Has there ever been a tv series that started one way, was thought not to appeal to “the average viewer” and so was “dumbed down” in some way, and as a result, actually got more popular with the public?
Or anything like that?
-FrL-
Didn’t Happy Days do that?
I’m not totally up on the history of the show, but as I understand it, it started out kind of in an “American Graffiti” vein, but the response to enigmatic character of Fonzi (he didn’t speak at the beginning, aside from about 2 or 3 words) and the switch to filming before a studio audience (who were allowed to cheer for the actors) contributed to dumbing it down a great deal. The characters became sort of charactures and they each had a catch-phrase (or two) to say. It really got hokey and over-the-top near the end there.
The Jump the Shark entry for Happy Days has a lot of comments about the history of its popularity that seems to be directly proportional to its quality.
Just to add, in case you didn’t know: The phrase “Jump the Shark” meaning when a show has ended as far as quality is concerned (though it may still go on for many seasons) came from the Happy Days episode where Fonzi donned waterskis and jumped over some sharks.
I don’t know if this qualifies as “dumbing down,” but the original Detective Chris Cagney in the series “Cagney and Lacey” was Meg Foster (Loretta Swit had played the role in a made for TV movie a year earlier).
Ratings were weak early on, and surveys suggested that viewers thought Foster wasn’t “feminine enough.” As a result, she was fired and replaced by Sharon Gless. The show became more popular soon afterward.
All of them?
“Married with Children” comes to mind. The characters were not quite as low class in the first season. Kelly Bundy, most notably, was not as stupid as she later became; she was merely loose. She was actually kind of interesting. But as she grew up (and out) her IQ grew down.
It seems most comedies eventually find their groove and then stick in it. When you finally find a gag for a character the audience expects to see it again.
Oh, and “Family Matters.” That did not start out as insipid as it became. But the Urkel character became popular and the show took off. That was also about a nice middle class family.
But then I don’t watch t.v. to be intellectually stimulated. I learned in college when I did not have time or a television that t.v. did not really mean that much to me (with the exception of some good shows and those only come along once in a blue moon). I rely on the internet now for mindless fun.
I thought Home Improvement did this. I quite liked it to start with, a bit out of the ordinary, but then Tim turned into this maladroit doofus who could never have possibly been hired for the job he did so I lost all interest.
Mission Impossible. The first season starred Stephen Hill, who was a brilliant mastermind – planning and monitoring the IMF, and making quick decisions when things went wrong. CBS wanted someone more action-oriented and the producers replaced him with Peter Graves (another factor was that Hill refused to act on Friday night or Saturdays). The show lost a lot once Hill was gone. (Also, in the first season, the tape was not always set to self-destruct – sometimes Briggs had to “dispose of this tape in the usual manner.”)
Not a TV show, but Pink Floyd achieved massive success once they watered down their music. Dark Side of the Moon was a clearly more bland and slick version of their sound, and it turned them from great to good, bombastic and popular.
I’ll submit a recent entry: Crossing Jordan which had a really nice visual narrative style that you could peg – almost poetic at times. Plus, I loved Ken Howard as Jordan’s Father.
AFter Hennessey had her kid, they came back and retooled it and even though there are still likeable characters on it, it is kind of meh these days.
Happy Days is an excellent example of going to hell – or a live studio audience, it seems to limit the scope and writing of a show and quality has a tendency to drop, but each successive season became more and more unwatchable.
Hill, as I understand it quit MI, because they wouldn’t honor his not filming on the Sabbath (he’s a practicing Jew and so, Friday sundown to Saturday night – no filiming for him). It was a great loss though.
Can we count spin-offs that took the initally interesting premise and just made it silly: I’m thinking Girl from UNCLE, Gloria, and amazingly enough – just when you thought a show couldn’t produce something more annoyingly stupid Alice writers shat out “Flo” which made Alice look like Shakespere.
I could rant for hours about this, but I do have work to do. . .
If I recall correctly (and I’ve never watched this show) Melrose Place started out as a at least quasi-serious drama which addressed tough issues and tried to be realistic. Then it turned into cheese, and became much more popular.
Good Times while never exactly brilliant, started out as a ghetto family with a strong father trying to hold things together. Once the character of J.J. took off, however, the influence of the father (and later, the mother) was so watered down they were eventually written out. It got so bad that even Jimmy Walker (J.J.) asked that his character be made less stupid.
“Now he’s stupid and whiney.”
Well yes and no. Yes, it did start out as an earnest, “issues” oriented drama, but it still addressed the issues in simplistic, addle-minded ways, and always featured cardboard-cutout characters played by great-looking but otherwise horrible “actors.” Thus, “Melrose Place” was not a case of dumbing down as much as it was a case of a show owning up to the fact that it was drivelous trash all along.