What's on TV? Tuesday, April 20, 1993

Oprah Winfrey's guest today is Corazon Atienza, who is described as having "evaded a 1966 mass murder by hiding under a bed." That's a pretty ordinary description, but there was still something in that "hiding under a bed" bit that rang a bell, and as it turns out, that description really undersells the story. In 1966, Corazon Atienza was a student nurse in Chicago, and the "mass murder" that the listing so blandly refers to was, in fact, the gruesome murder of eight student nurses by Richard Speck, at the time called one of the "Crimes of the Century"; to this day it remains one of the most infamous crimes in American history. Although Atienza later returned to the Philippines, the connection to Winfrey's show is no surprise, given that she did her show in Chicago. In 1993, Speck's name would still have been familiar to most Americans, who would have remembered the murders; unfortunately, the listing in this week's New York City Metro edition fails to provide any historical perspective whatsoever. Oh well, I suppose by this time if you've seen one mass murder, you've seen them all

This week in TV Guide: April 17, 1993

this week's TV Guide is a special, the 40th Anniversary edition. It's an interesting issue, and this is going to be an interesting look at it; we won't even dip into the programming until Monday. That's because this is the 40th Anniversary Issue, and as you can tell from the cover, we're going to be reading about TV Guide's choices as the All-Time Best TV.* Ratings like this are ultimately pointless (one man's trash is another man's treasure, after all, and as the Editors themselves point out, "most of the fun is in the argument"), but they're usually fun to look at. Let's see if that's the case this time as well.

*I can't imagine writing this phrase without using Capital Letters.

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The shows are separated into categories: sitcoms, family shows, cop shows, Westerns and the like, and winners are chosen for the decades of the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s and overall. Some of the choices, which must have seemed so progressive at the time, are probably going to be quite dated now, while others are going to be a testimony to how cultures change over time. Let's start, as an example, with sitcoms. The best sitcom of the '50s is no surprise: I Love Lucy. Probably not much disagreement there. For the '60s, the winner is The Dick Van Dyke Show, the '70s is M*A*S*H, the '80s is Cheers, and the All-Time Best* is M*A*S*H. What does this mean?

*There are those Capital Letters again.

The justification for selecting M*A*S*H as the all-time best is that it did what only the greatest comedies do: "mix hilarity and tragedy, often in equal measure." I'm not sure I agree with this—the definition, I mean. Yes, many comedies introduce an element of drama from time to time, but I disagree strongly with the assertion that this is a requirement of classic comedy. The editors acknowledge that M*A*S*H's politics could occasionally be heavy-handed, but "never at the expense of laughter or character," and I'm not sure I agree with that either. The politics of M*A*S*H, while ostensibly referring to the Korean War, was often meant as an allegory for Vietnam—but by this time, much of it has become dated, not to mention simplistic, and its cast members seem even more sanctimonious and pushy than they did back then. Perhaps the editors could have created a category for Best Dramedy, where M*A*S*H could have competed against Thirtysomething and SportsNight.

Another characteristic of classic comedy is its timelessness, and that's something that one can genuinely question about M*A*S*H. Let's put it this way: if you were to introduce this show to an audience today, one that lies outside of the demographic most preoccupied with Vietnam, would they find it funny in the same way they do Lucy or Andy Griffith or Leave it to Beaver, or even Frazier and Seinfeld, if you want to project into the future? I'm not sure they would, because those other shows, although rooted in a specific time period, often draw their humor from situations that are timeless and jokes that are often funny regardless of their setting. Much of M*A*S*H's humor may fall into that category (after all, authority will always be the butt of the joke), but I don't think you can say the same for its politics, and for that reason M*A*S*H, like another contender from the era, All in the Family, is too much of its time to be considered timeless.

My own personal choice in this category, not surprisingly to regular readers, is Hogan's Heroes, which combines a modicum of slapstick with some very clever "caper" plotting that also happens to be very funny. There's a certain gravitas about the mission of the Heroes that doesn't exist on, for example, McHale's Navy, and from time to time you're reminded that their missions do, in fact, often involve killing. The complaints about bad taste fall on deaf ears in this household, and most of the situations that form the basis for the comedy do seem, to me at least, to be universal in a way that they aren't in M*A*S*H. This is just one man's opinion; however, remember that the one man happens to be the owner of this blog.

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Best Drama? Your winners by decade are Playhouse 90, The Fugitive, Upstairs, Downstairs, and St. Elsewhere, and even before I turned the page I knew St. Elsewhere would be the winner, because it came from the '80s, which at the time was considered another Golden Age, and it was the most recent in people's minds.

Here, my complaint revolves around methodology. Some people might consider Hill Street Blues, the winner of Best Cop Show, as the best dramatic series of all time. Ah, but Hill Street is a genre show, albeit one that transcends the normal lines that separate a genre series from a regular drama. Others might suggest that The Waltons, a nominee for Best Family Show, should be considered for this category. For that matter, St. Elsewhere could be considered a genre show itself, a medical drama. But wait—there isn't a category for best Medical Drama. Could it be because there aren't really any medical dramas on television at the time, before ER and Chicago Hope and House? Can we even say that St. Elsewhere would be the best medical drama if that category existed? After all, Ben Casey and Dr. Kildare took on some weighty issues for the time.

I think this is a terribly weak choice: of the shows listed, I'd probably go with The Fugitive, although Playhouse 90 is a strong contender. The problem with Playhouse 90, in my mind, is that it was an anthology; as such, without a regular cast, you don't have to consider things such as character development and continuing storyline. It probably should have gone in a category for Best Anthology, but said category does not exist. Meanwhile, The Fugitive could just as easily have been put in the cop show category since its protagonist spends his time trying to avoid capture by—you guessed it—a cop. Upstairs, Downstairs could just as easily be put in the Best Nighttime Soap category (not that there's anything wrong with that), but if you're going to consider it as among the best, then let's look at the series that was the best Masterpiece Theatre had to offer: I, Claudius. Or was that too much of a soap? And what about The Prisoner, one of the most provocative series of all time? It isn't even mentioned in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy category. What about The Defenders or Judd for the Defense, shows of exceedingly high quality, or Perry Mason, a series with high entertainment value? What about Mission: Impossible, which doesn't seem to fit into any category?

The bottom line here is that the categories themselves are useless—unless there's something that makes a series unique (and I'd allow that science fiction can fall into that description, as well as the anthology series, and today's reality shows), a drama is a drama and a comedy is a comedy. To paraphrase the editors, a classic television series transcends simple classification; just as Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe transcended genre fiction to be considered mainstream literature, the best series, regardless of the field in which they take place, are dramas (or comedies) first and foremost. Dragnet, one of the decade winners in the Best Cop category, is fine as a genre show, but it doesn't reach the level of another decade winner, Naked City, which is not a police drama at all, but a drama about men who happen to be policemen. See the difference?

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There are a few other bones to pick as well.

I mentioned Best Family Show above, but I'll say again that I think this kind of segregation cheapens the quality of these shows. The Waltons not a drama series? Leave it to Beaver and The Donna Reed Show classified as "family" shows and not sitcoms? It's almost as if the editors are embarrassed by them, giving them a special category rather than letting them compete with the "big boys." And speaking of embarrassment, I wonder how they'd feel about their all-time winner in this category, The Cosby Show? (Whoops!) They might like to forget it, but Cosby was the biggest hit of the day. Why isn't this a sitcom, unless you want to define them as containing jokes about sex and other bodily functions?

I also mentioned Hill Street Blues winning Best Cop Show, but how can you compare cops on the beat to homicide detective Columbo (winner of the '60s)? Dragnet is a worthy winner for the '50s, but if you want cops, why not choose the crew of Naked City, a much better show than Hill Street, at least in my opinion. Still, if this issue had come out today, the choices probably would have been one of the Law & Order versions, or one of the NCIS versions, or the Matlock reboot, so I suppose we have to be grateful for small favors.

Johnny Carson is named best Nighttime Talk Show host, defeating Steve Allen, Jack Paar and David Letterman. No surprise, and I don't think you can really argue with it. Paar is more my taste, but between Johnny's staying power and the memorable moments from interviews, comedy skits and impromptu bits (thrown any tomahawks lately?), it's hard to dispute him as the king. And to think so many from today's generation have no clue who he is.

The Ed Sullivan Show wins for Best Variety Show, beating out Laugh-In, Saturday Night Live and The Tracey Ullman Show, and I'll admit I'm kind of surprised by this. I'd have thought they might go with SNL, based on its "groundbreaking" reputation, but Sullivan's show offered, as the editors point out, "all-encompassing variety," a program "that offered everything from dramatic readings to dancing bears, from opera buffo to Topo Gigio, from The Doors to Dinah Shore." As I pointed out here, it was influential in ways Sullivan himself couldn't have anticipated.

Howard Cosell is named Best Sportscaster, but he wasn't really a sportscaster in the sense that Vin Scully or Keith Jackson or Brent Musberger are; he was a sports commentator, or even better a sports personality. Yes, he did boxing and was very good at it (although not better than Don Dunphy), and he is absolutely one of the most important figures in television. But he doesn't belong in the same category with Red Barber, the voice of the Brooklyn Dodgers, or Jim McKay, host of Wide World of Sports, or even the young Bob Costas (who actually did more than pontificate back then), the other three nominees. Here, a little bit more distinction in categories would actually have been useful.

The Simpsons is the winner for Best Cartoon (what we'd call Best Animated Series today), but I think that really belongs in the sitcom classification, where it would probably have beaten M*A*S*H. It beats out Gumby (which wasn't a cartoon at all), The Bullwinkle Show (which wasn't a kids' show at all), and Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids (which has suddenly become very awkward). I'm really quite surprised, considering its longevity and popularity, that The Flintstones doesn't make the list.

I'm even more surprised—make that appalled—that Captain Kangaroo doesn't make the list of Best Kids' Show. Yes to Howdy Doody for the '50s and Sesame Street for the '70s, but Walt Disney instead of the Captain for the '60s? Disney's appeal crossed over to adults as well as children, and when you're talking about a "kids' show," you can't possibly compare "The Love Bug" and "Davy Crockett" (popular though they were) to Mr. Green Jeans talking about nature, the Captain introducing kids to the wonders of books through reading, or the various animal guests. As for the show of the '80s, ABC's Afterschool Specials, again—it's not a weekly series. Isn't this just apples and oranges? By the way, Sesame Street wins—no surprise.

For best Sci-Fi Show, I would have chosen Doctor Who, but at the time the British import hadn't gone mainstream, though it still had an enormous cult following in this country. Star Trek: TOS is the winner here, over The Twilight Zone (again, I'm not sure they really fit in the same category), Mork & Mindy (?), and Star Trek: TNG.

The original version of Jeopardy!, with Art Fleming, takes the Best Game Show category, and I'm not going to disagree with that—it's much better, in my opinion, than the Alex Trebek-helmed version. What's My Line?, the '50s choice, would have been mine as well, but it's not really a game show in the same sense as Jeopardy! or the other winners, Password and Wheel of Fortune. It was considered a panel show, which is really a horse of a different color altogether.

Best News Show: 60 Minutes, over See It Now, The Huntley-Brinkley Report (which, I can't stress enough, was NBC's frigging evening news program, not in the same category at all) and Nightline. If you're talking about news magazines, sure, 60 Minutes—but if you're introducing Huntley-Brinkley, why not The MacNeil/Lehrer Report?

Best Morning Show: The Today Show, and I'm all right with that if you're talking about the '50s and '60s, as they do here. Good Morning America is the '70s choice, and CBS News Sunday Morning wins the '80s. It just goes to show how weak the entire weekday-morning lineup is.

Best Daytime Soap is General Hospital. Best Evening Soap is Dallas. I won't quarrel with either. Best Daytime Talk Show Host is Oprah Winfrey, and I think that choice, though regrettable, was inevitable. Arthur Godfrey's '50s show and Merv Griffin's '60s daytime show were in the mix, as well as Phil Donohue in the '70s; I prefer Merv's evening/late night show, for the same reasons they chose his '60s program—Merv as host was "a literate, intelligent one who didn't shrink from cerebral or controversial guests." And in that vein, don't forget that Dick Cavett started out as a daytime host as well, with ABC's This Morning.

Best Western Show: Gunsmoke, over Maverick ('50s) and Bonanza ('60s). Sure, although I think Gunsmoke is better placed in the '60s than '70s, but they had to have something for the '70s, since they couldn't come up with anything for the '80s (for the simple reason that there wasn't anything. For a genre that, at one time, dominated the TV airwaves, it's too bad TV Guide's format is so limiting; it leaves out a program such as Have Gun—Will Travel, a very complex program.

I'm not even bothering with the Best Actor and Actress categories, since I think the Best Show categories have created enough of a mess, but if you're curious the comedy awards went to Jackie Gleason and Lucille Ball (but wait a minute! The Honeymooners wasn't even a choice for sitcoms, and The Jackie Gleason Show didn't make it for variety show!), and the drama award winners were James Garner (who's magnificent forte is really the lighthearted drama) and Tyne Daly (whose Cagney & Lacey doesn't have the staying power needed to be voted best anything, I'd submit). Best Newscaster is Walter Cronkite, and my favorite, the non-nominated David Brinkley, wouldn't have stood a chance.

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And there you have it. I'm sure I've probably slammed some of your favorite shows, and if I have, I hope you'll forgive me. This is, after all, One Man's Opinion, and even if - as I mentioned earlier—that man happens to run this site, my opinions should be taken for what they're worth.

On the other hand, I think my opinions are as valid as anyone else's, certainly as much so as the editors of TV Guide, compared to whom I think I've shown more discernment and taste, as well as a greater sense of historicity, and I won't back down from that assertion.

However, what I'd like as much as anything is to hear your opinions. Keep in mind that this was written in 1993, so some of your favorites (especially from the cable boom) weren't anticipated, but otherwise, have at it—with either TV Guide, or me, or both.  TV

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What's on TV? Wednesday, December 18, 1996

I neglected to mention on Saturday that this issue comes to us courtesy of Steve Harris, who graciously gifted me the three TV Guides that make up the "Greatest" series (greatest shows, greatest stars, greatest moments).

If you're wondering why Bill Cosby was on that list on Saturday, you have no further to look than today's listings. Count the number of sitcoms on today - both original prime-time runs, and reruns during the daytime, and then remember that when The Cosby Show hit the airwaves in 1984, experts were proclaiming them dead. Everything's cyclical, of course, but it was Cosby's success that triggered the resurgence we see here.

The listings today are from the Los Angeles edition, and I could have included a lot more if I'd wanted to. I didn't want to - I think this is enough.

This week in TV Guide: December 14, 1996

We're back with another of the special, themed issues that TV Guide occasionally dabbled in. Having looked in the past at greatest shows and greatest moments, we're now on to greatest stars. This isn't about the suspense of who's on the list; you can read it right here, without ever looking at the issue. But as I page through the list, my question is whether the list is meant as a historical record or a sign of the times. It is, after all, over 20 years old. If someone falls off the list, is it because they're less important, or less remembered? Are lists made by historians or fans?

Number One is Lucy, and I don't think that would surprise anyone - I actually wrote that sentence before looking at the list, it was that predictable. I mean this as no criticism of Miss Ball, but sometimes I think people who've never even seen her just vote her in as if the position were hers by some kind of divine decree; that's riduculous, of course, because what it proves is that her kind of humor is timeless. Does Roseanne Barr, who comes in at #28, share that trait? I don't think so; her comedy may have been cutting edge at one time, and she might have been a trailblazer in terms of how women are portrayed in sitcoms, but I'm not sure that translates to timelessness. I see her more as a product of her time, not someone a television historian would choose if limited to only 50 picks.

Johnny Carson is #2, and though Terry Teachout described him a while back as virtually unknown by the present generation, any television historian is going to include him on the list. Maybe you've got him at #2, maybe #8, but either way it's a pick you can defend. Less defensible, however, is the omission of Steve Allen, who invented late night television - if Carson refined it, someone still had to come up with it in the first place. Allen was a certifiable legend, not only with Tonight but What's My Line?, Meeting of Minds, and a score or more appearances through the decades. I understand you may not want to load up on talk show hosts, but I don't see how Steve Allen does not make the list, especialy when Phil Donahue is #42.

And then there's David Letterman at #45. TV Guide calls him the natural successor to Ernie Kovacs, and that may have been true back when Dave was doing Stupid Pet Tricks and the like, but by the time he got around to sexually harrassing his staff and espousing liberal politics, he'd lost a lot of his creativity. And yet - if this list were made today, would Letterman be ahead of Carson? He's not only more recent in people's minds, he's still revered by many viewers, and unlike Carson's time, it's now fashionable to get political on late night television. If the list is based on trendiness rather than historical significance, I think Letterman would get the edge. Speaking of Kovacs, he's nowhere to be seen on the list, and I think that's criminal. His greatest sin as an entertainer may have been that he was too far ahead of his time, but he was the first to realize and exploit the potential of television. I would have had him in the top ten. At least they remembered Sid Caesar, at #29.

See how easy it is to demonstrate he should be higher?

Raymond Burr is far too low on the list, at #41. Maybe realism is valued more in courtroom dramas than it was in the days of Perry Mason, but Burr created an iconic character, the symbol of TV lawyers for a generation, and that ought to count for something, don't you think? And while we're on the topic of crime, Jack Webb is another one missing from the list; while Webb might not be considered a great actor, Dragnet revolutionized the way police drama was portrayed on television; his "just the facts" persona and use of detailed realism really changed how the game was played. He was to cop shows what James Arness was to the Western, and Arness makes the list at #20. Fred Rogers is on the list at #35, but is there a Fred Rogers without Bob Keeshen? I don't think you can overlook Captain Kangaroo - but then, Mr. Rogers was on PBS. Why not include them both? And I like the choice of Don Knotts at #27, proving that second bananas have a place - but what about Art Carney? Jackie Gleason is #3, but would he be that high without Carney?

Bill Cosby is #9, and while I was never a great fan of Cosby, I'll certainly defend his place on the list, even though I suspect he wouldn't make the list today. Carroll O'Connor is #38, and rightfully so; starring on a show that redefined the sitcom, he was Archie Bunker. Michael J. Fox is #39, but I question his being on the list. It's not that he's not good, but in sports terms this should be the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Very Good. Bob Newhart, on the other hand, is probably underrated at #17, having starred in two of the great sitcoms of the era.

Patty Duke is on the list at #40, and I'm not sure why - her signature series, The Patty Duke Show, only ran for three seasons, and while she appeared in 30 TV movies and miniseries, Jane Seymour has probably done the same, and she isn't on the list. My complaint about Patty, as it is with Telly Savalas (#33), is that her fame comes from movies as well as television; you might as well include Sally Field or Denzel Washington or George Clooney or Johnny Depp; they all featured on TV as well. Dinah Shore is #16 - if the list were being made today, would historians recognize her place in TV history? Same with George Burns and Gracie Allen at #13; a list made today probably wouldnot include them.

I do like the picks of Milton Berle (how could you leave out Mr. Television?), Michael Landon, Carol Burnett, and James Garner. I think Rocky and Bullwinkle was an inspired choice, but I'm not sure Bart Simpson falls in the same category; it wasn't long before he was eclipsed by Homer. I think Dick Van Dyke should be rated higher than Mary Tyler Moore, but they both belong there. I think Oprah's done more cultural damage than perhaps any other television personality, but for that very reason she has to be on the list.

Like any list, this one has its good points and bad. We're not quite done with it yet, though - stick around until the end.

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There are only 11 days until Christmas as the week begins, which means we should be able to find some seasonal tidbits to highlight.

What's striking about the mid-'90s, after having spent so much time looking at the '50s and '60s (and '70s), is how Christmas programming was dominated by variety shows. There was at least one on almost every night, and every one of them had a Christmas episode just before December 25. (And that doesn't include the one-off specials by stars like Bob Hope and Perry Como.)

By now, most of your Christmas TV consists of "holiday" episodes of sitcoms with vague, Hallmark-like storylines, such as Ellen (Wednesday, 9:30 p.m. PT, ABC), in which "Christmas goes to the dogs for Ellen, who adopts a stray and ends up not going on a Mexican vacation with Paige because of her new canine attachment." Now, there's nothing wrong with this, although I'd suggest that many of the episodes from years past tend to have at least some kind of more overtly Christmas message in them, such as the Yuletide variety show episode of The Dick Van Dyke show, which coincidentelly appears on Nick at Nite Sunday night as part of their 17-episode classic TV Christmas Party, which includes the Bewitched episode in which Samantha is determined to prove to a skeptical orphan that Santa Claus exists. Shows also love to do variations on It's a Wonderful Life or A Christmas Carol, and we have an example of the latter with Martin (Thursday, 8:00 p.m., Fox) as "Martin has a Dickens of a time scaring up some Yuletide sentiment in this takeoff on "A Christmas Carol" that finds him playing host to some unexpected ghosts.

There are, however, specials this week, and not surprisingly there's a good share of music to be found. For example, there's Opryland's Country Christmas (Saturday, 9:00 p.m., CBS), which features Patty Loveless, Clint Black and LeAnn Rimes. On Wednesday, it's the 15th annual Christmas in Washington (NBC, 10:00 p.m.), in which the cast of 3rd Rock from the Sun and others serenade President and Mrs. Clinton.* And a syndicated special at midnight on Saturday, This is Christmas (KCAL), stars Luther Vandross, with guests Mariah Carey Boyz II Men, U2, Melissa Ehtridge, and Gloria Estefan.

*Do they even do that show anymore? No - it turns out the 2014 edition was the last. They probably couldn't have found anyone to do it this year anyway.

There are also cartoons; ABC has an animated version of Lilly Tomlin's Edith Ann character on An Edith Ann Christmas (Saturday, 8:30 p.m.), while CBS offers a triple-header on Thursday night, beginning at 8:00 p.m. with A Charlie Brown Christmas, followed by A Garfield Christmas, and concluding with Mickey's Christmas Carol. (Not a bad lineup there.) And of course, it wouldn't be Christmas without movies, would it? On Tuesday, KTLA airs A Christmas Story (8:00 p.m.) long before it becomes a Christmas marathon staple; an hour later, Dolly Parton starsas an angel unlike any I've seen in Unlikely Angel (9:00 p.m., NBC). On Wednesday, The Angel of Pennsylvania Avenue (Wednesday, 8:00 p.m., Family) has Robert Urich as a falsely imprisoned mfsadan whose children appeal for help to President Hoover. There are also airings of White Christmas and A Christmas Carol on various stations through the week.

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This week's highlight in sports is on Tuesday night, as Shaquille O'Neal and the Los Angeles Lakers take on Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls on TNT. Good game, as the Bulls - en route to their historic 72-10 season - pull out an overtime win, 129-123. Shaq has 27 points and 13 rebounds, while Jordan scores 30, and his sidekick Scottie Pippen puts in 35. You'd want to point to a game like this for the historical record, for a number of reasons. Besides featuring two all-time greats (and a third, Kobe Bryant, coming off the bench for the Lakers), it gives us a chance to look at another way in which the context of sports has changed in society.

You may recall that Michael Jordan took a fair amount of heat from black political leaders for not being more outspoken on civil rights and other issues, to which Jordan made the famous reply that "Republicans buy shoes, too." Of course, social media didn't really exist back in 1996, unless you count talk radio, newspapers, and face-to-face communication; still, despite the flippant sound of the answer, Jordan made a point that many athletes seem to have forgotten today: athletes are salesmen, and fans are consumers. That doesn't mean an athlete, or anyone else, has to give up their individuality, or their rights of speech, just because they've become famous.

No, the larger point - and I'm not trying to take sides here or get political myself - is that the successful businessperson knows that it's never a good idea to antagonize the customer. The NFL is finding this out now. Granted, we can't know what Jordan may have done had social media been in existence in 1996, nor are today's athletes the first to become politically active - see John Carlos and Tommie Smith in the 1968 Summer Olympics. Nonetheless, in an age when Taylor Swift is criticized for not being political, one can see how different the entertainment landscape has become. The Michael Jordan of 1998 is a reminder of that.

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Let's take a look at what else the week has to offer.

On Saturday, it's a first-ever prime-time episode of General Hospital (9:00 p.m, ABC), as the shocking story from Friday is continued. Boy, that's classic soap opera jargon, isn't it?  Sunday's highlights include the Yuletide classic Christmas in Connecticut (WGN, 2:00 p.m.), and a Louis & Clark episode that features Howie Mandel as an alien intruder. Meanwhile, A&E's Holiday at Pops (9:00 p.m.) features Tony Bennett with John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra. 

Monday night is something of a remembrance of series past: Melrose Place on Fox (8:00 p.m.), The Jeff Foxworthy Show on NBC (also 8:00 p.m.), Murphy Brown and Cybil (9:00 and 9:30 p.m., CBS). Oh, the Bills play the Dolphins on Monday Night Football (ABC, 6:00 p.m.)

Tuesday, Dan comes home to Roseanne to spend the holidays with the family (8:00 p.m., ABC), Fox tries (and fails) to recapture the magic with The Munsters Scary Little Christmas (8:00 p.m.) featuring none of the original cast, and in the night's winner, PBS plays a pair of Wallace and Gromit shorts, "A Grand Day Out" and "A Close Shave" (8:00 p.m.)

On Wednesday Nick at Nite takes home the prize, with Season's Greetings from the Honeymooners (9:00 p.m.), two hours of bits first shown on The Jackie Gleason Show. If you don't like that, there are holiday-themed episodes of NewsRadio (NBC) and Drew Carey (ABC). Thursday brings the first college bowl game of the year, the don't-miss Las Vegas Bowl between Ball State and Nevada (ESPN, 6:00 p.m.) Seriously, these are two pretty good teams, with combined records of 16-6. Many of this year's games should do so well. And Friday has highlights at the beginning and end of the day; Sandi Patti: O Holy Night brings us Christmas music (9:00 a.m., Family), while the prime-time spectacular is NBC's airing of The Sound of Music (8:00 p.m.), or as co-star Christopher Plummer allegedly called it, "The Sound of Mucus." 

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Since this was kind of a short entry this week, that leaves us time for a little self-indulgence. You may be thinking, after reading my comments on the 50 Greatest Stars list, what my choices would have been. (Or maybe not; just play along here.) Do I think I could do any better?

Well, sure. After all, why do anything if you don't think it can be just as good as, if not better than, anyone else's? That doesn't mean it is better, but it does mean it's out there for others to pick on for a change. The list is updated to include stars who appeared after 1996, as well as to rectify oversights from the first one. And as a historian, I tend to take a long view of things; I'm hesitant to include stars who are too recent, whose stardom hasn't yet had a chance to ferment. Real stars have staying power, so it doesn't hurt to be a little cautious.

And so, for what it's worth, here's how I would have done it.

	1.       Lucille Ball	26.   Andy Griffith
	2.       Johnny Carson	27.   Art Carney
	3.       Ernie Kovacs	28.   Edward R. Murrow
	4.       Steve Allen	29.   Robert Young
	5.       Raymond Burr	30.   David Janssen
	6.       Carol Burnett	31.   Bob Keeshan
	7.       Jack Webb	32.   James Arness
	8.       Regis Philbin	33.   Betty White
	9.       Oprah Winfrey	34.   Don Knotts
	10.   Michael Landon	35.   Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca
	11.   Dick Van Dyke	36.   Fred Rogers
	12.   James Garner	37.   Phil Silvers
	13.   Mary Tyler Moore	38.   Jerry Seinfeld
	14.   Jon Stewart	39.   Rocky & Bullwinkle
	15.   William Shatner	40.   Bob Hope
	16.   Jackie Gleason	41.   Carroll O’Connor
	17.   Ellen DeGeneres	42.   Jim McKay
	18.   Bob Newhart	43.   Lawrence Welk
	19.   Bill Cosby	44.   Julia Child
	20.   Milton Berle	45.   Howard Cosell
	21.   Walter Cronkite	46.   Barbara Walters
	22.   Ted Danson	47.   Ed Sullivan
	23.   Peter Falk	48.   Chris Berman
	24.   Tom Sellick	49.   Jane Seymour
	25.   Julia Louis-Dreyfus	50.   Chet Huntley and David Brinkley

There - the floor is now yours.  TV  

What's on TV? Thursday, July 4, 1996

And a Happy 4th of July to you too, albeit a day early. I believe I neglected to mention on Saturday that this week's edition is from the Los Angeles area; no wonder, since I never got around to even touching on the week's programming. Never mind - we'll make up for it here.

For all my complaints regarding television in this era, it might surprise you to know that I think the pioneers of television would be pleased with much that you see here. Maybe not the tawdry "discussion" shows that dominate daytime television, or the common-denominator programs that run in prime time. But if you look at Channel 18, for example, or Channel 40, you'll see what I mean: programs that directly address a small, niche audience that would ordinarily be ignored by network television. In the case of Channel 18, you've got a veritable United Nations of language spoken on their airwaves. Channel 22 is another, with a prime time of Spanish-language programming. Both of these stations are doing exactly what the FCC hoped to accomplish through their emphasis on local programming - they're addressing a need on the part of the public, one that can't possibly be addressed by a network on the other side of the country. And Channel 40, the TBN affiliate, just like Bravo and A&E and other specialty stations, concentrates on programming to fit a very specific demand - religion in this instance, but it could be arts or sports or current affairs or news. This, rather than endless reruns of network shows from the last ten years, is what television's potential was supposed to represent.

Of course, it also produced a fragmented viewing public, but that's a complaint for another day.

This week in TV Guide: June 29, 1996

We now come to another in our series of special TV Guide issues, thanks to the generosity of Mr. Steve Harris, whom you may recall was also responsible for the 40th Anniversary and 45th Anniversary issues. This week, it's the 100 most memorable moments in TV history - according to TV Guide, that is.

Lists like this are always hard to critique objectively. We have moments that are personal favorites, or made an indelible impression on us for one reason or another, and so it's understandable that we might attach a greater importance to such moments than others would. We also have to realize that different generations view things in different ways; we tend to have short attention spans nowadays, and very little historical perspective, with the result that we tend to regard anything that happened more than, say, five years ago to be ancient history never to be revisited again. We also live in a culture that has been heavily Oprahfized, with the result that we attach a far greater sense of import to moments that appeal to emotions and feelings. Unfortunate, but also a reality given the world in which we live.

There's also the question as to whether or not memorable moments are also timeless moments - in other words, does a story that makes an impression at a certain place and time need to remain vital twenty years later, or is it enough that people were impacted once, without it having to carry the same weight to succeeding generations? In this case, I'd suggest that it's enough for a moment to have been memorable once; even if something similar to it were to happen again, you can't expect succeeding occurrences to have the same impact as the original. We'll see an example of that very early on - at #8, in fact.

You may recall that we looked at a similar list a few years ago, written from the perspective of 2012, and while I wasn't terribly impressed with that list either, I think it can be useful to consider not only for those events that happened since 1996, but also as a way of measuring how things have changed in our culture in the 21 years since this issue came out. We'll get to that in due time, but first let's examine the list we already have in front of us.

Removing all suspense at the very outset, I'll clue you in that the single most memorable moment in television history, according to this TV Guide, is the first manned moon landing in 1969, and quite frankly I'd find that very hard to disagree with. It's hard to find a moment that more accurately represents the culmination of a centuries-held dream than Neil Armstrong's first step onto the surface of the moon (on live television!). The rest of the top ten: Lucy in the candy factory (#2), John-John's salute (#3), the Beatles' first appearance on the Sullivan show (#4), the final episodes of Newhart (#5) and The Fugitive (#6), the O.J. Simpson verdict (#7), the wedding of Charles and Diana (#8), Bette Midler on the penultimate Carson show (#9), and the 1968 Elvis comeback show (#10). Some of these are perceptive choices, others come across today as little more than the flavor of the month but were special once.

Charles and Diana, for instance, were big stuff once, before their fairy tale went south. In our 2012 list, it's been replaced by two events: the funeral of Diana, and the marriage of her son William and Kate Middleton. Had the list been made years before, the event on the list might have been the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. A few years from now, it might be the coronation of William. Times change, and there's no question that the impact made by that 1981 wedding was substantial. That doesn't mean it should appear on any other list, but I suppose it does validate its appearance on this one. And so on - considering that the younger generation doesn't even know who Johnny Carson is (or so we're told), it's not likely that Bette Midler singing to him is going to remain on future lists . But it was good enough to happen once.

Now, while no list is perfect, and I've already given this one some breaks, there are things that I simply can't overlook - events that just don't belong on this or any other list. For example, there's Muhammad Ali's knockout of George Foreman to regain the heavyweight championship in 1974 (#54). This frankly baffles, since the fight wasn't even on live home television - the live broadcast was on closed-circuit in movie theaters around the country. It wasn't until later that the bout made it to Wide World of Sports, by which time you'd have had to have been completely out of it to not know how the fight had turned out. I don't question its place in sporting history, but to call it one of television's most memorable moments is simply nonsense.

The #3 event on the list, John F. Kennedy Jr.'s salute to his father, is similar. There's no question it's a touching moment, but I don't think its fame derives from the live television coverage. No, what gave this moment its iconic status are the pictures taken by UPI photographer Stan Sterns and New York Daily News photographer John Farrell. As Sterns says, it was a moment that most missed. "As the caisson was rolling out to Arlington Cemetery I asked every photographer I could if they had the salute. Duh! Nobody saw it. Everyone I talked to had been concentrating on Jackie and the caisson." Farrell was nominated for a Pulitzer for his photo*, which appeared on the front page of the Daily News the next day, and it's that exposure, not the original moment as captured on television, that people probably remember. Look at the original television coverage of the funeral; as this still taken from the CBS coverage shows, the salute is not the focal point of the shot; John Jr. can only be seen in the lower left-hand of the screen, a small boy on a small black-and-white picture tube being watched by millions of people who were literally shell-shocked. The picture in the paper the next day is what people would never forget.

*Farrell lost to Bob Jackson's photograph of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. That image, which was seen live on NBC, was - as Guinness certifies - "the first known human killing seen live on TV ." TV Guide rated it #73, but I think that's the memorable moment of those four dark days.

For the same reason, I object strongly to including the premiere episodes of programs that go on to a long and successful lifespan, such as the debuts of Roseanne (#40), The Cosby Show (#31), and Bonanza (#29). While it's true that each of these series may have, to one extent or another, redefined an aspect of television, nobody knew or appreciated that at the time. To be included as a memorable moment, it seems to me, one has to have an immediate, "did you just see that? kind of reaction. To their credit, the inclusion of Hill Street Blues' premiere (#65) does have that moment, when the camera reveals that the lover of defense attorney Joyce Davenport is, in fact, her nemesis Detective Frank Furillo. Maybe it wasn't the most groundbreaking moment of all time (which is probably why it ranked relatively low), and I don't know that I would necessarily call it the scene that tipped everyone off that here was something special, but at least it was something of a sit-up-straight moment.

Now, it's true that a list like this isn't going to satisfy everyone - in fact, it might not satisfy most people. And I don't want to dismiss it out-of-hand, because I think it does reflect some very perceptive choices. The writers were wise to rank The Fugitive's final episode (#6) ahead of the M*A*S*H finale (#78) and the "Who Shot J.R." episode of Dallas (#13), despite those two shows garnering more viewers. Clarence Thomas' comments on being the victim of a "high-tech lynching" (#30) showed many people for the first time the extent of the political divisions within the black community. Ed Ames and his tomahawk on The Tonight Show make the list at #35, even though they botch the money quote; they offer Johnny Carson's comment "I can't hurt him any more than you did" when asked by Ames if he wanted a throw, whereas I think most people remember Carson's riposte (thought up while the audience was in hysterics) that "I didn't even know you were Jewish." Maybe that wasn't P.C. enough for this crowd. And even though I'm no fan of Lucille Ball, I think the choice of her famous candy on the conveyor belt scene as #2 indicates an appreciation of television history that's too often missing from lists like this.

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This week's list is now over 20 years old and there's a lot that's happened since then, which is why we look at the 2012 list. It's interesting to note that 13 of the 20 items on that list occurred in the 16 years between 1996 and 2012. Think about that for a moment: while television has been around since before World War II, it's really only been since the late 1940s that it's entered into the realm of pop culture. And while it took nearly 50 years to produce this week's TV Guide list of 100, it took only 16 years to accumulate 65% of the events on this (admittedly shorter) list.*

*Of those seven that happened prior to 1996, three happened within five years of our TV Guide issue. Only two occurred prior to 1986, and they were actually part of the same event (JFK's assassination and funeral). None were from the broadcast of an episode of series television or a sporting event. Let me repeat that for you - none. 

Does this mean the world moves more quickly, or that we have shorter attention spans? Is series television not as memorable as it used to be, or is it just less important? (I would say, for instance, that the final episode of The Sopranos certainly deserves a spot on the list, and some would compare the whimsical conclusion of Mad Men to the absurdist finale of Newhart.) Are we more attuned to separating the important from the frivolous, or are we just more ignorant when it comes to television's history and heritage? I suppose there's some truth to each of these, and we'll probably never know the exact reason why.

In the meantime, it should come as no surprise that the top TV moment in that 2012 list is the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, and in some ways I think contrasting the top choice from each of these lists is the most interesting thing of all.

By 1969, public sentiment was turning against the space program. Now, I don't mean to suggest that a majority were opposed to it, but those who were comprised a vocal minority. Their argument centered around the enormous financial cost to put a man on the moon, and how that money might be better put to use funding social programs in this country. (Eventually, the Nixon Administration did put the kibosh on the moon landings, but there's a school of thought that suggests this was due to Nixon's animus toward the Kennedy legacy as anything. But, we digress.) Despite this, the flight of Apollo 11 was one of the most highly anticipated events in world history, the culmination of one of mankind's greatest achievements. I say this partly for the benefit of you youngsters out there who've never lived a day in your lives without the reality of man having set foot on the moon - it's difficult to overestimate just what a spectacular event this was. It was the ultimate in human scientific triumph - we had conquered the moon, and the stars lay ahead!

The contrast with the World Trade Center couldn't be more stark. In the Twin Towers, we had another of mankind's great technological feats. Although the towers had since been displaced as the world's tallest, and even though the aesthetic charms of the buildings were sometimes difficult to appreciate, think about it: the concurrent construction, side-by-side, of two 100+ story towers. And over the course of two or three hours, they were both gone - destroyed by another of man's great achievements, the jet aircraft. Whereas the moon landing represented technology's success, the WTC was a stunning downfall.

In some ways, this reminds me of the Titanic sinking. As you probably know, I've long been interested in the Titanic, and the story of the world's largest and most luxurious ship - virtually unsinkable - going down the very first time she sailed is one of history's great parables, speaking to man's hubris. (As a man of the time had said upon completion of the Titanic, "God Himself could not sink this ship.") I don't mean to suggest that the destruction of the Twin Towers is a similar case; the fact that it was a man-created disaster makes it all the more shocking, as if it had been man and not God who had brought down the Tower of Babel. What it is, ultimately, is a reminder to put not your complete faith in technology, no matter how great an achievement it might be.

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And ultimately, isn't this what television is, a great technological achievement? Beaming a moving picture into the home, covering events live (as they happen!), covering them in color, covering them in HD, covering them (for a time) in 3D, covering them in 4K. When does it end?

Despite this, television's star begins to fade. Cord-cutting is on the rise, even as the number of stations continues to increase. Networks pay more for the rights to sporting events, which look magnificent on the newest 4K televisions - while at the same time viewers move away from traditional broadcasts in favor of streaming tiny pictures on their mobile devices. I don't understand why anyone would want to watch a small picture when a large one could be had, just as I don't understand why anyone feels it necessary to be constantly on the move instead of actually concentrating on one thing at a time. But then, that's just me - maybe they think they're fish, and that if they stop moving, they're dead.

Ultimately, this list (and lists like it) tell us far more about ourselves and our times than they do about television, for while we learn very little about the shows themselves, we find out a great deal about the times that produced them. We replace the "unreality" of scripted TV shows with the "reality" of news, the emotion from comedy and drama shows with the emotion from celebrity deaths, the optimism of television's youth with the pessimism and cynicism of television's present.

And the future? Television continues to evolve, from over-the-air to cable and now to streaming. In this sense, a list like this represents (as all such issues do) a kind of autopsy, for a way of life as much as for television itself. When that next list comes along, will we see even less evidence of institutional memory, less knowledge and respect for television's history? Will another raft of news events, significant or trivial, come to dominate the list? Will our viewing be dominated by some type of virtual reality, making us more a participant in what we watch? The only appropriate response seems to be: stay tuned. TV