Sunday, November 3, 2013
MTM vs. Lear
From your viewings of All in the Family, Good Times, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show and your reading of Kirsten Lentz’s essay, how do you think Norman Lear’s shows differed from MTM’s? Why do you think the term “quality” was often used to refer to MTM’s shows and “relevance” to label Lear’s programs? How does Lentz see these productions as differing?
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From screening episodes of MTM's "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and Norman Lear's "All in the Family", "Good Times", and "Maude", I agree with Kirsten Lentz's thesis that MTM's shows were more driven by gender and Lear's by racial tensions. Though "AITF", "Good Times" and "Maude" all existed in a series of spinoffs, I think their similarities run deeper than that. Lentz points out their shoddy visual quality in contrast to their sharp, socially relevant writing and sets this against MTM's highbrow white feminist world, but I don't think one brand of shows deserves the label of "quality" over the other. Both were entertaining and well written in a way that was reflective of their time. MTM's working woman was seen as more "quality" because it didn't deal with issues of race, but arguably, budding feminism was just as socially "relevant" a topic as race relations. Lentz counters my own doubts with her analysis of MTM's tendency toward more organic storytelling. "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" displays feminism through its stories, and doesn't tend to do "spotlight" episodes like "Maude" 's abortion dilemma or Archie in the elevator. The situation doesn't bring out the issues, but rather the characters, which Lentz and many others see as a collection of realistic traits rather than a caricature of racism or liberal counterparts. I mostly agree with Lentz's thesis, but still see some problems with pigeonholing each show into one category. In many ways, I think its deft handling of racial themes made Norman Lear's shows high quality (not to mention their humor), and Maude's feminist character is not that different from Mary's besides her exaggerated qualities. And "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" 's avoidance of racial topics could arguably make it seem "irrelevant" rather than "quality", depending on how much a person admires the show. "Quality" vs "relevance" can be useful, but using a binary of two opposing terms to describe anything can create problems, and Lentz's argument is no exception.
ReplyDeleteIt is definitely quite apparent that the Mary Tyler Moore differs from Norman Lear’s shows in that MTM deals with feminism while Lear’s deals more with racial and social issues of the time. MTM is a show that focuses more on the “quality” aspect in that by dealing with this feminism and improved images of womanhood they are in fact improving upon the quality of television overall. “The Mary Tyler Moore Show represents its own self-reflexivity as removed from and superior to “normal” modes of television.” So quality television in MTM is that we, the audience at home, are watching The 6 o’clock News within the show as an example of bad television. Since the show acknowledges this we, the audience at home, establish MTM as good quality television.
ReplyDeleteLear’s shows focus more on the “relevance” aspect within his shows. His shows talk about more ‘relevant’ information about what is going on with the current public of the time; women’s liberation, impotence, homosexuality, racism, rape, extramarital sex, menopause, gun control, abortion. The humor of the shows was then more offensive and really brought to the table what the issues within society were. In the episode of Maude we watched in class, they brought up abortion and information women in society might not have known during that time, but through humor we find out that abortion for women is okay and socially acceptable now. All in the Family brings in some racial stereotypes with Mexicans and African American people when a group gets stuck in the elevator. Humor is brought in with awkward statements and punch lines to really show how ridiculous some of the stereotypes are.
Norman Lear’s shows differed from MTM’s in both a visual sense and content-wise. Visually speaking, MTM had a more polished look to it; the image was sharper, the focus was deeper and the colors were more vibrant, while Norman Lear’s shows didn’t tend to bother with that. This is one of the reasons why MTM was considered quality whereas Lear’s shows were not. At the time, quality television was meant to “improve the television text aesthetically” meanwhile relevant television aimed to “become more responsive to the social and political milieu of the 1970s” (Lentz 47). This essentially means that quality television was more concerned with the narrative structure, how it looks and how it appeals to the viewer while relevant television was more intent with how the narrative reflected the social and political views and not so much as they appeared aesthetically. For example, in the episode of Good Times that we viewed, the little kid kept telling his parents how the word boy was a “white racist something something” because issues of race and racial interactions was a very hot-button issue at this time. The joke itself was funny (although it lost its edge with every repetition) but it’s not something that would ever be featured on a quality television program; it’s too direct, it deals with an ugly issue without really sugarcoating anything for the viewer, which would not be an aesthetic improvement to the television text, it was more important that the show sends the socially relevant message. The problem with this idea, however, is that there is this dichotomy where a show can either be “quality” or it can be “relevant” but it cannot be both. While it might be the case that a show is more quality than it is relevant or more relevant than it is quality does not mean that both cannot be represented in a program; I think Lentz just makes some generalizations about these programs in order to better suit her argument, and while I do agree that these shows are observably different, it doesn’t mean that they can only fall under one category.
ReplyDeleteAfter viewing “All in the Family”, “Good Times”, and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show”, there does seem to be a fairly obvious distinction between Norman Lear’s shows and those of MTM. Lentz’s ideas regarding the “quality” versus “relevance” debate are apparent in the episodes we watched. For example, in “All in the Family”, the storyline was dependent upon the open discussion of race. When Archie was trapped in the elevator, he did not hide his negative opinions of each of the minority cultures represented in the episode, but these ignorant suppositions were counteracted by the characters themselves, who refuted his stereotyping. In this way, “All in the Family” lives up to Lentz’s argument that Lear’s programs were centered on discussing relevant issues in a “tell it like it is” manner. These “relevant” programs were more concerned with their subject matter: they wanted to bluntly deal with social issues and subsequently were not overly concerned with the aesthetics of the show. For example, Lentz includes a discussion of set design, which is more sophisticated on quality television than their relevant counterparts. In the episodes of “All in the Family” and “Good Times” that we saw, the plot unfolded in a very limited setting, which only changed a couple times throughout the episodes. The representation of race and racism took precedence over aesthetics. “The Mary Tyler Moore Show”, on the other hand, was more interested in the appearance of the program and the specific techniques used to subtly portray its message, such as the self-reflexivity of the characters critiquing a news report while they, themselves, are also on a TV show. Furthermore, when “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” did deal with social issues, it mainly only included influences of feminism and presented it indirectly. A label of “quality” was used in reference to shows like this, where the goal was to improve the medium of television through a style reminiscent of theater or film. “Relevant” shows were, as this name would suggest, interested in portraying issues that were prominent in America at the time.
ReplyDeleteAs some of my classmates have offered above, there are pretty clear differences between the Mary Tyler Moore and Norman Lear shows. The Lentz article brings up the distinction between “quality” and “relevance” and how the two classifications can be attributed to MTM and Lear shows.
ReplyDeleteLentz claims that Lear shows focused mostly on socially relevant content. This can be seen in the episode of “All in the Family” that we watched in class. There is a scene when Archie is trapped in the elevator and his negative feelings toward minorities are clearly represented. Lentz further claims that such a scene would not be found in the Mary Tyler Moore show. She claims that social commentary, if any, was limited to allusions to feminist ideals. Mostly it was a self reflexive type of show. Lentz labeled with with the “quality” sticker. She asserts that through its aesthetic style it was attention to improve television as a whole. And by not spending so much time and energy on discussing relevant social issues, it could have more refined sets. In the episode of All in the Family there were only a few sets that we saw and they were rather simplistic because most of the emphasis was, as stated before, placed on content.
The idea of “relevance” is often thrown around with regards to Norman Lear’s sitcoms because they dared to go where none had gone before. While other shows only scratched the surface of issues like feminism (such as The Mary Tyler Moore Show), Lear’s programs delved deep into issues like race, class, women’s rights, civil rights, sexual abuse, etc. Other programs were more concerned with retaining viewers than addressing such serious issues.
ReplyDeleteOne particular episode, the episode about Edith’s 50th birthday on All in the Family, really shows just how far Lear was willing to go to make his programs speak about larger social issues. In the episode, Edith is attacked in her home, and the man attempts to rape her, all while her family is in the kitchen. Edith survives, and talks about what happened to her and her feelings later in the episode, but it was hard-hitting. Edith, usually a light and happy character, was changed by the incident. Everything was up for grabs for Lear’s programs, and even though they were usually dealt with through comedy (such as Archie Bunker getting kissed by Sammy Davis Jr), they were serious issues that other programs wouldn’t dream of touching, and that’s what really set Lear’s sitcoms apart.
I think it’s incredibly interesting that Lentz draws the distinction between “quality” and “relevance” in her essay when talking about the MTM show and shows like AITF. While watching the two shows, we could clearly tell a difference in the production quality – MTM has more of a crystal clear, crisp look, while AITF often looks grainy, with simple sets and backgrounds. But what made these two shows different also included the content. MTM was more known for “quality” television, while All in the Family was known for more relevant issues. The two divergent areas of television are now blended, but back in the 60’s and 70’s, Lentz discusses how these two areas are completely different, even though they are normally discussed together. As discussed by my other classmates, the two shows differ in matter of subject discussed – MTM was more about the characters in a feminist world while All in the Family focused more on racial issues and didn’t bother much with production value, at least compared to MTM. I think that it’s extremely interesting that there was a distinction between the two in early television. Now, in order to sell your television show, you have to have a combination of both quality and relevance to have great tv. If you don’t at least hint at some of the social issues of the day with a high production value, the television show won’t last.
ReplyDeleteIn the Lentz reading, there are clear distinctions between the term quality and relevance. In terms of “quality” television, MTM was considered a quality shows for a number of reasons. First, the actual production of it was clear and when people viewed it on the television, the show was physically clearer. The content of the show was also considered quality because of the aspects that MTM dealt with. The show focused on Mary Tyler Moore, a woman who was clearly making strides towards feminine equality. Another interesting aspect of the show pertains to the self-reflexive aspect that the show has about television production. All of these different examples combined helped to show how the show could be considered a quality show.
ReplyDeleteContrasting with this, All in the Family is more of a “relevant” show, because of the controversial topics that it dealt with. The show itself was a lot fuzzier than MTM, but the conflicts that were presented on the show were very relevant because they dealt with issues such as race. In the episode we watched in class, All in the Family presented a number of stereotypes that were very offensive. However, as time progressed in the episode you could see how the characters retorted with comebacks to Archie’s blatant racism. As a result of this, the viewer could see that stereotypes still exist in society, but it also questioned the validity of these stereotypes, making the show “relevant” because of the controversial topics that are presented and criticized.