Did you ever know that youre my hero the stuff they got away with because its a cartoon. The father strangling the child. Why you little we are going to keep on trying to strengthen the American Family to make American Families a lot more like the waltons and a lot less like the simpsons. We go to a completely bizarre period of time in 1992 when a sitting president is raging against a sitcom. They have dealt with politics. They have dealt with popular culture. Theyve dealt with all kinds of issues of racism, of sexism. Dont ask me, im just a girl. Right on, say it, sister. Its not funny, bart. Millions of girls will grow up thinking this is the right way to act. They have found a way to talk about everything thats going on in our lives through the filter of the simpsons. American Network Television has long been considered the home of the blands, the cautious and the predictable. So it was with some trepidation that it the abc Network Launched a new series that was none of those things. Twin peaks is already described by one critic as the series that will change tv. Its directed by david lynch. David lynch was a filmmaker known for his taste in the eccentric and memorable. The idea that he would do television in the 90s was crazy. Do you watch much of it . I like the idea of television, but im too busy to see very much of it. What do you think of that which you do see . Some of it i really enjoy. Are you being diplomatic . Sort of. [ screaming ] the beautiful thing about television is you have the chance to do a continuing story. And thats the main reason for doing it. I think that twin peaks with the initial attention it got allowed all the other networks to say, lets do something different. No more schools, no more asin plexes. You can sense trying to see how they could do things different than they have done five or ten years ago. Sometimes that led to really challenging Network Television that was cool and fun to watch. Sometimes it just seemed to fall off the edge a little bit. Lets be careful out there at the time, Steven Bochco was a very successful producer of hour dramas and wanted to try something brandnew. Were the police we have a warrant for your arrest. So his idea was to combine a gritty cop show with a broadway musical. I saw one in which a bunch of gang bangers were in jail. They began to sing. Life in the hood aint no pizza pie, everybody die when the bullets fly. Life in the hood aint no pizza pie, people die when bullets fly and i said wait a minute. I thought this is it. This is great. This is going to be as innovative as anything i have ever done. He is guilty, he is guilty, judge, you can see it in his eyes he did the crime and now hes got to pay it circled the drain. With advil liquigels, what bad shoulder . What headache . Advil is relief thats fast strength that lasts youll ask. What pain . With advil liquigels a hotel can make or break a trip. And at expedia, we dont think you should be rushed into booking one. Thats why we created expedias addon advantage. Now after booking your flight, you unlock discounts on select hotels right until the day you leave. Addon advantage. Discounted hotel rates when you add on to your trip. Only when you book with expedia. Well, esurance makes it simple and affordable. In fact, drivers who switched from geico to esurance saved an average of 412. Thats auto and Home Insurance for the modern world. Esurance. An allstate company. Click or call. Paying too much for insurance that isnt the right fit . Well, esurance makes finding the right coverage easy. In fact, drivers who switched from geico to esurance saved an average of 412. Thats auto and Home Insurance for the modern world. Esurance. An allstate company. Click or call. The following movie is rated r. In 1990, 91, there was not a whole lot of original programing for cable, but they were airing movies. So we needed to compete and i felt that if we didnt, we were going to kind of get swept out. So i came up with a notion of doing a cop show that was rrated. When abcs broadcast standards read our script, they went berserk. I was sitting with a pad and a Pencil Drawing pictures of breasts to try to show them what we would show and what we wouldnt show. Grownups sitting in a room doodling. Then we started on the language. We heard it with the brains of a flea and the balls of a moth. The program premiered with an advertising boycott. Channel 7, shame on you but it was such an immediate hit, that boycott lasted, oh, four weeks. They could use the nudity and the curse words to go deeper into the actual emotional burden of being a cop. Im an asshole. And it had this character, andy sipowicz. He is a raging alcoholic, racist, sexist, violent. He created the tv antihero. I know the great africanamerican George Washington carver discovered the peanut. But can you provide names and addresses of these friends . You know, youre a racist scumbag. Despite his flaws, despite his prejudices, i think people identified with his pain. I wish there was a way to say this that wouldnt hurt you. Theres a famous episode where they are investigating the rape and murder of a young boy. And they find a homeless Child Molester who murdered the kid and sipowicz to get the confession has to be very sensitive and very good cop. I know this has to be tearing you up inside. But youre going to feel a lot better if you just tell the truth. You can sort of see on dennis franzs face this is killing him to not destroy this guy right now. Finally, he gets the confession he gets the signed statement. He walks out of the room, he goes into another Interrogation Room and he breaks the door in two with his fist. And im choking up talking about it right now, because thats how great a moment of tv that it is. 20 years from now, the best tv dramas, what do they look like . I dont know. Will they be bolder than what we see today . Oh, assuredly, assuredly they will be. The 90s gave us several shows that didnt explode in the ratings, but were influential to other people making television. Homicide is one of them. Shell me with questions all night im living in a danger zone Homicide Life On The Street was really innovative in terms of its style. It used music in ways that advanced the narrative and also used Feature Film Directors that brought a look and style to the
show that really stood out on television. Tears coming out of your eyes. Aint no tears coming from my eyes. Those eyes are brimming with tears. They had so many africanamerican characters in the cast that on several occasions they were the only people on Camera Interacting with one another. And that sounds like, so . But as late as the 90s, that wasnt done on television. When a cop shoots somebody, he stands by. He picks up the radio mic and calls it in. He stands by the body. If not, cops are no better than anybody else. In the 90s, television was getting more complicated, stories were starting to become more episodic and characters were starting to develop and change. None of that happened on law order. This was a show that completely delivered on its formula every time. You get a crime, you got the investigation into the crime. You better be packing more than a dirty mouth. You got an arrest. Whats the charge . Hey, im asking you a question. Whats the charge . Theres no charge. This ones on us. Then you had a trial. Hes badgering, your honor. Sit down and shut up. Overruled. You will address the court from now on, mr. Mccoy. So every time you watched you got what you came for. Tell me, doctor. All those women you ran through your examination rooms, do you remember their faces or did you not even bother to look up . You had in law order the kind of characters people take to heart. Ill let you take me to lunch. Onetime offer. And if youre an actor and you say well, gee, maybe its not really such a bad medium after all. Miranda, the supreme courts mimic decision. The whole thing was illegally obtained. They were both represented by counsel. You just get hooked in. Its life and death and stuff. We know what you did. Counsel. You hear me . Do you hear me . Look at me law order was like crack. Youd have to sit and watch me for 50 minutes just like, not moving, barely breathing. Theres times i have almost passed out watching law order. I need your help. E. R. Had originally been written as a movie, forced Steven Spielberg to direct. We had this twohour piece which was michaels reflection of experiences as a medical student. You need a large in case theyre bleeding. Do you know how to start an i. V. . Actually, no. E. R. Is a hospital show, but its really an action movie. Three walking wounded. Red urgent, yellow critical and black a gurney. Got it. A gurney comes in, people are shouting instructions, climbing on the body and doing cpr and racing off to the surgical suite. Get that gurney out of there someone wanders in. Theyre tossing around medical jargon. They dont stop to explain what it is. Prep for a peritoneal lavage. I think i know what that is now, but only because i watched a lot of e. R. Over the years. You try. We can bypass him. That would be the fastest way. What do you think . Youre the attending. There was so much information coming at you that i think it made the experience feel as if you had to watch it in the same way that youd watch a film. You had to stay involved in it the whole time. Come on, ben. Hold on, buddy. Hold on. There was a lot of research that said people didnt want to watch anybody have anything other than a happy outcome. Its not flat line, its defib. Another line of epi. We argued that wasnt really showing what the world was for physicians. I had unbelievable amount of respect for the people who did this because i understood how human they were. We got married after college. And had twin boys. But then one night, a truck didnt stop. But thanks to our forester, neither did our story. And thats why well always drive a subaru. Mayor maybe theyre Justnts Posinan ordinary couple. Uple. Either way, this room came at an unbeatable price. No one looks out for you,
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you must never miss an opportunity to tell these people how much they mean to you. We had been through so much together. You spend so much time with the same set of people, it does become your family. I feel pretty lucky to have the friends i do. I think the legacy of cheers is our need to belong. And i think thats what we as americans are longing for. Thank you, guys. The final scene of cheers was really what was sams real first love. You can never be unfaithful to your one true love. Im the Luckiest Son Of A on earth. His real first love was the bar. Sorry, were closed. How big of a loss was this for nbc . Out of the sad, sad sorrow and being scared to death that i would quickly lose my job i was like what are we going to do . In the 90s cable was coming on strong. We had to examine who we are going to be. We wanted to be smart, sophisticated comedy. Six months ago i was living in boston. My wife had left me, which was very painful. Then she came back to me. Which was excruciating. I thought frasier was dead with cheers. But we thought, we got a builtin audience, and great
potential to build out the character to another place. Frasier was kind of like oneact plays. Mother and i moved here when i was a small boy after the tragic death of my father. I kept the pain of that loss buried deep within me like a serpent coiled within a damp cave. Okay, thats it. We always assumed the audience was smarter than most other people did. And we played to that. Just unschooled like liza doolittle. Henry higgins. Shell be ready for a ball in no time. Leave it to you to put the pig back in pygmalion. Kelsey grammar played pom positive like nobody youve ever seen and got huge laughs. Dont consider a move until my fingers have completely cleared the piece. Whats taking so long . But i am analyzing my options
unlike your wingit approach i like to plan a strategy, like a general leading his troops into battle. Checkmate, schwarzkopf. I think frasier stands as the single most successful spinoff, at least in the history of sitcoms. And the emmy goes to frasier. Frasier. Frasier. At the height of mustsee tv, thursday nights on nbc, 75 million americans watched thursday night. That was at the time onethird of the country. Ooh what is this stuff . The sweater is angora. Well, its wonderful. The machine that was nbc in the 90s For Comedy was untouchable. Youre not from around here, are you . It generated so much viewership and money and awards. You do not need this. Its the top of our wedding
cake. Were not its not a scrapbook, its a freezer. No we were all kind of part of we certainly associate nbc of the 90s of having extremely successful sitcoms but they werent the only network that found their way to having some success. Tgif was on abc on friday, and it was their block of familyoriented comedies. I cant take it. I need the cake. It was not sophisticated television. But these were shows that people adored. [ laughing and snorting ] cbs. Cbs was in a really bad spot. They had just fallen apart over the early part of the 90s and had gone through a couple Different Network executives. But then suddenly they had this hit with an unknown comic. This was the year of seinfeld, no hugging, no learning, and this was a show being made as if it was produced in the era of the Dick Van Dyke show. I love you. There was hugging. There was learning. I love you, son. All right, all right. If you worked for me, your job was so go home, get in a fight with your wife and come back in and tell me about it. Dont sleep on the couch. I just cleaned down there. In fact, the pilot i put in this true thing that happened to me wherein i sent my parents a gift for the holidays of the fruit of the month club. And did you know you sent me a box of pears from a place called fruit of the month. Thats right. Thats right. How are they . And my mother reacted as if i had sent her a box of heads from a murderer. Why did you do this to me . Oh my gosh. I cant talk. Theres too much fruit in the house oh what is happening . What do you think we are, invalids . We cant go out and get our own fruit . I tried to tell him. All right. Im cancelling the fruit club. The real story is where the real connection with your audience is. Thank god, all your families are crazy, too. Looks like you got the whole family together. Yeah, yeah, its dysfunction palooza. Happy anniversary dinner, darlin. Can this much love be cleaned by a little bit of dawn ultra . Oh yeah one bottle has the Grease Cleaning Power of three bottles of this other liquid. A drop of dawn and grease is gone. Well, sensationalism sells. In a plea bargain, 18yearold amy fisher got up to 15 years in prison for shooting the wife of her alleged lover. So intense is the interest in it this case there are three, three madefortv movies now in the works about it. You make money off sex. You make money off death. You make money off crime. The press calls the case the Beverly Hills mansion murders. The story reads like a script that circulates here in hollywood. We enter into the Television News soap opera. A story of basic instincts, anger and fear. I was scared and i just wanted him to leave me alone. And so, Broadcast Journalism loses its purity and becomes much more shoddy and sensationalistic. And then it all comes together with o. J. Simpson. Im larry carrol in los angeles. The los angeles District Attorney has just filed murder
charges against o. J. Simpson. I have to interrupt this call. I understand were going to go to a live picture in los angeles. Police believe that o. J. Simpson is in that car . The o. J. Simpson story starts with the chase and then goes on to his arrest and then culminates with the trial, which goes on and on and on and is televised day after day after day. This is going to be a long trial. Theres a lot of evidence to come in. The o. J. Simpson case was such a National Phenomenon that those of us who were covering it just lived this case 24 hours a day because there was so much demand for people talking about it. As simpson struggled to slide the gloves on to his hands and turned to a juror saying theyre too small, prosecutors were incensed. The trial was on television during the hours that had traditionally been the time for soap operas. He appears to have pulled the
gloves on, counsel. And o. J. Was very much a soap opera. Impeached by his own witness. I ask you to put a stop to it. Excuse me, mr. Bailey. Will you stand up and speak when its your turn. No question that the best tv show of the 90s was the o. J. Simpson trial, and everybody on it was riveting. The Simpson Trial finally winding to a close. We the jury in the above entitled action find Orenthal James simpson not guilty of the crime of murder. In violation of penal code section 187a the verdict of the o. J. Simpson trial viewed by 150 million people. Its more people than watch president ial election returns. Thats crazy. Because there was trial footage every day, cnn saw its audience increase like five times. The success of cnn was not lost on other people. And so there were competing forces coming into play. How delighted i am we have now reached this moment when we can firmly announce the starting of a fox news channel. Unfortunately, with cable news and the ability or the need to be on the air 24 7, where you try to get as many eyeballs as possible at one time, to gravitate toward those stories that are sensational, it brought us the ability to go too far. Is the Jonbenet RamseyMurder Investigation turning into a media circus . Yes, its tabloid. But on the other hand its a tabloid era. Heres the point. Heres where the fear comes into it, i think, larry. Its the fear that says, gosh, if we dont cover it big time, our competition is. When they cover it big time, theyll get a big jump in the ratings. The