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Sharon Johnson 00:00
Welcome to 80s TV Ladies, part of the Weirding Way Media Network.

80s TV Ladies Theme Song 00:04
80s TV Ladies, so sexy and so pretty. 80s TV Ladies, steppin’ out into the city. 80s TV Ladies, often treated kind of sh#*ty. Working hard for the money in a man’s world. 80s TV Ladies!

Susan Lambert Hatem 00:23
Hello, I'm Susan Lambert Hatem.

And I'm Sharon Johnson. Welcome to 80s TV Ladies, where we explore female-driven television shows in the 1980s and celebrate the people who made them.

Last Season we looked at Cagney & Lacey, Scarecrow and Mrs. King and Remington Steele. This Season, we wanted to explore more comedies and half-hour ladies-driven sitcoms.

And we want to look at more diverse shows this Season. Our first Season was very homogenous. As Serita from 90s TV Babies put it, more white ladies doing white lady things.

Today we'll be talking about what shows we're going to be talking about this Season, just a little something to talk about. We're also going to be getting a little Advanced 80s TV Herstory.

We want to give you a sampling of some of these shows.

Kind of like a wine tasting, only for 80s television.

Indeed. On future episodes this Season, we'll be looking at the following shows, not ne cessarily in this order.

The Cosby Show spinoff A Different World starring Lisa Bonet, Jasmine Guy and Kadeem Hardison,

Designing Women starring Dixie Carter, Delta Burke, Annie Potts, Jean Smart, and Meshack Taylor. 227, a spinoff of The Jeffersons, which starred Marla Gibbs, Hal Williams and Regina King.

And we want to look at a sitcom that was called both It's A Living and also returned in syndication as Making A Living. It starred so many 80s TV Ladies, including Ann Gillian, Barry Youngfellow, and Emmy winner, Sheryl Lee Ralph from Abbott Elementary. We're so excited to take a look at these shows. Some of these show suggestions came from you, our listeners, so keep them coming. Go to 80sTVLadies.com and tell us what shows or ladies we should be talking about.

But we need a little framing for this Season. So we brought on a special guest today to kick us off and give us a little bit of advanced 80s TV Ladies her-story.

You know, Sharon, I found this guest because I was on the search to find other podcasts like us to make sure we weren't the only unicorn in the sea. Or that lonely whale, the 52 hertz whale that's crying out to find any other whale like it. Just a metaphor for the awesome loneliness of our lives. But we're not, we're not alone. I found Advancd TV Herstory, a podcast by Cynthia Bemis Abrams. She has been looking at women in television history for 140 episodes.

That's amazing.

I know, right? She's way more advanced than us. We're just babies. So we had to get her on the show.

Let's go.

In June of 2015, a far more innocent time, Cynthia embarked on bringing the backstories of women in and off television to audio with her podcast, Advancd TV Herstory. Her episodes connect the dots of television and feminism to American culture and politics. Advancd TV Herstory has built a vital history unmatched in podcasting.

Cynthia herself has a distinguished career in public relations and leadership consulting. In fact, it was teaching a leadership class of undergraduates that featured a look at the language and wardrobe of TVs Designing Women that led her to realize there's a lot to be learned from television. So she took her passion and made it happen with a podcast.

I love that. So welcome to 80s TV Ladies, Cynthia Bemis Abrams. Thank you for joining us.

Cynthia Bemis Abrams 03:53
Thanks for having me.

We really appreciate you taking the time to talk with us today.

Oh, I appreciate always having the chance to talk about TV and 80s TV and the women of 80s TV. So it's it's an honor to be here and dig into some of the subject matter that you guys love as much as I do.

Well, we're very excited. And again, we're ready to get our advanced degree now.

So to that end, if you wouldn't mind, tell us about your decision to and and the process you went through to create Advanced TV Herstory.

Well, thank you. It's a it's a fairly simple story, actually. I was at a point in my life where I knew I had extra time. My kids had gone off to college. We had just recently had some old people in the family die and you know, they're just gets a point where you all of a sudden have time, time to explore what you really understood to be passion. And I found a picture of what had been my office-- Air quotes, office when I was 8, 9, 10 years old, and the piles of Rona Barrett Magazines. So the whole love of TV had always been there. And I still have many of my Rona Barretts as well as others I've collected through the years. And I thought about the lessons, the lessons and some conversations I had with my kids and in class that I had been teaching, really realized that the 80s, well, and all of TV has a special role in our lives as women, as American women, worldwide women, actually when you realize the tremendous power TV has, and an area of feminism that is evolving, and needs to continue to be explored. And so rather than write a blog, which somebody would have done six or seven or eight years ago, I decided, oh, I can, I can write script, I can talk into a microphone. And so that's kind of where it started. It is called Advancd TV Herstory. And it is trademarked by the way, because I kind of thought it would be structured in a sense, like lessons. That my my likely audience was probably the only people who were listening to podcasts seven years ago were, you know, Gen, Gen Zers, millennials, maybe some Gen Xers and that I would try to dig deep into TV, either that they barely knew of, or didn't quite understand the context of. And then it's just kind of evolved since.

Well, this baby boomer has been listening to podcasts for over 10 years. I don't remember exactly how I got started, but I've been completely hooked on podcasts ever since then. When you were mentioning about 80s TV, what was it about that decade in particular for you that you felt that that was some place to kind of start?

Well, I don't know if you started with 80s TV, you cover everything.

I yeah, I I have tried really hard. I had a very old school sort of grid out in terms of trying to dig out the stories that both I felt passionate about, but also that hadn't been covered. And six and seven years ago, there weren't necessarily even the podcasts we have today with the Office Ladies and lots of fan driven, where it's a series-- Buffy the Vampire-- There are going to be series that I will never ever touch because I know that the fans already have that covered or the shows have been covered already. I did feel like I needed to do a certain amount with Mary Tyler Moore because she was essential and found my way through Jennifer Keshian Armstrong, who wrote the Mary, Lou Grant-- The book on-- It was a really great behind-the-scenes book. I knew that Cagney & Lacey at some point would need to get covered. And I didn't-- I was so early in it that I and I knew that it was such a seminal show. It is so important for so many reasons. And I never quite knew how to dig into it. So I did cover it in a few ways. And so when I was approaching the 80s, I think the biggest first Episode I did was about the 80s moneyed matriarchs, which was talking about Jane Wyman in Falcon Crest, and Barbara Bel Geddes in Dallas, and they were considered senior at the time. I have no idea how old they really--

They were probably 45.

Right! And then you had Angela Lansbury roll forward with yet a different kind of drama. And these are, these are legends. These were TV legends. These were older women who were allowed to have power. And that was really important for the 80s.

That is so interesting. We haven't looked at those yet the, you know, and Dynasty, I look as part of that. But I'm really excited when we get to get to them to look at that because like you're saying it's powerful women. And Falcon Crest has come up a lot. That one it's been called out by some of our guests as a show they remember particularly because of her. They remember her.

I think she was of that particular genre in the 80s Her character was probably the most powerful of the women matriarchs of those various shows for a number of reasons. Yeah, yeah, I watch a lot of TV.

Yeah, Sharon's, like the best consumer I know-- television podcasts. It's why it's why she's on the show.

Susan-Sharon 09:15
(Laughing)

You if you're gonna try to explain the importance of shoulder pads-- And and I think we are all sort of have the same-- We're within a couple of years age of each other all. Shoulder pads are really important. There really is a power component to shoulder pads as there is to hair. And that was something that in the 80s women needed to grasp-- how to show up at the powerful moment, looking their best. If they look their best, then it was pretty well understood that they had their stuff together.

Yeah.

And then that rolls over to Julia Sugarbaker in Designing Women, where she far more so than anybody else in that show, had the wardrobe that was the power wardrobe. And so it's worth an entire Episode, I think, to just focus in on what and why they had Angela Lansbury's wardrobe look the way it did and Jane Wyman's and Barbara Bel Geddes. And oh my god to do the wardrobe person for Designing Women would be fabulous. And even A Different World because wardrobe was really important and retail-- As we've seen now, retail is a very fragile industry.

Yeah. Well, and we are very excited. I mean, obviously about the wardrobe. We got to talk with the woman that played Francine, Martha Smith, the actress on Scarecrow, Mrs. King. And she talked a lot about basically trying to rein her wardrobe in a little bit. Because she felt that even though it was powerful, it was not necessarily a working-woman's wardrobe for an agent. But no one would listen to her because they wanted Francine in 80s--

Right.

And because she was a woman who had an opinion about what should happen to her character. But so I want to back up just a little bit and talk about a little more about your podcast and when you started, and kind of what, why you think representation is so important. Like why is it vital? What what happens when we see women?

I mean, that's a ,that is a question that I really believe is being asked much more frequently than it was seven years ago. I was stumbling over the words representation to try to help people, particularly women, white women understand it. I think it is much more it was more understood even eight and 10 years ago by people of color because they it's what they talked about of who isn't in this series. But white women baby boomers, were raised to be happy to be at the table. I get into trouble sometimes when I say this stuff, happy to be and things like that. But it was a, it was a very different time for feminism. And so I'm a very end baby boomer . What I remember saying and realizing was how important women's tennis was for me. Yes, Charlie's Angels, because in my mind, Charlie's Angels was not nearly as sexualized as evidently the rest of the world thought it was. I saw it as three women who for the most part, were catching the bad guy without a man interceding for them. And that was the you know, the Pepper Anderson in Police Woman was immediate. It was kind of what you'd consider immediately before--

Yeah.

Charlie's Angels. And Barney Rosensweig was a part of that. Bless his heart, he opened some very important doors. Barney Rosenzweig of Cagney, & Lacey. So it was somewhere in the Charlie's Angels and the tennis thing where if they can play tennis, I can play tennis. I play tennis, and I played and I played, and that's who I wanted to be. I wanted to be that. And it took me a long time of sort of just stumbling my way through life and careers and, and duties and obligations to realize just what a powerful impression that had made for me, that was totally lost, just totally lost in my life. I did not celebrate those performances, those games, those matches that were played the even the women's golf. Oh, don't get me talking about Dinah Shore. I thought all of this was really important. And I could be that. And I spent a certain amount of my life with men as gatekeepers who did not want me to be that. And who didn't want to open a door the way that Barney Rosensweig did for so many.

Yes, I mean, I think that we see that with a lot, I think of our generation. And we sort of have a span of generation here. But I think it's so different. Mostly because a lot, a lot of the gatekeepers for everybody, they're still there, but their power, in some ways has diminished because of the ability to communicate in so many different facets of our lives, information that we didn't have at our fingertips. And we do now. And it can be used for both good and evil. But you kind of can't put the information back in the box that everybody can now access.

I agree with that 100%. And as we think about all too often today, people are looking for the opportunity to become polarized and to not want to listen to somebody else. And we've lost the ability to have good conversations where people find things in common. And so what I often recommend at the end of episodes is particularly if it involves a series from the 60s or 70s, or now even 80s, is when you are struggling at the Thanksgiving Day table or at, you know, a family function to find something in common with the older person who perhaps is, you know, become a little isolated with how they receive information. Ask them what was their favorite TV show from the 60s or 70s and why. And more often than not, if it's a woman she's going to tell you perhaps That Girl or Mary Tyler Moore or, or Murder She Wrote or something. And then you ask why again, and you just keep asking why. And pretty soon they have given you their definition of representation.

I think that's brilliant. I think that's great. Television is so particularly, you know, if you keep coming back television was the medium where people had a shared view of American society.

Exactly. And events, you couldn't run from it. And the next morning at the watercooler, that's what everybody was talking about.

And that was also one of the advantages of a world with just three television networks because there was more of a sense of community because more people were watching the same things than now. And yes, it's great now to have the opportunity to watch a whole swath of things, but it does sort of fracture the ability to say to somebody Have you seen such and such? They probably are watching it and they may not have even heard of it, but for that era, that sort of watercooler-ness of television could be really helpful in stimulating conversation.

And I love the idea of of using it to stimulate conversation, because, you know, everybody watched All in the Family. And that's, you know, of a certain era, Mary Tyler Moore and All in the Family and The Jeffersons were watched by everyone

Or Maude or--

Yeah, yeah.

Even WKRP in Cincinnati, you just get get, you find that common part and, and people feel good. And that's, I think the more we can find the opportunity where there's a fond memory that then sort of eases people's defenses. They're going to realize that we really are all in this together and yeah.

And by God, sometimes you don't know that turkeys can't fly.

(Laughs)

'Chi-chi Rodrogueez.'

For those not in the know that's a WKRP reference.

Melissa Roth 16:53
Or Les Nessman.

Arguably the best episode, the most remembered Episode of WKRP. (sing) WKRP in Cincinnati.

I almost always seek that out on Thanksgiving because you just have to. It's it's just it's so classic.

You guys go look it up. We're gonna put it in the audioagraphy today.

You know, the the other asset or I think the other very good thing that happened in the late 70s and into the 80s was that we had TV series that were not just set in LA or New York. But Cincinnati being one, Minneapolis, Denver, Colorado, as we were talking a little bit offline about Dynasty, Dallas, Texas, Knott's landing. I mean, it was just it was they were other places, which was a reminder that life went on in places other than what we consider to be the coasts.

Right. And that's really fascinating. So you're in Minneapolis, which we also talked about a little bit. In my dream world, you move there for Mary Tyler Moore. Inspired by Mary Tyler Moore.

Well, I've actually I lived here for the first 50-some years of my life. And then we were in Chicago for six years. And now we've come back, and it feels good to be back. I live about a mile from the Mary Tyler Moore house. And I will I will send you a picture of where-- Not only of her house, which you can see online but then also where she was when she's washing the car. And then they kind of do that little panorama of a very small skyline.

Yes, yeah. Oh, that'd be so great. Okay, that would be fantastic. We want that. We'll have it on the website.

There's also a sculpture. TV Land did, a sculpture as well by Navy Pier of Bob Newhart sitting on a couch. And so you can go sit and have your, you know, have your picture taken with Bob Newhart. And in Minneapolis, you know, Mary, they have Mary, tossing her tam.

Oh, my God, a Hail Mary, as it were.

It is.

(Laughs) Oh, my, I'm so excited about all this as my husband will be. I mean, this podcast started because during pandemic, we started watching 70s and 80s TV. Not an unusual thing for us to do, because my husband's a TV writer, and producer, and we met over television shows in some ways. And literally, it was all of Newhart into the next Newhart Show. And then Mary Tyler Moore, and then we got into the 80s. And then I started having questions. And I was like, there should be a podcast.

And that's just by coincidence, I watched a couple of Mary Tyler Moore episodes yesterday. I hadn't watched in a long time, but they popped up and while I was doing housework and stuff I had it on and it was really great to walk back and take another look back at those shows.

Do you remember the episodes that you--

They both were in Season seven. The first one had to do with Sue Ann getting fired. And Lou trying to coerce Mary into hiring her. And Mary didn't want to do it.

Nooo!

Well, Lou had-- Lou basically said you now have the responsibility for hiring and firing. And Mary's like, Oh, that's great. And he says, By the way, so Sue Ann wants a job. It's up to you.

I love that

And then the second Episode owed Gordy, played by John Amos, hadn't been on the show since first Season. And he came back to visit the station. And he was about to go off and do a network talk show. And Ted was trying to get a job as his co-host on that show. It's great.

Betty White, man.

I know.

And Betty Ford.

And Betty Ford. and Betty Ford! Everybody was on that show. Holy crap.

All right. Sorry. We digress.

For all those young people out there and just go watch Mary Tyler Moore. Just do yourself a favor.

Yeah.

The two episodes that I watched didn't feel at all anachronistic. It was just about people and relationships. And it could happen today.

And it's very appropriate. We are talking about Mary Tyler Moore on anything regarding TV and women because those showrunners were so committed to having women writers. So that was really the, that was the series. And that launched a lot of different careers that, you know, they-- All of these women went off to write in other shows and become really credible in their own roles. So--

That access and someone making a choice, which they did in Mary Tyler Moore to seek out and lift up female writers and then let them move up. Because I was doing a little research on Cagney & Lacey recently because you know, Cagney & Lacey, and I was curious if it affected the number of women who went into the police force. Tom Cruise, like, like the first--

Top Gun.

Top Gun, you know, basically was a ad for the Air Force.

Navy.

Sorry. Yeah, see, I got-- That's where I am not a military--

I'm an Air Force brat, and my brother went to the Naval Academy. So I have a little bit more information--

And I know, Air Force and Navy are very--

It's not the same thing.

It's not the same. And what's interesting is the Navy flies off aircraft carriers.

Correct.

And so did Cagney & Lacey register a blip?

I haven't found the answer. I know. I haven't found the answer yet. But I did pull up a 1984 report from the NYPD where they talked about diversity from 1976 to 1984. There being a significant bump, both in women and minorities. And they were purposely trying to make their police force look like their city. And it sort of worked. But what was interesting was to find out that women weren't promoted.

Well, in parallel to Cagney & Lacey was Hill Street Blues, 1981 to 1987. And there you had Betty Thomas as one of the very few women in uniform depicted as a police officer. And I believe when I did that Episode, I did find something that said that her presence, and this was, you know, the toward the end of the series, there was a blip in women entering the police academies in some cities. I'm not sure what it was. And then of course, you had the Joyce Davenport character played by--

I'm not helping, ladies. Drawing a blank.

Veronica.

Yes, Veronica Hamel.

Veronica Hamel.

And their very capable, shoulder pads public defender. And so they were there were very distinct roles, which otherwise was a very masculine Thursday night.

Yes.

You know, heavy, heavy show. So we were very fortunate in the 80s. And I don't think that the pair from Hill Street Blues gets nearly the credit that they should and because Cagney & Lacey cleaned up in the best, you know, dramatic leading actress role in all of those years, it just--

Yeah, nobody else got to get a shot. Yeah.

Yeah.

Betty Thomas did very well as a director.

Yes, she did.

Yes. She went on to become a director. She did very well as an actress.

Yeah.

Did she direct the first Brady Bunch movie? I want to say? Betty Thomas, I mean.

Yes. And something more significant than that. But don't get her confused with Penny Marshall.

No. Penny Marshall. Oh, my God. That'll be my own podcast. I gotta go dream about Penny Marshall. I mean, a director that literally did not get the respect of making so many hit, like, creative and commercial hits. Big and League of Their Own should have given her carte blanche. She should be making movies and doing everything every year for the rest of her life just for those movies alone.

And if her name had been Peter Marshall--

Or Garry Marshall! Opps!

Garry, yeah.

Garry Marshall. Very, very nice. He did seem to lift up a lot of women as far as I hear. Okay, so--

Well, Betty Thomas, Betty Thomas, if you're listening to this podcast, recognize that you have some really serious, knowledgeable fans who will bring you on to an Episode of their podcast and just let you retell the best stories and celebrate the women you've worked with. If you listeners happen to be listening, and you know Betty Thomas for some reason, just give her the shout out. Tell her to listen in. We will use your time and we will raise your voice the way that it should be, the way it always should have been. You know, there are still many tomorrows and many opportunities for women who are in the field. We'd love to bring you forward.

Absolutely.

A quick rundown of some of her movies. 28 Days.

Private Parts. I know she did the, Howard Stern, right?

Howard Stern in 97. Troupe Beverly Hills, 1998. That was with--

Shelley Long?

Yes. Thank you. You do it much faster than my computer. And--

Embrace the pause, Melissa.

Right? And she was also directing some Grace & Frankie.

Oh, yeah. Awesome.

And of course, Alvin and the Chipmunks, one of the Alvin and the Chipmunks.

So, listen, don't knock it. Yes.

She got a lot of money then. Hey, Alvin. No, hey. Yeah. Hey, Alvin. Hey, Alvin. I knew that so well when I was a child.

(Laughs)

I still identified with Alvin. I was in so much trouble all the time.

So you know, another thing about the evolution of podcasts is that I think we have definitely become legitimized as sort of this archive that is out there for free, that we are respectable. I mean, you can you can either try to entertain and be coy, and not do your homework. Or you know your stuff, and you understand the mission of why you pick up the microphone, and you prepare and produce, and do this labor of love that we're doing. And so the Betty Thomases of the world, all they have to do is listen to a couple of your episodes from your first Season or any of my episodes, and they realize, Wow, this is 45 minutes of my time? Of course, I'm gonna do this. So--

Yeah, I think one of the things that I love about your show, and I'm discovering about our show, is that in the world, we don't celebrate women enough. And so when you do, it stands out, it becomes a like a beautiful flower of a field of flowers to laud, you know, the accomplishments and the history of powerful female stories, and examine how gender, which now is expanding, thankfully, to include so much more than the binary. But how gender plays a giant role in our power, in our politics, in our culture, and how we see ourselves. And that we have to examine this in order to sort of imagine and create the world we want ahead of us.

And the format of podcast, many without commercials, some with a few, but it's a way to have a long discussion about some of these questions and issues, much more so than you can do on your regular talk show or late night talk show on television these days. And we've only been doing this a relatively short time, and it's just been fascinating and awesome. That we take as much time as we need. We don't have to worry about is it, you know, making it the short or this long, we just talk until we until we get--

Until we exhaust ourselves.

Pretty much! 'Til we've all just had more than enough.

Well, and to Susan's point, the the notion that we are we are pausing in our lives to celebrate and to just gush. And sometimes I will just say that a performance was singlehand-- I mean, I will gush at length about China Beach, for instance, because I do believe it was this, that and the other. We need to celebrate. We can do that because somebody else who all of a sudden was like, Oh, I remember China Beach, or Designing Women or whatever. It's been a long time since they've thought about it. And we're not getting into their ears so that we can be negative. We're trying to really goose those endorphins, all of the positive things that come when you hear positive, when you hear compliments. That we can give a little bit of ourselves to be positive about a performance that happened 40 years ago. Men do it quite adroitly, and they do it quite frequently. And we as women, I guess, somehow think that celebration and recognition is pie because we're not going to give up any more than we need to. And I'm convinced that it just is this positive feeling. And so we're educating as well as we are trying to model why it's important to say, you guys are doing a great job. You stepped into the podcasting world at this time to pick off this one footprint of TV, Herstory, because that's what you guys are, you're in the middle of it and you've you have built your square. And you are now going to work it and you're going to build this tremendous catalogue of interviews and series and clips and analysis. And I give you guys credit for taking time out of otherwise was your life to dedicate this. We are not academics. And sadly, I think it's been very difficult to get academics to understand the role that podcasts play. And it's very difficult sometimes to even access what academics are writing because academia loves to keep itself very secluded.

Yeah, you got to be in to get in to read some of that stuff. It's true. We're-- Okay, so we're gonna take a little break.

80s TV Ladies Theme Song 30:10

Commercial Break 30:13
Hey, it's David here. And this is Rob. We are the host of a brand new podcast called Totally 80s and 90s Recall. if you love all things 80s and 90s, from music and movies to television and pop culture, then this is the podcast for you.

(Rob) Join two Gen X dudes every week as we revisit and discuss all of our favorite things from when we grew up in the 80s and 90s for a fun, and nostalgic look back at two of the best decades.

(David) So come and listen for yourself. We promise you'll have a great time and then go subscribe to Totally 80s and 90s Recall on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome back. So anyway, you've been doing this for awhile, I'd be curious about, like some of the interviews and guests and books that are your favorite episodes or episodes. Any Hi.

Yeah, I will say that. I do try to I have a whole cadre of sort of women in academia who have granted me interviews. I've been very grateful. When I was in Chicago, I was able to get to Michigan and Wisconsin and actually traveled to their offices. And Robin Means Coleman, Dr. Robin Means Coleman is a very smart woman. And she knows her, just she knows her Different World. I love that she's she's taught it for many years. And now she's back at a great Episode of yours. And she's at Northwestern, and I was in her office and hear in an acrylic frame is a handwritten note from Michelle Obama. And I was like, Okay, I'm just gonna stop here. And I and I went into that interview having never, you know, I kind of sent her a cold call, kind of email, and I had read a couple of her academic articles. And by the time she left, she's like, Oh, come, you know, we'll do this again. And I'm like, yeah, and then she gave me a hug. And it's like, you know, because we sat for two hours and talked about A Different World and Debbie Allen, and how important that series was, then, and even still today, it's just,

it's so powerful. And that's when we're gonna cover this this Season. So I'm really glad we're having you on talking about that, how groundbreaking it was. And I, I know that Episode, I'm gonna put it in our audioagraphy. And you can link to it on the website, because it's a really spectacular Episode of yours, talking about A Different World with her.

And Margaret Cho too. That-- I was really thrilled to get her we learned again, she she understands 45 minutes of her time, you know, kind of unverse soapbox. I let her talk about it specifically in her series American Girl. And, yeah. So.

And that, I mean, I remember that because it was so groundbreaking too. And I also remember how she did not have the support that you would want to exist. It definitely felt like she was alone out there trying to make that show, even though I know a lot of people were making that show with her. But in terms of being representative that was, yeah, it had really good intentions. Yeah. And that unfortunately, some of the whole issue had to do with her weights. And yet she was not treated well. But I would say that the interview overall, she was very positive. And she has used that entire experience to become much more of an advocate on a number of different levels, both for people of color for Asian women,

for you know, body size. I mean, everything she's, she's a force.

Yeah, we're huge fans. One of the other episodes, you talked about how important it was to have DVDs or some hard format of the shows that you'd love to in case they go off streaming, which happens, or some aren't on streaming. And it just reminded me that I did I was so happy that I had the entire DVD set of Remington Steele and Scarecrow & Mrs. King, because I loved them before I started this podcast. So I I was very happy to have them. And I thought it was such an interesting idea.

Yeah, in the move, I relocated, obviously all of my DVDs and now I need to go through something that's very methodical so that i i can just sort of soak them all up. I do love it, having it on DVD even like I'm like Sex in the City. Do I really need this? Yeah, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna let it go. Not Yeah, no, you're gonna Yeah, yeah. What I think not enough people understand is that they appreciate the convenience of streaming. Maybe they like TV, but they don't necessarily think of themselves as having to have loving TV. And you have to be of a certain age, that by the time there was a video store that actually had TV series that you might have remembered but hadn't gotten to see because they weren't available in syndication, that it was accessible it all of a sudden, you could get it and a movie, or you could see Casablanca without having to think that it might come on at 10:30 at night and you're gonna have to stay awake. That physical accessibility for some people is super important. And I still am convinced that as the corporations and the media conglomerates continue to merge and merge, they hold all this power and if you really gonna just take streaming, what streaming offers you and will continue to offer you at a price? How badly do you want to see me be in St. Louis on Christmas Eve? Do you want to pay $7.99? You want to pay $11.99 just to see it? You don't get to own it. Maybe that's what it's worth to you. But I want to see it in July.

It's true, you want to like I? Well, and it's because I went to film school right in the 80s. And it was really, you wanted to track down these classics, or even modern classics to use as formula for what you were working on. And I remember walking into a video store-- This would been in the 90s, a Blockbuster, for goodness sake. Because I wanted to get a copy of Die Hard because I was writing basically a 'Die Hard on a Blank' for work. And like, Oh, I'm gonna go watch Die Hard. And that's gonna help me structure this action. 'Die Hard,' you know, 'meets Robocop' movie that I'm writing. And so I went in, I went to the Blockbuster. I'm like, looking around, can't find it. They got Die Hard 2. I think maybe they had Die Hard 3 by this point, I don't know. But I then walk up to the counter to this, you know, dude, and I'm like, Hey, Die Hard. And he's like, is checked out? And he's like, No, we don't have it. And I was like, it's Die hard. I mean, there was no bigger movie for filmmakers and, you know, in the world of action movies than Die Hard. And the fact that like, I don't know, five years later, 10 years, or whatever it was, I was flummoxed. I was flummoxed that I couldn't get Die Hard at the Blockbuster. And that's when I was like, I got to own a copy of VHS. And I got the DVD. And now we have the whole series on DVD. Because when you need it,

yeah, when you need it, and you never know when you're going to need it sometimes. Yes. But the other sad thing too, is I think most of us are under the impression that everything is available. And sadly, it's not for a variety of reasons. You know, as recently with the merger with Discovery, HBO Max has been pulling stuff off of their streaming service for no particular reason, or at least not one they're willing to share. So you now can't go watch some of those things if you were so inclined. A lot of series, especially in the 80s. And before DVDs really became really popular, were never released in full anyway, on DVD, or VHS. Even Murphy Brown. I think they put out the first couple of seasons and then didn't end up releasing all 11 seasons. So that's not available if you want to go and even buy the DVDs. I'm not even sure if it's available to stream anywhere.

My understanding is that the contracts that were written at the time of the creation of Murphy Brown did not include I don't even think it included syndications, specifically, or it was very, very tight syndication, and then reproduction, none of it and some of that had to do with the music. That's very well documented that the music rights have hung up a lot of Murphy Brown,

and a lot of shows, I mean that music rights back if you don't get those music rights at the beginning, in perpetuity for the universe and all that stuff, which are expensive. So sometimes you don't. And there are a number of things, but Murphy Brown, probably being the biggest one.

And the one with Fred Savage, the kids, I wonder, Wonder Years, anything that was really, really built around music like that sure was, but but again, we we tend to think that, oh, everything is available, and then you go try to find it and you can't, and you know,

and there's weird little one off, like you'll be watching a whole Season and somehow, you know, there's an Episode that just dropped out of that Season. Like trying to think of something in particular recently, but it's weird. And then well 30 Rock

removed four episodes about blackface. Yeah, even though it was recognizing the political implications of blackface, still, they just did not want to even go there. So yeah, because it can get taken out of context. Yes. You asked the question that sort of Dennis down this rabbit hole of favorite favorite episodes, or whatever. And I indicated to interviews and Advanced TV Hertory is as much you know, the conversation I have in my head with myself and my chasing information and doing research and finding the connection that hadn't really been thought of or if it has been thought of it's sitting in academia and academia will let us look at it. So I'm just gonna bring it to the masses. And that's where I really when, when Linda Bloodworth Thomason of Designing Women brought forward she wrote in The Hollywood Reporter this full column about how she left Hollywood on a rail, courtesy of Les Moonves who was the at that time he was under siege at CBS. He finally left CBS is for good reason as president, all of that, yes. And it all started to make sense. And then also thinking about the other Episode that I did called Designing Women, One; Body Shamers, Zero. And it's the Episode entitled They Shoot Fat Women, Don't They? And that was at the crux. I certainly remember reading the National Enquirer articles about Linda and Suzanne Sugarbaker played by Delta Burke, who was gaining weight, and they didn't understand why. And it was becoming this big point of criticism. And, and she was obviously struggling personally, she's talked a little bit about it, but not a lot. It's not our business. And Linda had to deal with it as the showrunner. And she was often the writer and director. And we, the viewers only got a little bit of that full story. We don't really understand. And of course, what sells National Enquirers is to have a cat fight, to have women fighting each other. You couldn't possibly have women supporting each other. That doesn't sell paper.

Yeah, we talked about that. Yeah,

or just being good co-workers. I mean, that just, you know, that's what right happens in the workplace.

So we need to talk about that. Because sometimes, sometimes it's very subtle, and all of a sudden, you're being turned against this woman. And Madeleine Albright would say that, you know, we should always be supporting each other, because that's the only way we're gonna get ahead. There's a lot to learn about feminism from some of these stories, that we are only now getting the full picture

of, yeah, the recognition that, and these are the light bulbs that went off, you know, in my head with the Me Too. And all that stuff of him being an early person making movies. And there was once someone like, we were looking at casting, and I was like, Oh, how about this actress and, and immediately was told, Oh, she's terrible. She's difficult. And now I'm like, what she? Or did not sleep with someone, or wanted to call it out when she got hit on appropriately. And, you know, like that, like, now I'm looking at these conversations that I had in my young career not knowing all what might be behind them burger, this this world, like the rest of the iceberg,

right? The rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say, right, yes. Yeah.

And I think that's also interesting to me. I mean, we're, we're having fun, we're looking at these these shows, sometimes we're very goofy point of view, and certainly a fan point of view in a lot of ways. But we're also really interested in these deeper underneath stuff of, you know, what is it to be difficult on set, if you're a woman, versus if you're a man? You know, why is that story so different? And it is. And as you know,

I mean, it's impossible to think that there haven't been men who are quote, unquote, difficult on set, and yet it never makes it out into the world. For what you know, I'm not quite sure why that is the only the only time recently that I remember hearing about this, and in fact, not that my memory is infallible. But the only time I remember hearing it at all was a couple of years ago on a FOX show with Damon Wayans Jr. and his co star whose name I can't remember. And suddenly, there was all this in the press about how they didn't get along. And, and, and all of this and, and I just remember thinking, I can't ever remember hearing this kind of story about two male co-stars and yet on every show, practically that is in the cast is dominated by women, there always seems to be some question about, Are they friends? Do they get along? Yeah.

From Charlie's Angels to Cagney, & Lacey, even, you know, to like, it's

like, it's a requirement that in the workplace, because they're women, that they're supposed to go out for drinks and hang out and braid each other's hair or whatever it is that people think that they're supposed to be doing together, because they're women when they're not not working. And yet you never hear, I can almost never remember hearing that about male co-stars on a show. I think you told me recently about a team and some of the issues on that show. I never heard anything about that.

Yeah, no, no. Yeah. Brotherhood is tight lipped. Absolutely.

Absolutely. And and it's it's one of the many crosses that women have to bear that men do not. There's an expectation sometimes between women themselves about how women are supposed to be in the workplace that's not put upon men. And we certainly see that over and over again and how television is covered.

The most recent example I can think of on that is Sex in the City and then the movies and Now getting back to what's the reboot reboot called And Just Like That. Yes, Kim Cottrell not not wanting to be in it it for all of her reasons, and immediately it has to be this personal thing and this power thing, and I think they as mature women, mature Experienced women have done everything they can to simply say, there's no story here, right? And still,

they won't let it it won't it has to be. We're going to create this antagonism between women on purpose

because we're emotional. Yes, because we're so emotional. Another aspect of feminism that I think we in the podcast world can continue to explore, because at the very minimum, I think, who we understand our listeners to be our people who are always kind of looking for the different perspective. And I was thinking about this last night, when I was thinking about A Different World and how it was a spinoff. It was derived from The Bill Cosby Show. And at the time that it did, Bill Cosby could do no wrong. And we have now since learned that Bill Cosby could do a lot wrong. And he was not called on it for a very long time. There were many victims of the things that he did. And there's nothing that would make me disbelieve the women who survived is abuse. But to put myself in the Debbie Allen or the Felicia, Rashad shoes, where we can be critical in 2022, we can be credited didn't they know to shouldn't they have said something, you know, why shouldn't they have distanced themselves? Did they really need his help? They made very smart decisions. These are two very smart women, and they had an opportunity, and he opened the door for them. And they were storytellers, and very high quality TV. And we have to keep thinking about that. Because we can't, we aren't necessarily going to you can't dismiss the art that that Debbie Allen created from the second Season of A Different World on it. It was head and shoulders better than Andy Bates in the first Season.

I also think we have this imagined, you know, from television and movies, Ideal that it is all you need is a little bit of gumption to speak truth to power. And that is not true. There is no good moment when you are beholden to great power to really speak truth. It takes I'm risking my entire career, possibly even more, possibly the safety of myself. And for something and again, the rumor mill in Hollywood tells you a lot. But it doesn't tell you everything. You know, I was working for Disney. And a friend of mine called and said I really want and Disney just bought Miramax. I didn't work for Miramax. I just was working in Disney marketing for features so, but a friend of mine called and said, It's my dream to work for Miramax. Can you make an introduction? So I call over to an assistant I know who was connected? And I'm like, Okay, so my friend wants a job at Miramax. And that person said, No, they don't. And told me that they did not want a job at Miramax to be an assistant to somebody and start there. That it was not a good or fun place to be. I took that to be, oh, these people are just sort of cruel, they're swimming with the sharks, you know, these this is a a hostile, abusive environment. I didn't take that as something that was in addition to that, sexual abuse and harassment and, and rape. But the known entity was the word back to me was, this is not somewhere you want to go. If it's a friend of yours, you don't want to send your friend into this environment. And so I passed that on. I didn't have any other information. I couldn't call anyone out on that information. That was somebody giving me a solid piece of information that was not very solid at all. It was just a comment. And I passed it back to my person. That's how you find out about information. Right, but it's really more this person's difficult to work with that person's difficult to work for. There aren't a lot of specifics. And I don't know. I mean, again, that's a very different position that I was in than someone you know, working in these worlds, but the worlds are very siloed. And the power is very, very siloed power protects itself. And it's really I think it when we're seeing it is very hard to take down powerful men, we only get to take them down who have abused the system so egregious Slee. They only get taken down when they're old and weak. Nobody called out Harvey Weinstein when he was at the top of his power. Nobody called out Bill Cosby when he was at the top of his power. They tried to. Nobody listened.

And the people that knew that were in a position maybe to do something about it, were making too much money and didn't necessarily want to know or want to do anything about it. I say that because I also worked for Disney and someone that I became acquainted with that had worked in the high levels of NBC. There was something in the news or something we were talking about, unrelated to this about Bill Cosby. And I said, and she just said to me, and I quote, Bill Cosby is a bad man. That's all she said, is what? Bill Cosby is a bad man. Now, like, Susan, I didn't have any context for that. I didn't quite know what that meant, and what way she was meaning that but it said to me, that somebody at that network knew, or should have known what was happening, but there was too much money on the table. So like a lot of things that we'd have not heard about to this day, and we'll never hear about that have gone down, they chose to look the other way. Not it's not right. It's it's all kinds of wrong, but it is, it is, it is what happens a lot of times, and like

you said, it's not simple, right? There's nothing. There's nothing simple about stepping into areas where the power structures are imbalanced. And the imbalance of power structure leads to corruption and abuse. It just does.

I've always found it unfair-- This is just my opinion. When things like this happen come to light. And then fingers start getting pointed at co -tars or other people who had no power really to do anything about it. Even if they had known why is it up-- There are other people that were more powerful than them that new probably knew they did nothing. Why is nobody pointing at them? Why is nobody putting the blame on them? Because I just I just think that's unfair. It's unfair.

And it's not, it's not the problem, right. And we're not even pointing to the problem, which is like, that person should not have done that. That was illegal, and they should have been held accountable. And Justice was not equal in that case, and you were unable to hold him accountable. And so there's one person to blame in that situation. There's other people that you recognize now, but it's the-- It's again, talking about police abuse, talking about these things, The institution is wrong. The format of the institution in an institution that is based on a hierarchy that is based on abuse, whether it's slavery or women being servants, and broodmares, those are structures that need to be questioned. Right, whether it's based on capitalism, completely unchecked. Those are the structures that need to be questioned and called and we really have gone have gone really, really dark and deadly. Oh my gosh, we're gonna have to stop here. We've run out of time. We're gonna have to save the part two for our next Episode, Sharon.

Well, them's the breaks. I

guess we keep doing this to them. We're sorry. And we're also happy, but trust

us, you definitely want to come back for part two. We'll

then re examine all the power structures and we'll break them all down and we'll you know, we'll talk about them. We'll talk more about TV when we come back. For our audioagraphy today, of course, the podcast I'm recommending is Advanced TV Herstory. Find it at TVHerstory.com. TV, H-E-R, s-t-o-r-y.com.

And a shout out to our friend Kenya Rothstein. Her podcast is called Thank You For Saying No. And it's about finding meaning in life's unexpected turns.

Her conversations are about finding ways to be thankful when we've been told no.

It will inspire you that when things don't go according to plan, it will still work out potentially even better than you could have ever imagined.

So check out Kenya's podcast.

Thank You For Saying No.

Thank you for listening to 80sTVLadies. We are so excited to have you back for Season two. We love hearing from you. Send us your thoughts questions at our website at 80sTVladies.com. That's eight-zero-S-TV-Ladies.com We read every email. Stay tuned for next Episode where we finish our conversation with Cynthia Bemis Abrams.

We hope 80s TV Ladies brings you joy and laughter and lots of fabulous new and old shows to watch all of which leads us forward toward being amazing ladies of the 21st century.

Thanks for listening
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Episode 201: “Welcome to Season 2: Advanced TV Herstory w/ Cynthia Bemis Abram, Part 1”

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