What’s everybody watching?
While desperately searching for a topic for researching this week’s column, I found myself reading through the Wikipedia entry for “January 19,” and discovered that on this day 65 years ago, nearly three quarter of Americans with television sets watched that week’s episode of “I Love Lucy.” And from the episode’s Wikipedia description, it’s easy to see why this was “must see TV”:
“January 19, 1953: Almost 72% of all television sets in the United States are tuned into ‘I Love Lucy’ to watch Lucy give birth.”
Whoa! Talk about pulling out all the stops for sweeps week! In 1953 no less!
OK, OK — before any of you compose condescending emails to me with openings like “Dear Chowderhead,” I know that this episode didn’t literally depict Lucy while giving birth. In fact, Wikipedia further notes that scripts for the episode “were reviewed by a rabbi, a minister, and a priest in order to make sure it would not be offensive.” Which makes sense for a sitcom since, as we’ve learned from countless jokes, putting a rabbi, a minister and a priest together is comedy gold. In fact, I’m surprised they didn’t also run the scripts by a guy who walks into a bar.
Still, it’s kind of a shame that the network didn’t take audiences into the delivery room, since viewers would have no doubt enjoyed the scene where the doctor tells Lucy to push and she responds by grabbing her husband by the lapels and screaming out her signature “Waaaah, Ricky!”
But that’s not why I bring up the topic. I’m actually more struck by the fact that back then a single television show could capture such a high percentage of Americans’ attention at the same time. These days the most-watched show on TV every year is the Super Bowl, but less than half of the American public tunes in to the game, and half of them only do it to see the commercials.
The reason, of course, is that today we enjoy so many more media options compared with 65 years ago, when viewers had, at most, three TV channels to choose from. Frankly, it’s a wonder even more people weren’t watching “I Love Lucy” that night — what on earth could have been more compelling than the birth of Little Ricky that demanded their attention? The crop report?
Since the heyday of “I Love Lucy,” we’ve enjoyed an exponential expansion in the diversity of entertainment options, whether through the hundreds of cable TV channels we can watch, the countless movies and TV shows streaming on Netflix, and all those videos that pop up on our Facebook pages and start to play whether we want them to or not. But all this content has come at a cost to the collective culture. Back in January 1953, pretty much any American who had enough money to own — or know someone who owned — a TV set was well aware of the new arrival in the Ricardo household. This was true no matter your income level, how old you were, or where you lived. Excepting perhaps if you lived in a particularly rural area, in which case maybe you were glued to the crop report.
This communal TV experience was still in effect when I grew up in the 1970s and ’80s. Back then you could be confident that most of your classmates or coworkers would be just as consumed as you were by the critical TV-related questions of the day, including, “Who shot J.R.?”, “When are Sam and Diane finally going to get together?” and “Did Fonzie make a tragic mistake by deciding to waterski over a deadly man-eating shark without first removing his signature leather jacket?”
No more. Not only do we all watch different shows, but thanks to smartphones, today a group of people can all be in the same place while watching different TV shows — and they often do, whether at home in the living room, dining out at a restaurant or on the floor of the House of Representatives.
Nevertheless, I think it’s time to buck this trend. Which is why, in the spirit of “giving back,” by which I mean “making a lot of money,” I have come up with an idea for a TV show I believe everyone will want to watch.
Taking its cue from “I Love Lucy,” my show is also pregnancy themed. But instead of a sitcom, it’s a reality show pitting 10 pregnant women against one other in a no-holds-barred battle to the … birth. Like other reality shows, each episode will feature challenges, like contests to see which mom-to-be can eat more pickles and ice cream in one sitting and races to fill shopping carts with overpriced child-rearing necessities.
Each week’s winner would also earn special privileges like use of a coveted maternity pillow to sleep with and free legal representation for any cast member who assaults someone for commenting that she “looks like she’s about to pop.”
Just imagine the skyrocketing ratings as the moms all race to the epic finale to see who’s the last one to give birth … or maybe who has the biggest baby — I haven’t worked out all the details yet. But don’t worry, I’ll figure it out. Possibly with the help of a rabbi, a minister and a priest.
Malcolm welcomes reader emails (that don’t begin with “Dear Chowderhead,” that is) at CultureShlock@gmail.com.
