When I put together the list of the top 10 TV couples for my Valentine’s Day post, I had to leave someone out. And one of the last couples to be cut was Darrin and Samantha Stephens from Bewitched. Samantha was so in love, after all, that she didn’t even notice when Darrin was abducted by aliens and replaced by an entirely different person!
But anyway, I feel bad about leaving them out, so today’s Minisode Monday feature is Bewitched. This one features Dick York (the first Darren), as he tries to deal with the latest witchcraft-caused disaster to befall his family. Hilarity ensues, as always.
Sometimes, as you’re showing your kids classic TV shows, you realize certain character actors were just meant to play certain roles. I made two of those discoveries recently. Before he was Floyd the Barber, Howard McNear played Andy the Barber in an episode of Leave it to Beaver. He gave Wally a shave to help him save face in front of his friends during an episode called “The Shave.”
And before he was Little House on the Prairie’s Reverend Alden, Dabbs Greer was the minister who married Mike and Carol Brady. His contribution to the episode was looking heavenward and laughing bemusedly as Mike and Carol were covered in wedding cake. It was an acting master-stroke.
Valentine’s Day is the time when our minds turn to greeting cards, chocolate and, incidentally, love. And to celebrate, Pop Literate presents 10 TV couples who have taken a special place in our culture. If your kids want to know about real love — the good and the bad — just plop them down in front of these ten clips. (more…)
It’s almost Valentine’s Day, so this week’s Hulu Hump Day features Hearts Afire. (Get it? Hearts Afire?) It features a lot of people your kids should be aware of, mostly because they’re famous for other roles. John Ritter was better as Jack Tripper on Three’s Company. Markie Post was better as Christine Sullivan on Night Court. Billy Bob Thornton was better as Karl Childers on Sling Blade. But they were still very good here, and when you put them all together, and you have one of the best TV comedies of the ’90s.
One of the most hilarious complaints of entertainment moguls is that the Internet makes it possible for anyone — no matter how talentless — to clutter up our lives with bad art.
And maybe they’re right. If only we could go back to that Pristine Time of Yore, when benevolent gatekeepers stood guard over our attention to make sure we only saw quality entertainment programming. Programming like the 1994 hit Muddling Through.
“Pistol-packin’ Connie Drego had just been paroled from prison, where she had served three years for shooting her cheating husband, Sonny, in the butt, in this raucous comedy. She had returned home to go back to work at Drego’s Oasis, the family’s truck-stop diner/motel in rural Michigan.” –The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows
Ha ha! You’re laughing already, aren’t you? And perhaps you’re wondering what makes this show Minisode Monday-worthy.
Two words: Jennifer Aniston. Before she was a waitress at Central Perk, Jennifer Aniston was a waitress at Drego’s Oasis: the daughter of an ex-con, and the young wife of the ignorant cop who had put her mother away. It’s worth watching to see just how good Aniston is — that even in this mess of a show, she managed to convey that something that made her a star.
With last night’s Lost season premiere, time travel is all the rage in pop culture. But what do you get when you combine time travel with history and humor? Why, Peabody and Sherman, of course! They are intrepid time-travelers whom every child should know.
This week’s Hulu Hump Day video takes us back to the era of Don Juan. And to a time on television when an entire 5-minute segment could be nothing but an elaborate build-up for one of Peabody’s horrible puns. Watch and enjoy.
Just because this blog is about pop culture, doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy the finer things in life. I just want the finer things in life delivered to my living room on a television. Take painting: you can have your Picasso and your Rembrandt, but I prefer the world’s first and finest TV painter, Bob Ross.
Not only did Ross introduce thousands to The Joy of Painting, but he also helped fuel tens of thousands of peaceful afternoon naps with his laid-back PBS show. And his descriptions of “happy little clouds” and “happy little trees” remain a part of the language even today. Your kids needs to know Bob Ross for that reason alone. So here is a Bob Ross video for a new generation, combining painting and snowboarding. I dare you not to fall asleep.
Hey, hey, hey! Thanks to websites like Hulu, our children can experience important parts of pop culture history firsthand. It’s like teaching them to review primary sources for a history paper — without having to teach them to load a roll of microfilm into one of those annoying machines.
So I think part of my job for Pop Literate is to dig through the vast video archives of Hulu to bring you and your kids pieces of pop culture history. Today’s featured Hulu video: Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. In this clip, the kids use the wonders of live theater to take on the societal blight of graffiti. (After you’ve watched the clip, you’ll have the option of watching the entire episode.)
Minisodes are a great way to make kids more pop literate, in the time it would take them to find a clean pair of socks on their bedroom floor. The Minisode Network takes classic TV shows and distills them down to about 5 minutes. And that’s not as easy as it sounds, because the opening credits of some shows were like 3 1/2 minutes long.
For my first Minisode Monday, I’m offering an episode of Green Acres. If your children know only one ditzy Hungarian blonde, it should be Eva Gabor. Zsa Zsa got the men, but Eva got the comedic chops.
Incidentally, the little boy in the alien outfit is Buddy Foster, who you may recognize from such other roles as Mike Jones (The Andy Griffith Show), Wolf Boy (The Six Million Dollar Man), and Boy in Car (Foxes). Oh, and he’s also the brother of Jodie Foster, someone your kids might actually recognize.
Welcome to Hulu Homework, wherein I pick a classic clip and give you, my dear readers, an assignment. Today’s clip comes from Alfred Hitchcock Presents, one of the great TV dramas of all-time. And it features two actors, each of whom starred later in TV shows with their character name in the title. One of them may even be known to your children from a recent run on a reality series.
Your assignment:
1. Identify the actors.
2. Name the shows in which their character name appeared in the title.
3. Name the reality show on which one recently appeared.
Leave your answers in the comments. And no peeking. And if you want to watch the whole episode, you can do it here.
