Extra Credit: Have you bought the aforementioned TV series on DVD? If not, would you if it were readily available at a reasonable price?
Karen‘s own post for this Weekend Assignment was about her history with the TV series that inspired the blockbuster movie she mentions here. Despite my own nerd credentials, that won’t be the show I choose to talk about. I was aware of, but actually didn’t love, Star Trek as a kid, although my mom enjoyed watching it – and judge me for it if you must, but I still am not a huge fan of the Original Series. I really didn’t embrace the series till it went to the big screen (as of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, of course – the first movie was a snoozefest), and on the TV side of things, I am a Next Generation, Captain Picard loyalist through and through.
People in my age group were probably the first to grow up with TV as a fact of daily life – we had “the electronic babysitter.” If we were at home, the TV stayed on for much of the day; around my house, we watched cartoons, re-runs (mostly syndicated comedies, some of which weren’t even in color (!)), and game shows. TV viewing in the evenings was more restricted by my parents and an early bedtime. Most of the shows I remember from my grade-school years were the ones that everyone watched and talked about, so you’d be left out if you couldn’t talk about them too – and of course, we still have shows like that today, but with only three networks back then, “everyone” really was pretty much everyone.
Sitcoms have always been a regular part of my TV viewing, although the amount of space they occupy in it varies based on what’s available at the time. My favorites are funny enough to make me laugh a lot and smart enough to make me think – but only one has ever inspired thoughts of a career. And since I grew up during the waning days of Top-40 AM radio, I think this one just brought it all together.
WKRP in Cincinnati made me want to work in the radio business. I thought I wanted a program-director’s job like Andy Travis’, but I think what I really would have liked was a position more like music director. WKRP was one of the first shows I remember that used current, recognizable music regularly as part of the show, but its selections weren’t entirely true-to-life – many of them were much more likely to turn up on music-focused FM stations than on AM ones that still included farm reports in their programming. Obviously, my career didn’t go in that direction, but my continuing interests in the business sides of both the radio and music industries can be directly traced to WKRP.
I do own the one season
I have grown attached to, and occasionally obsessed with, other TV shows in my adult years. Some have been comedies (Seinfeld, Scrubs) and others have been more serious and grown-up (Once and Again, The West Wing, Gilmore Girls, Lost), but there’s just something about the TV of my youth that stays with me – and clogs up my brain with useless trivia. What show(s) of TV seasons past have stayed with you?
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As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.
Well, I had to say it. Had to.
We used to sell records and posters and buttons and such at record shows in Covington KY, across the river from Cincinnati. Whenever I saw landmarks from the WKRP opening sequence, the theme song shot straight into my head and stayed there. Great, great show.
Oh, and I later got to meet Richard Sanders, more or less in character as Les!
Shows that have stayed with me from the past…
I loved The Wonder Years, Simon & Simon, Magnum P.I., One Day at a Time, Alice, All in the Family, Maud, What's Happening. To this day I still watch Seinfeld and I Love Lucy repeatedly. So much so that my kids can recite many of the lines.
Karen – Someone had to say it. Thanks for stepping up!
For some reason, I’m not all that surprised that Richard Sanders would be a lot like Les Nessman…
Ti – My son has recall for Seinfeld quotes and plots that far exceeds mine. He’s still trying to get us to observe Festivus :-).
I was a big fan of The Wonder Years and One Day at a Time too.
For some reason that no one can quite figure out, when EACH of my three kids was a newborn, I was too tired to remember the lyrics to any song except the WKRP theme song.
Emily – Well, it is a catchy little tune, and it does have the word “baby” in it…:-)
I do believe that we were the first real generation where TV was a fact of daily life–when having a TV was counted almost as a necessity in many American households as opposed to a luxury, even. Like you, the TV was on practically all the time when I was growing up. My dad especially loved his TV. He was the only one in our house who had full view of the TV during the during hour, and insisted that it stay on even then despite us all being in a completely separate room. And oh, how I remember all the game shows! And soaps, for me. During the summers, I got to watch my mom’s soaps and would go on to follow a couple of them well into my college years, one of which I even watch now and then just for nostalgia sake. Most of my evening TV watching depended on what my dad wanted to watch since he controlled the remote (until I reached high school and had a TV of my own in my room–a little black and white). The A-Team and Miami Vice were among our household favorites. MacGvyer, Magnum P.I., Colombo. So many others! I grew up on reruns of Leave It to Beaver and Family Affair. After School specials, Saturday cartoons, and Sunday’s sparse fare . . . There always seemed to be something to watch.
Sitcom wise, I was a big fan of Family Ties and Growing Pains when I was growing up. And The Facts of Life and Different Strokes. My brother really liked Webster. Punky Brewster. I am not a huge fan of sitcoms though as an adult. I did watch Friends–but not often until it was released on DVD. Sports Night was a favorite of mine. My husband makes me watch The Big Bang Theory now and then. I tend to prefer the hour long dramas. These days, you’re likely to find me watching Lost, Chuck, Grey’s Anatomy, Dollhouse, Castle, and American Idol.
Wendy (Literary Feline) – We may be the first generation for whom TV was the norm…AND the last whose families owned black-and-white sets :-)! My parents were older than those of most of my friends, and grew up back when there was only radio; they never permitted the TV on during dinner. (As an aside, it always amuses me when I see scenes of people gathered around listening to old-fashioned radios…looking as if they’re watching.)
I deliberately left out mention of the soaps I used to watch :-).
I think my TV habits these days are split pretty evenly between dramas and comedies, although the dramas literally take up more time. A friend of ours (the one we’re seeing Star Trek with today, actually) keeps trying to get us to watch The Big Bang Theory, but we haven’t quite gotten around to it yet.