Which decade produced the most innovative/creative television?

[Deja Q]

I'd say the 1960s. While technology and budgets have improved over the years, this decade produced the widest variety of shows. Since then people have been only remaking the same stuff, just with higher budgets and actors who may or may not grasp the material.

[Faygo Kid]

1. "The Smothers Brothers," "Laugh-In"

Dick Van Dyke, Andy Griffith, Beatles on Ed Sullivan - the '60s reflected the creativity of the times (flame me, you youngsters).

[Deja Q]

4. Laugh-In is way-cool

I've been meaning to see The Smothers Brothers as well...

I've got 12 eps of Laugh-In and I'm dying to get more and I don't get the one cable channel that airs the show. Being a relative youngster myself (31.6 years), I find the show to be fascinating. It's hip, it's mod, it's deliciously 60s, and it's extremely fast-paced - justly so. I'd say season 2 (1968-1969) was the best, with the best group of comedians involved, though season 1 did include Barbara Feldon as a regular, with Don Adams appearing on the show eventually... I think Ed Platt did too... And Lily Tomlin's inclusion possibly saved the show from an early grave... But not to forget Sammy Davis Jr, he was great... (I didn't care much for Joey Bishop though...)

At times the show takes great pleasure in pissing off the censors (e.g. the James Garner episode where Chelsea Brown said to James she couldn't kiss him (because she's black and he's white...) (a running gag was, in separate clips dotted throughout, the Laugh-In girls would do him a big kiss...) Anyway, he asks "Your place or mine?" and they walk off. Then the German dude appears and says "Veeery interesting, but right now there's a test pattern being shown in Birmingham!" LOL! Later in the show, they had my favorite guy, Alan Sues, trying to do the same kissing routine, you can imagine Mr. Garner's reaction - hilarious stuff, and the censors always wanted Alan to remain in the closet...! (the same episode also had a rare example of utterly unfunny humor, which in this case was racist as it horribly mocked the Chinese.)

What is the strangest is their use of the word "negro", though it's not used very often. It's just surreal that, in 1968, the word was mainstream and commonplace.

What's interesting is that the cable channel and all of the DVD releases ("Best of" series or the Guthy-Reckner series) are openly avoiding seasons 4-6. I can't fathom why... ??

[Snow]

7. There was some fine drama and cultural material on the tube in

the 50's - the Firestone hour, the Hallmark show, and some truly great comedy shows....burns & allen, your show of shows - some excellent variety shows - ed sullivan started in the 50's. And we had those quiz show scandale, too. It was a time when winning $64k was a big deal. The 60's was when you began to see some really stupid sitcoms - witness beverly hillbillys, a straight ripoff of real mccoys, certainly not destined for greatness itself.

Having said that, though, the whole anti-authoritarian culture resulted in some terrific stuff. SMothers brothers was fine, but for my money the best was TW3 - That Was The Week That Was.

[Faygo Kid]

9. You are dating yourself - but you're right

TW3 was excellent. Still got to go with "The Smothers Brothers," though. As for sitcoms, they were dumber in the '70s, and even dumber today (if I ever watched them, which I don't. Too old for the crap now).

[Snow]

14. *chuckle* Thought I'd already dated myself by

being able to remember the 50's shows. But I think turbulent times produces some good political tv. Now why the 80's tv was so bad, I do not understand - why the blazes weren't we rebelling like we did in the 60's? I'd guess there was still the resistance to the rebellions of the 60's and 70's going on; that's largely what Reagan's election was about. You could hypothesize that the current bush is another manifestation of that anti-rebellion fear. Security, it's amazing what people will pay to feel less afraid. It was one of the things that frustrated me the most when I lived in Korea, was the authoritarian crap people would put up with, even welcome, to feel safe. When I was there Pak Chunghee was the dictator, and although he was rough at least he was honest and not corrupt. But the pair that followed him, Noh Taewoo and Chun DOohwam, were brutal, vicious scoundrels - on the other hand, a few years of those jerks and even the most security-loving conservative Korean was ready for a progressive. I got a bit off topic, eh/ Ah, well.

[Cooley Hurd]

2. Those 70's shows...

With the introduction of shows like "All in the Family," "M*A*S*H," "Sanford & Son" & "SNL," TV turned a big cultural corner. Before that, TV was quite bland...

[montana_hazeleyes]

5. I voted the 70's

for the exact reasons as you.I was also thinking of "The Carol Burnette Show" which I loved.

[UrbScotty]

15. SNL, Three's Company (RIP John Ritter), Family Ties, and The Brady Bunch

How could you forget those last three?

[Cooley Hurd]

19. Those were great shows, but...

...I wouldn't consider them "cutting edge." AITF was innovative for its addressing of race and social issues, MASH was very clearly anti-war during Vietnam, Sanford & Son was important because it was the first all-black sitcom (since Amos & Andy), and SNL was the first topical comedy show whose irreverence showed that nothing was off-limits... Plus, FT premiered in 1982, so I couldn't count that...

[DoctorBombay]

20. Add Soap to that list

Televisions first gay character, played by Billy Crystal.

The spin-offs of AITF, Maude and The Jeffersons were important, too.

Can't forget The Rockford Files as well, one of the great shows ever on television.

[peekaloo]

17. add Mary Tyler Moore & Bob Newhart

for proving sitcom's could be intelligent and funny!


My lone vote in the 80's is 'Hill Street Blues'.

[Ellen Forradalom]

3. The 90s were not too shabby.

Seinfeld, Homicide, E.R., The X Files, the list goes on.

[Deja Q]

6. Roseanne, Ellen, Spin City

Roseanne started in the late 80s, but didn't really blossom until the 1990s anyway. :D

Ellen was always great, and her show was never "too gay". There were plenty of season 5 episodes where there was no sexuality talk and she kept the gay thing in check. Plenty of hetero comedies go far out in tems of flaunt, but Ellen did not.

And who'd not know of Spin City? :D Carter rules!

[BurtWorm]

8. The 1960s for the reasons you mention.

Actually the period coinciding with the anti-war movement in particular, from about 1966 to about 1974. Some of my favorite innovative programs from that period: The Children's International Film Festival with Kukla, Fran and Ollie; The Great American Dream Machine, on the fledgling PBS network; 21st Century with Walter Cronkite; The Smothers Brothers; The Avengers; Batman; CBS's presentation of RFI's Leaonardo (about da Vinci)...and many, many strange, oddball experimental TV shows that popped up now and again, including one occasional series actually called something like NBC Experimental Television Theater. NBC! We'll never see the likes of that again, excpet perhaps on channel 264.

[BiggJawn]

10. The 30's.

EVERYTHING was innovative, because it had never been done before. the 48-line Baird-system broadcasts on the BBC in the late 20's actually adressed the huge problems of bringing drama and entertainment to the new medium.
If it hadn't been for WWII, the "golden age" of the 60's might have happened in the 50's. "I Love Lucy" might have been in the late 40's.

[Cooley Hurd]

11. There were networks and programming before WW2...

...many don't know that. FDR had a 1939 RCA TV at his home in Hyde Park, NY. He was the first to appear on TV, too.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

12. The 1960's

One Step Beyond
The Twilight Zone
Thriller
The Outer Limits
The Avengers
The Prisoner
Star Trek
The Invaders

[elperromagico]

13. Should we put Ernie Kovacs down as 50s or 60s?

His kind of groundbreaking material wouldn't get played on network TV these days... it barely got played back then.

[peekaloo]

18. wasn't it Kovacs who said

"Television is a medium, because it is neither rare nor well done".

[randr]

16. 50s by far

This was the age of experimentation. Most all programing ideas were developed out of thin air. Many local shows aired live. Many national shows aired live and improvization ruled.
Most of todays programming follows early formates with few changes.

[Zuni]

21. the 1990s

One word--Seinfeld, Another--the Simpsons

[Raenelle]

22. Also in the 90s

the hour-long dramas that some TV critics think made the 90s the golden age of TV--ER, Law and Order, NYPD Blue, Sopranos, etc. The TV hour-long dramas are consistently, week-by-week, almost always better than 90% of movies.

And the comedies were good too. I'd add South Park, Friends, That 70s show, and especially Sex and the City. Also Curb Your Enthusiasm, Jon Stewart, Bill Maher--all 90s.