PROLOGUE I’m hardly the first guy to ponder the end of television, merely the last. The epiphany came at a Berkeley cafe in Fall 2011, when I overheard one college freshman say to another, “I can’t wait to go…
The Age of Television (1948–??)
Category: 1970s
Gerald Ford and Fidel Castro. Just Because It’s August.
(Editor’s note: I’m not sure what made me want to lump these two figures together in the first place, but we do have an anniversary coming up– August 9, 2014 will mark 40 years since Nixon became the first and only…
Remembering Casey Kasem
At times, it’s easy to be cynical about this country, this world, and everything in it. But other times, there is room for optimism. And so it is with the Casey Kasem story. Like many a kid in the…
Ann B. Davis (1926-2014). Alice Has Left the Kitchen.
40 years after the Brady Bunch went off the air, it lives on stronger than ever in reruns. So ubiquitous is this show in popular culture, that not only do people today still know the name of Alice the Brady’s…
Tania (The Hearst Mystique)
It would be interesting to conduct a quick straw poll to see just what sort of name recognition Patty Hearst gets these days. I suspect that people under, say, age 42 may know the name, but have no idea who…
Kaddish For Reuben
Considering he’s just a TV character, some of the crustiest punks I know have had surprisingly strong feelings about Reuben Kincaid. It boils down to family issues and the search for a suitable male role model. Needless to say, these…
HAPPY 2014 ABE VIGODA!! (Plus a status update on Al Molinaro)
It’s time to wish Abe Vigoda another Happy New Year! Last January, we commemorated the spate of passings of TV greats in 2012 who were actually older than Abe Vigoda, but somehow slipped under the radar. At the top…
Remembering John Denver on the Occasion of His 70th
I would like to take a minute to talk about a man who would have turned 70 today had he lived, a man whose iconic bowl cut and moon pie face conjured up earthenware pots of apple-cinnamon oatmeal in whole…
Dyna Girl in the Twilight Zone
Before she was Electra Woman’s better half in Electra Woman & Dyna Girl, Judy Strangis had a small role as Cora, the smart-mouthed preteen in the hour-long Twilight Zone episode, “The Bard,” which aired May 23, 1963.
The True Story Behind Badfinger’s “Baby Blue”
I stopped watching Breaking Bad two years ago, but by reading the subtle signs of the cultural landscape, I managed to figure out with reasonable certainty that the song “Baby Blue” played a prominent part in the show’s finale tonight.…