Just wanted to drop in and say how much I enjoyed this podcast. In particular your dissection of television from the various ages and the changes it reflected from society. I have noticed, for instance, that my favorite decades for movies and knowledge base of the actors, are mostly those of 40's and the 70's. ....and that the young movie actors of the 40's became the T.V. actors and writers of the 70's? This brings up a particular phenomenon that was ubiquitous in the 70's that I had forgotten: For some reason, one of the premium channels ran "The Towering Inferno" a month or so back. The leading men (Heston, Lorne Green..ect) were in their 50's..60's?, but their love interests were all women in their 20's. Remember that? I was a quite common occurrence in movies and television. Old to middle aged men losing their wives and hooking up with women in their 20's and 30's, or as it would be described now...ewww. The broader point being that the men of the "Grey Flannel Suit" , now the "Madmen" era ran things (including all of the entertainment industry) in this country long past their normal time of influence. It is how we ended up with a doddering senile President for two terms in the 80's as well. Pop culture largely reflected the things they were going through...for many decades after their prime. In the 70's these men went through their mid- life crisis period, and all the television shows began featuring broken families (as you pointed out)..and their dreams of younger women ( In Towering Inferno, Heston abandons his wife Ava fucking Gardner! for 20 something..Genevieve Bujold). They may have even killed off Gardner for convenience sake...I couldn't make it through the whole atrociously acted movie..) But one question: I am a year younger than you (born a month after the President), but my parents were born in the 20's, in fact my dad was a WWII pilot. Does that make me a boomer, while the President, whose grandparents were of my parents generation....not a boomer? Anyway, this is getting too long.. Thanks again for a great podcast.
My upbringing was so far afield of a typical boomer that I would refrain from making comments about the 'Mad Men' generation. But following Plato's advice,'when the mode of the music changes', I divide boomers into the folk music wave, who were idealistic enough to get they heads busted in the South, the Hendrix wave who got their heads busted in anti-war protests and the disco wave who said, ahh fuck it. None of them took a serious look at the working world which was a major concern of the generations that came before them and for which none they are paying a very heavy price.
I tend to keep the generational markers flush with the decades, the forties and fifties producing the Boomers, the sixties and the seventies Generation X, and the eighties and nineties the millenials. Driftglass's attitudes and experiences (insofar as he's related them online) sound very Gen-X to me. Some people have this thing called "Generation Jones" or "That Seventies Show Generation" that was born from about 1956 to 1966. (I can just imagine Driftglass and Jackie getting into a dust-up in Eric Foreman's basement!)
5 comments:
Remember, kids: America's dark history concerning slavery and racism was inherited from their British masters.
Good afternoon, Mr. Glass.
"Franimal." Tee hee.
Enjoy your weekend.
---Kevin Holsinger
Just wanted to drop in and say how much I enjoyed this podcast.
In particular your dissection of television from the various ages and the changes it reflected from society.
I have noticed, for instance, that my favorite decades for movies and knowledge base of the actors, are mostly those of 40's and the 70's.
....and that the young movie actors of the 40's became the T.V. actors and writers of the 70's?
This brings up a particular phenomenon that was ubiquitous in the 70's that I had forgotten:
For some reason, one of the premium channels ran "The Towering Inferno" a month or so back. The leading men (Heston, Lorne Green..ect) were in their 50's..60's?, but their love interests were all women in their 20's. Remember that? I was a quite common occurrence in movies and television. Old to middle aged men losing their wives and hooking up with women in their 20's and 30's, or as it would be described now...ewww.
The broader point being that the men of the "Grey Flannel Suit" , now the "Madmen" era ran things (including all of the entertainment industry) in this country long past their normal time of influence. It is how we ended up with a doddering senile President for two terms in the 80's as well.
Pop culture largely reflected the things they were going through...for many decades after their prime. In the 70's these men went through their mid- life crisis period, and all the television shows began featuring broken families (as you pointed out)..and their dreams of younger women ( In Towering Inferno, Heston abandons his wife Ava fucking Gardner! for 20 something..Genevieve Bujold).
They may have even killed off Gardner for convenience sake...I couldn't make it through the whole atrociously acted movie..)
But one question: I am a year younger than you (born a month after the President), but my parents were born in the 20's, in fact my dad was a WWII pilot. Does that make me a boomer, while the President, whose grandparents were of my parents generation....not a boomer?
Anyway, this is getting too long..
Thanks again for a great podcast.
My upbringing was so far afield of a typical boomer that I would refrain from making comments about the 'Mad Men' generation. But following Plato's advice,'when the mode of the music changes', I divide boomers into the folk music wave, who were idealistic enough to get they heads busted in the South, the Hendrix wave who got their heads busted in anti-war protests and the disco wave who said, ahh fuck it. None of them took a serious look at the working world which was a major concern of the generations that came before them and for which none they are paying a very heavy price.
I tend to keep the generational markers flush with the decades, the forties and fifties producing the Boomers, the sixties and the seventies Generation X, and the eighties and nineties the millenials. Driftglass's attitudes and experiences (insofar as he's related them online) sound very Gen-X to me. Some people have this thing called "Generation Jones" or "That Seventies Show Generation" that was born from about 1956 to 1966. (I can just imagine Driftglass and Jackie getting into a dust-up in Eric Foreman's basement!)
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