unlike St. Elsewhere, ER tends to focus heavily on the more realistic aspects of an actual emergency room. While St. Elsewhere was quite realistic for its day, ER has proven to be even more realistic, making use of the technical jargon frequently heard in real hospitals. In fact, ER deals very much with the medicinal side of things in a hospital, much more than St. Elsewhere. ER also moves at a breakneck pace, constantly showing patients being wheeled into the emergency room. The scenes around Cook County General are constantly changing, as opposed to St. Eligius, where the viewer could have more time to take in what was going on.

The patients on ER do not always live, and there are not always happy endings. While this was also true a decade earlier on St. Elsewhere, it happened far more often on ER. Blood and the more vile happenings of an emergency room are also presented frequently on ER. In this sense, ER is quite gritty. It has joined other dramas of the 1990s, including NYPD Blue, that specialize in the display of blood and gore, to a far wider extent than dramas of the 1980s. Some people have attributed this to the notion that America has indeed become a grittier place to live in in the 1990s than it was in the 1980s.

Yet, television historian Steven Stark made a good point when he asked, "Was life in the nineties really grittier, or had television simply gotten that way so it could acceptably increase the level of blood and violence that has always attracted audiences?" (Stark 294). Violence, like sex, sells, and television executives realized this notion more fully in the 1990s than in any other previous decade.

The differences between the genres of comedy and drama are not the only thing that separates television shows of the 1990s from those of the 1980s. Race has played an important part in the change on television in these two decades. One of the most popular and important shows of the 1980s was the half-hour sitcom The Cosby Show, which ran from 1984 to 1992 on NBC. The Cosby Show revolved around the Huxtables, an African-American family that lived in a townhouse in Brooklyn. The originally included the father, Cliff Huxtable, who was an obstetrician; his wife, Clair, who was a lawyer; and five children, four of which were girls. There was Sondra, the college student; Denise, a high-school student who later left the show to go to college; Theo, the middle child; Vanessa, who was finishing up elementary school when the series began; and Rudy, the precociously cute one.

In many ways, The Cosby Show resembled sitcoms of television’s past. It revolved around the traditional nuclear family with traditional values, and its stories always taught a moral lesson. However, unlike shows of the past, The Cosby Show was centered exclusively on black people. The Cosby Show’s family had two working parents and the family was very well off, both financially and academically. In this manner, The Cosby Show presented an idealistic view of blacks in society. In fact, that was probably essential to the show’s popularity. If it were centered around a white family, it probably would have gone unnoticed, because the themes of the episodes of the show were so traditional. It was the fact that all of the main characters were black that gave the show its cutting edge. Yet, the very fact that its characters were black was what earned The Cosby Show much of its criticism. White people and black people alike criticized the show for not being "black" enough. They also said that few black families are as financially successful as the Huxtables. Yet that did not stop The Cosby Show from being the number-one rated show in America for three years in a row. The Cosby Show brought whites and blacks together, at least in front of the television.

The Cosby Show also proved to be somewhat of a trailblazer for black people. The show implied that people don’t have to be white to be financially successful or have a traditional family. By the time the series was concluding its run in early 1992, America’s image of black people had changed, and racial harmony appeared to be close. That all changed with the riots in Los Angeles that began in April of that year. The riots began when white policemen accused of beating Rodney King, a black man, were given relatively light sentences. The riots began to quickly drive whites and blacks apart, destroying the racial harmony that The Cosby Show had influenced so much. The rift between the races grew even more two years later, when O.J. Simpson, a black man, was accused and later acquitted of murdering his white ex-wife and her white friend. This division between the races also proved to be evident in television shows of the 1990s.

As the 1990s dawned, new shows began to be shown on the Fox television network that were designed to appeal mainly to black people. The network, a division of the movie studio Twentieth Century Fox, was developed in 1986 but had, up until 1990, aired shows that featured mainly white casts. However, the executives at the then-fledging Fox saw that there was a large black audience in the United States and that the shows on the other three television networks, ABC, NBC, and the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), mostly ignored black people, at least in the series that they aired. Fox, therefore, began to develop shows featuring mostly black people in an attempt to win the black viewing audience. The programming strategy worked, and Fox soon became a major television network. In January 1995, two new networks, the United Paramount Network (UPN) and the Warner Brothers network (WB) were developed. The two networks, especially WB, quickly followed the example that Fox had set and began to air shows that appealed to predominantly black audiences. Again, the strategy paid off, as it helped to establish UPN and WB as major networks. Many people in society saw this exposure of blacks on television as long overdue, as, aside from shows like The Cosby Show, there weren’t many shows in television history that featured black people prominently.

Yet it is important to mention that, unlike The Cosby Show, these new shows seldom dealt with the subject of blacks and whites integrating. Also, unlike the Huxtables, the families on these shows (if there were families) were not very financially secure. Probably the biggest difference, though, between these new shows and The Cosby Show was that some of the characters on those shows were goofy, insulting stereotypes of black people. Nevertheless, as insulting as some of these shows may have been, black audiences watched them. It is important to mention that black audiences watched these shows; white audiences mostly did not. In fact, by the middle 1990s, the Nielsen ratings would point out, by releasing the Top Ten shows among black viewers and the Top Ten shows among white people, that blacks and whites usually watched completely different shows. Many people took this fact to mean that blacks and whites were becoming separated again, not only on television, but also in real life. New talk shows, that featured black hosts and black guests in front of a black studio audience, and new cable television networks, that featured black people almost exclusively twenty-four hours a day, further supported this belief. Television critic Jeff Jarvis perhaps conveyed this idea best when he wrote in 1997:

Another noticeable change, and a very controversial one, between television shows of the 1980s and those of 1990s is the time period between eight o’clock and nine o’clock at night that is referred to as the family hour. The family hour was developed in the 1970s by the federal government. The whole idea behind it was to provide an hour of wholesome television entertainment that parents could watch with their children without fear of the children hearing or seeing something they should not. The family hour led to the placing of such family-friendly shows as the 1974-1984 ABC sitcom Happy Days and the 1976-1983 ABC sitcom Laverne and Shirley between eight and nine o’clock, and pushed then-controversial shows like the 1971-1979 CBS sitcom All in the Family back to nine o’clock and later. After a few years, however, television producers claimed that the family hour was unconstitutional. They claimed that it violated free speech, by forcing shows that dealt with certain subjects to be shown late at night. Congress responded by de-regulating the family hour. Still, even though it wasn’t government-enforced, television executives voluntarily continued the family hour throughout the rest of the 1970s and the 1980s. Shows that aired during the family hour in the 1980s include the aforementioned sitcoms Family Ties, The Facts of Life, and The Cosby Show, as well as other family sitcoms like the 1985-1992 ABC series Growing Pains and the 1984-1992 ABC series Who’s the Boss? Other shows that featured more adult subject matter, meanwhile, were placed at nine o’clock and later. For example, the 1982-1993 hit NBC series Cheers, even though its sometimes-risqué subject matter would hardly raise an eyebrow today, was not shown earlier than nine o’clock during its entire original run. The family hour was even enforced on weekends, as such shows as the 1985-1992 NBC sitcom The Golden Girls, which frequently discussed sex, were banned from airing before nine o’clock.

However, in the early 1990s, television executives decided that, if they scheduled more adult shows at eight o’clock, more adults would probably watch. To quote television critic Ken Tucker, "it dawned on the nets Ýnetwork executives¨ that they make more advertising moola when they draw a young-adult demographic. The next thing you knew, NBC’s Friends was being pushed back to 8 p.m. on Thursdays"(Entertainment Weekly 105-106). Friends was not the only show with adult themes that was placed in such an early time slot. Such sexually minded shows as NBC’s Mad About You, which debuted in 1992, and ABC’s Spin City, which debuted in 1996, were also given eight o’clock time slots. While in the past, a move to such an early time would have prompted a toning down of the subject matter, by the middle 1990s, this was no longer the case. No matter what time a show aired, sex was allowed to be featured prominently. Tucker, in the same article, picked up on this fact when he wrote about the CBS sitcom The Nanny. According to him, the show, which debuted in 1993, "has successfully masqueraded as an ‘8 o’ clock show—that is, one supposedly designed for the whole family to enjoy—despite its quantity of corny, sniggery sex jokes that seems to increase with each passing year" (105). Although many other people felt the same way as Tucker, television executives did not change their ways. ABC and CBS did, though, devote their Friday nights to family-friendly programming such as ABC’s Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, which debuted in 1996, and CBS’ Family Matters, which premiered in 1989. However, by the middle 1990s, there were no longer family-friendly shows on every night of the week.

As the 1990s progressed, an increasing number of parents and politicians complained about the amount of sex and violence being shown on television. As a response to this, in February 1996, President Bill Clinton and Congress passed in to law the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which mandated the placing of a small computer chip, called the V-chip, in every new television built with a screen of thirteen inches or larger. The V-chip was designed to let parents block violent and sexual programming from the eyes of their children. The chip would scan a program for its rating, and then block the program if it has an adverse rating. Of course, as of 1996, television shows did not have ratings, and, since programmers hoped to have televisions made with the V-chip ready to be sold by late 1997, the government gave the television networks one year to establish a ratings system.

In January 1997, the major networks arrived at a ratings system for all their shows. Children’s shows received one of two ratings: TV-Y, which meant that the program was geared for children of all ages; and TV-Y7, which meant that the program is geared towards older children (specifically, children over the age of seven), as it was likely to show mild fantasy and comedic violence. For adult shows, there were four different ratings to choose from: TV-G, which meant that the program was suitable for viewing by all ages; TV-PG, which meant that the program may be unsuitable for viewing by younger children, due to mild amounts of violence, profanity, and/or sexual innuendo; TV-14, which meant that the program was unsuitable for children under fourteen years of age, due to intense amounts of violence, profanity, and/or sexual innuendo; and, finally, TV-MA, which meant that the program was unsuitable for children under the age of seventeen, as it would contain graphic sex and/or graphic violence, as well as foul language. The ratings would be shown in a small black box at the upper left hand corner of the television screen, and would stay on the air for about five or ten seconds at the beginning of a show.

Television executives thought that parents and politicians would be happy with the new ratings. They were not, however, and in a few months parents and politicians alike demanded a revision of the ratings system. In September of 1997, the networks released a new, revised ratings system. In addition to the old ratings, letters would be attached that would signify the actual content of the show. For children’s shows, the letters ‘FV’ were attached to a TV-Y7 to signify fantasy violence. For adult shows, one or more of four letters, ‘V’, ‘S’, ‘L’, and ‘D’, were attached to a show’s rating. ‘V’ stood for violence, ‘S’ stood for sexual content, ‘L’ stood for foul language, and ‘D’ stood for sexual innuendo. Thus, shows like the aforementioned NYPD Blue could achieve a rating of TV-14-VSLD.

Although the new ratings system and the V-chip have pleased people to a point, there is still a lot of turmoil over the content of television shows as the 1990s draw to a close. People long for the return of the family hour. They long for the days when television dramas did not feature sex and violence prominently. They long for the days when the occasional ‘damn’ and ‘hell’ was all the foul language that was heard on television. Essentially, people long for the days when clean, wholesome, family entertainment like Family Ties, The Facts of Life, and The Cosby Show were commonplace, and not just shows banished to Friday nights. However, as television prepares to enter the next century, it is clear that television shows will not come to resemble the shows of the 1980s. If anything, the sexual content of shows will increase, as will the amount of violence and foul language. As stated before, sex sells, as does violence and profanity, and making money has always been the main goal of a television network. As long as people tune in to the more adult programming, the networks will continue to program it. Only when people stop tuning in may viewers see a return to the types of television shows of the past. As for when that will happen, only time will tell.

__

Return to my main page.