Demographic Vistas: Television in American Culture

4. Gleason's Push

Gleason's Push *4 Translated to the big time, he began to press in all directions , a process known generally as throwing his weight around, which is an exact description of Gleason's most characteristic movements before the camera. He is a heavy man with the traditional belief of heavy men in their own lightness and grace, and he sashays and pirouettes with a faint and entirely inoffensive suggestion of effeminancyhe is so definitely one of the mob. Gilbert Seldes, The Public Arts 1was in New Yorkand 1had a little dough and 1wanted to gamble. 1 called a joint in LasVegasand 1 said to the guy, "This is Jackie Gleason. Will you please put a hundred on the red for me?" and the man said, 'Just a minute, Mr. Gleason. Hold the phone." 1 waited, and in a minute he was back. "Sorry,Mr.Gleason," he said, "Youlost." "Thanks, pal," 1 said. "I wired the hundred to you half an hour ago." That's class. Jackie Gleason, inJim Bishop, The Golden Ham The television personality develops in one or more of three general modes: the representational, in which he dons the mask of a frankly fictional character; the presentational, in which, as "himself," he addresses the audience within the context of theatrical space; and the documentary, in which his "real life"99 Demographic Vistas his exploits, his opinions on matters of public concern, his Lifestyle-becomes the subject of other television programs or presentations in other media. Gleason, like many of the early 1\T clowns, went the grand route of developing all three. Modern TV sitcom stars such as John Ritter, Robin Williams, and Henry Winkler are, by comparison, technicians in an age of specialization. The pioneers, having come to television from the four corners of the entertainment world, created personal vehicles for themselves; not needing a more precise term, they 100 simply called them "shows." The specifics of such packaging formulas as "the sitcom" and "the variety hour" had not yet gained their current importance in the business world. Jack Benny opened in front of the curtain doing stand-up and discussing the week's "show" in the presentational manner of Carson opening Tonight.Afterthe first commercial, however, he reappeared miraculously transported into a sitcom in which he remained 'Jack Benny" while an actor named Eddie Anderson played his valet, Rochester. Moreover, the subject of the ensuing sitcom narrative was often a problem encountered in preparing that week's "show."The Burns and Allen Show, which like TheJack Benny Program and Tonight was directed by Fred de Cordova, achieved a similar synthesis of modes. The "show" was transformed at will by George, who could at any moment call the narrative to a halt and shift into the presentational mode with long stand-up soliloquies, self-reflexive commentaries on plot, or even digressive non sequiturs. LikeFielding's authorial voice injoseph Andrews) George Burns is an interlocutory narrator who casually intervenes in the story line for comic purposes . George and Gracie, like their contemporaries Gleason and Benny, carried their personae across the proscenium curtain : They live in a sitcom world with their neighbors Harry Morton (Hal March; later, John Brown; later, Fred Clarke; later, Larry Keating) and Blanche (Bea Benaderet), they close the "show" on a stage, performing one of their vaudeville routines. The Abbott and Costello Show was structured along similar lines. Red Skelton, whose comedy depended largely on caricatures of the inebriated and the mentally deficient, self-consciously returned from the sketch world at the end of each "show" to thank the audience for allowing him into the privacy of its homes. Declaring a halt to the willing suspension of disbe- Gleason's Push lief, his clown makeup dripping out of place, he closed with his trademark line, "Good night ... and God bless." Ernie Kovacs, perhaps the most self-conscious artiste yet transmitted by the network system, often showed videotapes of his "works," personally presenting these on camera from the director's chair of a studio booth. As often as not, he appeared as an actor in these blackout sketches. The most interesting of the early 1Vcomedians were artists who had sneaked in under the gun of the marketing formulas that would eventually come to dictate form. The same had been 101 true of Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd in early Hollywood. Their films are exhilarating celebrations of what is possible in a technically complex mass medium...