Thirtysomething and Our Lost Principles

Since the summer, I've been slowly watching old thirtysomething episodes that I bought on iTunes, a show I was too young for when it aired on TV in the late 80s. I remember that I did watch it, at least for a while, but I could remember almost nothing about it.

Not sure why I decided to watch it in the first place but part of it is remembering all the buzz which surrounded the show when it first came out and wanting to revisit it to see how well it's stood up to the passing of time. What strikes me about the show now is how so much of the angst that people in their 30s had then has just disappeared. Not that angst has disappeared but the specific fears and pathologies that people (and society) have now are radically different.

For those not familiar with the show, it portrays a married couple (Michael and Hope) and their small group of friends (another married couple, Nancy and Elliot), and three single friends (Melissa, Gary and Ellen) in the Philadelphia of the late 80s. It's not a show with exciting action or overly dramatic plot-lines (at least not in its first season): it simply traces the ups and downs of middle class life, of marriage squabbles and problems, of dating life, of careers. This is done with scenes of two or more people sitting and talking. The show is really a series of conversations and there are rarely even new characters introduced.

In 2012, I am roughly the same age as the characters were in the late 80s, though the characters at the time were roughly the same age as my parents (in their 30s at the time). In many ways, the show is dated: the roles of men and women are not questioned in the same way now that they were then. So much is just taken for granted now in terms of women and careers and family life.

But what is refreshing to me when watching it how real it is in many ways: how they struggle with money but do so in a real way. It's not like TV now where everyone lives in gorgeous apartments in big cities and dresses in Gucci and Paul Smith but complains that they don't have money or can't afford to do something. Hope and Michael's house is always unfinished, they argue about money, about things they can't do because they can't afford it. Not having money has consequences, in other words.

Sell-out

Though it seems like a small thing, this money issue, in many ways it gets at the core of a different set of values that we have lost: one of the central themes of the show is the fear of "selling out," of losing (or having lost) one's integrity, of holding on to one's principles at a time when it isn't easy to do so. Gary doesn't want to buy into the politics of his university just to get tenure. Michael doesn't want to go after the big overly capitalist firms (he runs a small advertising agency) because they have no principles. Having money isn't the thing which motivates these characters. And that might on the surface seem pat and even trite, but the reality is that they don't have money and it seems like it (a disconnect that is very common in portrayals of modern life: people live like rich people and dress like rich people even if they drive a bus in New York City are supposedly "working class"). Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but to me this has to do with the fact that the middle class then was bigger than it is now, so the fears of selling out was a real concern: rich people had less integrity, fewer principles, were greedy.

More than this is the central struggle between pursuing one's creative pursuits and being forced to making a living in the real world. All the characters have moments when they realize that, in their 30s, they are no longer able to dream of their futures in the same way. This struck me in a recent episode when Ellen said, "I realize that I can't keep living for some idea of how my life will be one day in the future. I have to accept that this is my life now with all its flaws and drawbacks."

The Jewish waver-chick

Today, money seems to be answer, money and fame: not only is it a sign of success, it IS success. It seems to me (in large measure) that qualities like integrity are almost quaint (has anyone else seen that car ad using Fun's song "We Are Young"? Remember when that would have been absolutely appalling: that a band sold their song to a car company just months after it was a hit? But it seems that no one has qualms any more about this kind of "selling out." It's money, right?!). Sigh, maybe I'm just getting old...

But I digress: No, thirtysomething isn't perfect. It's dated at times, the characters can seem pretty self-indulgent and whiny. They are certainly middle class people with middle class problems (and, geez, every single person that ever crosses that camera is whitewhitewhite).

But perhaps because I am a similar time in my life (not quite middle aged but not young anymore) I can relate to these characters' experiences, worries, fears, and successes. And I've been enjoying watching it (slowly). If I do move on to season 2, it'll be in a while (I watch a lot more TV and movies in the winter) but I hope it continues to present interesting shifts in our cultures to think about...

The Mighty Embattled Sitcom

Oh, the embattled, unique situation comedy.

I have long been a fan of sitcoms. But it's an art form that is often considered common or lacking in depth. We often hold up sitcoms, in fact, as art for the average Joe precisely because they often hold mass appeal. Though they can often be appallingly bad, when they are good they capture something unique about life that combines both humour and insight. It's not an easy art form to write in but it's a very uniquely American one.

Miami, you've got style

First the bad: most sitcoms are badly written. The jokes are obvious, the acting is bad, the situations become ludicrous or downright silly. The pacing doesn't work or is uneven. Nine times out of then, a sitcom is totally unnecessary. And even in good sitcoms, not all episodes or seasons are good.

But when a sitcom can overcome these issues, they can sparkle and capture a truth in the same way a sonnet can. I choose the word sonnet very deliberately because there are many similarities between the strictures that require certain formalities in a sonnet  (the rhyme, the couplet, the rhythm) and the formalities in a sitcom (the rhythm, the A/B plots, the exaggerations). But the sheer act of writing with these limitations means a writer must be even more creative and clever in order to balance his or her vision with the technical or formal necessities.

Mr Graaaaaant

A unique thing about sitcoms: while dramas tend to be about ordinary people in unusual circumstances (stock characters struck by disease, war, alien abduction, zombie invasions, historical anomalies, etc.), sitcoms tend to be about unusual characters in ordinary circumstances (stupid people in families, sarcastic people at the office, etc.). This is where the humour enters into the picture: it's precisely these unusual characters reacting in every day normal circumstances that make us laugh and see our own ways of reacting. Think about Sheldon in The Big Bang Theory or Rose in The Golden Girls.

It could be argued that most comedy operates in this dynamic - unusual people in usual settings - but sitcoms exaggerate. The stupid people are unrealistically stupid, the oversexualized people are over the top, the vain people have no sense of living in any kind of reality. And that's where the danger lies and when sitcoms cross over into being silly or vapid or badly written. It's a delicate balance between creating funny, unusual characters and creating characters in which we can see few true human qualities. And the interaction between the "straight" characters (Mary Tyler Moore, Will Truman, Leonard Hofstetter) and the quirky characters (Ted Baxter, Grace Adler, Amy Farafowler) is where the beauty and comedy can be found.

The A/B plots are another hallmark of sitcoms: there is a main A plot which drives the conflict of every episode, and then there is a minor B plot that operates on the periphery, often relating to the minor characters. Sometimes the plots are related, often they are not. But the key is that both plot points must be worked out and resolved in 22 minutes, ideally with a "lesson-learning" scene whereby characters talk about what they have learned. Again, another minefield for critical alarm bells to go off since writes must walk a very delicate line here (can't be too trite but also has to be a lesson most people can relate to).

Soft kitty

Another complication for sitcom writers is the staging and this is where many sitcoms fail: there are too many characters and awkwardness ensues since the action generally only involves two or three of them at any one time. When there are too many characters, they stand around with nothing to do and the entire scene gets awkward (Newhart often has this problem). A good sitcom keeps characters moving.

Sitcoms are only one way to communicate and can't speak to us in the same way a drama or a long series-arc that lasts nine months can. In the sitcom universe, generally we start fresh every episode and it's not so necessary to watch them in order (as a general rule though this has somewhat changed in recent years). But we also grow to love sitcom characters in a way that we love a familiar neighbour or family friend.

Classically dated

Again there are many bad sitcoms. Most, in fact (sitcoms for "the family" are the worst: Webster, Silver Spoons, most of them, in fact: that new one Broke Girls is dreadful). Then there sitcoms which are pretty good but have frequent bad episodes or even entire seasons that are terrible (Will & Grace, The Golden Girls, Rhoda, Friends). Some sitcoms are classics and represent a vanished time (Mary Tyler Moore, Cheers, Seinfeld, All in the Family). In general, I'd say the 80s was a low point for sitcoms (and TV generally) but perhaps it's a dying art. They are very much a network kind of show and as fewer and fewer people tune into the big networks and watch more cable shows (I can't think of very many cable sitcoms).

So maybe sitcoms are dying a slow death. There are some new ones out each year but with the exception of The Big Bang Theory, most are terrible and it's been a long time since a sitcom really "caught" the public's imagination (like Friends or Seinfeld or several others). Maybe they don't speak to us in the same way any more. Maybe we all prefer seeing shows about meth or pot dealers or advertising cads or OCD CIA agents. We want more flawed protagonists now perhaps and sitcoms seem to represent a more innocent time when a character's biggest flaw was that he was a womanizer or that she was too vain or he lacked social charms. Quirky is definitely out.