Married . . . With Children
 1 9 8 7 - 1 9 9 7 (USA)
262 x 30 minute epoisodes
Set in Chicago, Married With Children is a parody of
American television's tendency to create comedies dealing with
perfect families a la The Cosby's (Coincidentally the top
rating TV show in the US when MWC premiered in 1987).
The creators of MWC had previously produced The
Jeffersons (a long running comedy about a black entrepreneur
who becomes wealthy and moves his family to an almost all-white
New York City neighbourhood).
This time they presented patriarch Al Bundy, failed shoe
salesman, whose family motto is "when one of us is
embarrassed, the others feel better about ourselves."
Al Bundy hates fat women, tries to relive his days as a
high-school football hero, and does almost anything to avoid
having sex with his housework-shy, chain-smoking spouse Peggy.
"You know what I would do if I was President? I'd take a
big empty state, that nobody's using, y'know, like Idaho, and I'd
pack every pregnant woman in the country into donut trucks, and
convoy 'em all to Boise. And since Idaho means nothing anyhow, I'd
change the name to Preg-naho".
Peggy's clothes are too tight, her hair too big, make-up too
thick, and heels too high, and she wants sex as much as Al wants
to avoid it. She also loves to shop (her ability to buy always
exceeding Al's capacity to earn), and refuses to cook so the
Bundys must take desperate measures in order to eat (frequently
searching beneath the sofa cushions for crumbs of food).
The Bundy's beautiful but dumb blonde daughter, Kelly
(Christina Applegate), is a frequent target of their naive con
artist son, Bud.
Kelly (pictured below) can never manage to find the right word
and her verbal confusions are hilarious: "Remember,
attraction is a three-way street. Or is it a one-way tunnel? Hmm,
in any case, I do know it's a four-lane highway, but it takes two
to use the car-pool lane".
 More
importantly, she has tremendous hooters and will seemingly have
sex with any available male (In one episode she acquires backstage
passes to a rock concert and announces she is 'just one paternity
suit away from a Caribbean home').
The Bundy's think Bud has no chance of ever attracting a date,
and running jokes mention his collection of pornographic magazines
(Big 'Uns) and blow-up rubber women.
The other continuing characters in MWC are the upscale
next door neighbours, Jefferson and Marcy D'Arcy. Marcy and her
husband serve as a device to entice and challenge the Bundy clan,
then put them down.
Marcy is a banker and activist for almost any cause. She
marries Jefferson while drunk and discovers him in her bed the
next morning. He has no career although he has claimed to be a
clever criminal, now living in the witness protection program.
Marcy's first husband, Steve Rhoades, also makes frequent guest
appearances.
The show has had a history of arguments with the censors
(hardly surprising as episodes focus on sex, crime and anti-family
values).
An episode entitled 'Her Cups Runneth Over' later caused a
stir. The program told of Peggy's need for a new bra, which
coincided with her birthday. Al and Steve travelled to a lingerie
shop in Wisconsin where an older male receptionist wore nothing
below the waist but women's panties, a garter belt, stockings and
spike heeled shoes. Steve fingered leather-fringed falsies
attached to the nipples of a near-naked mannequin and women
flashed their T-Shirt potatoes at Al and Steve (though the nudity
was not shown on camera).
One US viewer, suburban Detroit housewife Terry Rakolta, took
offence at the show after the bra episode, complaining that both
the language and partial nudity were unacceptable for viewing
during a time when children made up a large portion of the
audience.
She acted by writing to advertisers and asking them to question
the association of their products with Married With Children's
content. She also brought her argument to national television news
shows (including Nightline, Good Morning America and
Today), saying;
"I picked on Married With Children because they
are so consistently offensive. They exploit women, they
stereotype poor people, they're anti-family. And every week that
I've watched them, they're worse and worse. I think this is
really outrageous. It's sending the wrong messages to the
American family".
 Regardless,
by 1989 the show was winning its ratings slot consistently, and by
1995 had become the longest-running situation comedy on US network
television, on the air as long as the classic comedy Cheers.
MWC helped put Fox on the network map and, in return, it
enjoyed a 10-year lifespan, running from April 1987 to July 1997,
well after Rakolta launched her crusade and got her name in so
many papers.
Executive producer Pamela Eells pointed out before the launch
of the 1996 season, "the audience at home never hears the
funniest stuff (on other shows) because it's either too crass or
too outrageous or too silly. On this show, it all goes in".
Ultimately the jokes became routine and expected, even though
still funny, but the show has had an extremely lucrative afterlife
in daily syndication, running strongly for years in many markets,
both in the USA and overseas.
After all . . . who will ever forget 'The Bundy Bounce' ?
|
