TELEVISION
BOROFF, DAVID
ON TELEVISION By David Boroff A Cultural Nonexchange People who write for a living —especially those in the more intellectual, less remunerative areas some call "dirty shirt journalism"— often...
...And there it was above us, imperiously blinking its commands...
...The academics included sociologist Herbert Gans, novelist Harvey Swados, a lexicographer, a professor who has written a good book on satire, and me...
...To make sure there would be some rapport, Hazard chose perhaps the most appealing program available—That Was the Week That Was (TW3...
...To the amazement of some of the academics, the TW3 people declared that they wanted their ideas—oneliners, skits, satiric germs...
...The tempo of the staging was adjusted to their expectations...
...Introduce yourself to your neighbor...
...It was all in all a highly instructive evening...
...It struck me as fairly routine fare...
...During the recent Modem Language Association meeting in New York, it was his piquant idea to bring together some academicliterary types and some hard-bitten TV professionals...
...A year's-end program, it had some sardonic lines commemorating 1964's follies, a few songs, and two reasonably diverting skits...
...What struck me most was their frank helplessness about the nature and dynamics of humor...
...At the runthrough, in addition to the academics, there were the usual itinerants from places like Teaneck who had patiently waited in line in the lobby to catch the act...
...I suppose that what we reacted against was the disproportion between the feverish effort—all those people up front consulting and arranging and fussing—and the modest results...
...The professionals see things in terms of the moment —the line that draws a laugh, the sight gag that works...
...All the Aristotelian hair-splitting about the difference between farce and satire came to nothing...
...Nancy Ames was as pretty as one expected but more crisply professional, more career-driven than the public persona would suggest...
...Just be friendly," he continued...
...Thus, there was a vulgar MC (not for the program but for the audience) who said, "We want your spontaneous applause, and that's why we have installed an applause sign...
...Despite all the good will, one couldn't help observing how sealed off we really were from each other...
...The TW3 people, chronically self-deprecatory, declared later that this was a weaker show than usual...
...He is Patrick Hazard, chairman of the English Department of Beaver College...
...But did they...
...It was the academics who on this occasion pontificated about satire...
...Then the runthrough began...
...One person in particular has become a kind of one-man embassy in that other country of television...
...Then there are occasional academicians who make forays into the New Babylonia...
...they inhabit the poverty sector of TV (although it hardly looked poor to us...
...During the recent Presidential campaign, their time was preempted in favor of political oratory more often than they liked...
...I'm Adolf Hitler" (dutiful laughter from the Teaneck contingent...
...Their show, alas, is in trouble...
...But for the most part, the two cultures co-exist uneasily—the highbrows sneering malevolently, the lowbrows consoling themselves with wealth and success...
...The performers and writers were indignant...
...Generally, though, the TW3 people were literate and modest—so much so that we were deprived of our reflex of intellectual contempt...
...The evening was fun, but nothing could come of it...
...There are always efforts at rapprochement...
...Instead of monied arrogance, they presented a troubled face...
...The TW3 people are nervous pragmatists who try and try again, stumble and recover, hoping something will click...
...First of all, no matter how acerbic the satire, how serious the intent, TV cannot escape the contaminations of show-biz...
...ON TELEVISION By David Boroff A Cultural Nonexchange People who write for a living —especially those in the more intellectual, less remunerative areas some call "dirty shirt journalism"— often peer wistfully at that Other World of high tensions and higher earnings one finds in mass culture...
...Jack E. Leonard, bloated into his accustomed weight, was on hand as a visitor, "spritzed" the audience with some gags, did an obscene twist, and was pushed into the wings...
...The academics were prisoners of abstractions, sawing the air with ideas...
...The refugees from the MLA meeting sat through a run-through of a TW3 program (NBC), had a sumptuous dinner, then after watching the actual five broadcast on a screen, met with the TW3 people who then had their dinner...
...Help...
...Later that evening, the great confrontation took place...
Vol. 48 • February 1965 • No. 3
