Thirtysomething (TV series)

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Thirtysomething
Image:Thirtysomethingcast.jpg
The cast of Thirtysomething
Format Drama
Created by Marshall Herskovitz
Edward Zwick
Starring Ken Olin
Mel Harris
Melanie Mayron
Timothy Busfield
Patricia Wettig
Peter Horton
Patricia Kalember
Polly Draper
David Clennon
Country of origin Image:Flag of the United States.svg United States
No. of episodes 85
Production
Running time 60 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel ABC
Original run September 29, 1987 – May 28, 1991
External links
IMDb profile

Thirtysomething (1987–1991) was an award-winning American television drama created by Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick for United Artists Television. It premiered on ABC on September 29, 1987 and lasted four seasons. The last of its 85 episodes aired on May 28, 1991.

The title of the show was designed as "thirtysomething" (with a lowercase "t") by Kathie Broyles, who combined the words of the original title, Thirty Something.

Contents

[edit] General plot

Thirtysomething depicts the lives of a group of upwardly mobile friends who are all in their thirties (hence the title) living in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Although seen as an ensemble drama, the series tended to revolve around Michael (Ken Olin) and Hope Steadman (Mel Harris), who provided the focal point for the group. Michael's cousin was photographer Melissa Steadman (Melanie Mayron). Michael's business partner was Elliot Weston (Timothy Busfield), who had a troubled marriage with his wife Nancy (Patricia Wettig). Michael's best friend was Gary Shepherd (Peter Horton) who eventually married Susannah (Patricia Kalember). Hope's best friend was Ellyn Warren (Polly Draper).

[edit] Character descriptions

  • Michael Steadman and Hope Murdoch Steadman: Michael works in the advertising business with Elliot (initially in their own business, but later for DAA). Hope is a writer and stay-at-home mother who struggles with her desire to be at home with her daughter, Janey (and later son, Leo) and her need to work. Michael (who is Jewish) and Hope (who is Christian) are also an interfaith couple, a fact which was referenced throughout the series.[1] During the third season of the series, Hope is attracted to environmentalist John Dunaway (J. D. Souther) and contemplates having an affair with him but decides against it.
  • Melissa Steadman: Michael's cousin and Gary's former girlfriend. Melissa is a photographer whose career includes an album by Carly Simon and photos in the magazine Vanity Fair. Melissa becomes involved with a younger man, Lee Owens (Corey Parker), a house painter, but the relationship is fraught with problems based largely on the age difference and Melissa's insecurities.
  • Elliot Weston and Nancy Krieger Weston: Elliot works in the advertising business with Michael (initially in their own business, but later for DAA). Nancy is an artist and stay-at-home mother to Ethan and Brittany. In addition to coping with Elliot's infidelities, Nancy struggles with, and overcomes, ovarian cancer during the last two seasons. She also becomes a successful children's author and illustrator.
  • Ellyn Warren: Hope's childhood friend. Ellyn works with City Hall. She is initially involved with Steve Woodman (Terry Kinney) who works at City Hall as well. Later, she has an affair with a married man Jeffrey Milgrom (Richard Gilliland). During the final season, Ellyn becomes involved with (and marries) Billy Sidel (Erich Anderson), a graphic designer.
  • Gary Shepherd and Susannah Hart Shepherd: Gary is Michael's college roommate and a free-spirited professor of English literature. When he is denied tenure at the University of Pennsylvania, he thinks about becoming a social worker. It is at this point that Gary meets Susannah who is a social worker. Despite the fact that no one else likes her, Gary marries Susannah when they have a baby, Emma. Gary dies during the final season when he is killed in his car in chain-reaction car accident (ironic since he is a bicyclist and hates cars), just as Nancy recovers from cancer. Following Gary's death, Susannah moves away with Emma.
  • Miles Drentell (David Clennon): Michael and Elliot's boss at DAA. Miles' lack of ethics propels Michael into periods of self-reflection and depression, particularly when he is forced to fire Elliot. David Clennon reprised this role in the series Once and Again (1999 - 2002).

[edit] Cancellation

In 1991, Thirtysomething was consistently winning major awards and getting its highest ratings ever at the time[citation needed]. The main cast banded together as a group (with their agents) and approached the show's producers seeking to modify the contracts they had signed, seeking a large increase in the amount they were paid per episode.[citation needed]

Resistant to being bullied, the producers, together with MGM Television, immediately pulled the plug on the popular series. The cast quickly came running back, asking for the show to be reinstated and offering to honor their contracts and accept their original salaries, but it was too late. The producers refused to even consider continuing from that point on, and the show was canceled.[citation needed]

[edit] Popular culture

[edit] Influences and cultural impact

Thirtysomething reflected the angst felt by baby boomers and yuppies during the 1980s,[2][3] such as the changing expectations related to masculinity and femininity introduced by second-wave feminism (as noted in R. Hanke's 1990, article "Hegemonic masculinity in thirtysomething" and Margaret Heide's 1995 book, Television Culture and Women's Lives: "Thirtysomething" and the Contradictions of Gender[4]).

Feminist author Susan Faludi is particularly critical of Thirtysomething in her 1991 bestseller Backlash. She devotes an entire section of the sixth chapter ("Teen Angels and Unwed Witches: The Backlash on TV") to her analysis of the show's disdainful attitude toward single, working, and feminist women (Melissa, Ellyn, and Susannah) and its practice of "exalting homemakers" (Hope and Nancy).

Thirtysomething was notably influenced by the introspective, comic drama The Big Chill. Additional films and television programs which reflected similar themes include Baby Boom, Fatal Attraction and Wall Street (all appearing in 1987); the 1986 television drama L.A. Law; and the 1988 film Working Girl. In addition, its mix of realistic scenes and surreal flights of comic fancy owed a debt to such Woody Allen films as Annie Hall.

In the series The Golden Girls, Thirtysomething was always being referenced by either Dorothy. Sophia or Rose. Mainly because they always said they had a hard time "relating" to the series.

Thirtysomething, while never a huge ratings success, was nonetheless enormously influential in its day and won a number of Emmy Awards and nominations. Critics and audiences were sharply divided about the show's characters and dialogue; the show was widely praised for its sensitive characterizations, but also widely mocked for its generally affluent but depressed and neurotic characters (a fact satirized in one episode, when a focus group is shown a commercial based on the style of the series, with actors standing in for Michael and Elliot and speaking like them. The focus group's response is overwhelmingly negative, and they voice many of the criticisms of the series itself).

[edit] Oxford English Dictionary

Almost immediately after the introduction of the show, the term "thirtysomething" also became a catch phrase used to designate 'baby boomers' in their thirties. This cultural shift was reinforced by the Oxford English Dictionary which added Thirtysomething in 1993 (under the word thirty) and defined the term as one which became:

popularized as a catch-phrase by the U.S. television programme thirtysomething, first broadcast in 1987 . . . applied to members of the ‘baby boom’ generation entering their thirties in the mid-1980s; also attrib. or as adj. phr. (hence, characteristic of the tastes and lifestyle of this group).

[edit] Twentysomething

Thirtysomething was also responsible for the coinage of the word "twentysomething", to describe Generation X. This was reflected in Douglas Coupland's 1991 watershed novel Generation X: Tales For An Accelerated Culture. This work was dedicated to "the generation born in the late 1950s and 1960s;" today this group is sometimes referred to as the "Baby Busters".

Today, "-something" is routinely added to various decades of life: one is "fortysomething," "fiftysomething."

[edit] Controversy

The show made headlines[citation needed] with a 1989 episode in which two men, Melissa's gay friends Russell (David Marshall Grant) and Peter (Peter Frechette), were shown in bed together in a post-coital scene discussing their romantic pasts and their developing feelings about each other. Following the episode, several conservative sponsors[attribution needed] proceeded to pull their advertising and boycott the show.[citation needed] The characters were seen again in subsequent episodes the following season, but in much less controversial circumstances.

[edit] DVD Release

The show has not yet been released on DVD, apparently due to problems transferring the master tapes of the series from their original 35 mm media.[citation needed]

[edit] Episodes

[edit] Emmy Awards

Thirtysomething won numerous Emmy Awards and nominations for Outstanding:

1988 Winners:

  1. Drama Series
  2. Supporting Actress in a Drama Series — Patricia Wettig
  3. Writing in a Drama Series — Paul Haggis and Marshall Herskovitz (episode: "Business as Usual")
  4. Guest Performer in a Drama Series — Shirley Knight

It also received the following nominations in 1988:

  1. Supporting Actor in a Drama Series — Timothy Busfield
  2. Supporting Actress in a Drama Series — Polly Draper
  3. Editing for a Series — Single Camera Production
  4. Achievement in Main Title Theme Music
  5. Achievement in Costuming for a Series

1989 Winners:

  1. Supporting Actress in a Drama Series — Melanie Mayron
  2. Writing in a Drama Series — Joseph Dougherty (episode: "First Day/Last Day")
  3. Editing for a Series — Single Camera Production
  4. Achievement in Costuming for a Series

It also received the following nominations in 1989:

  1. Drama Series
  2. Supporting Actor in a Drama Series — Timothy Busfield
  3. Guest Actor in a Drama Series
  4. Directing in a Drama Series
  5. Writing in a Drama Series
  6. Art Direction for a Series
  7. Sound Mixing for a Drama Series
  8. Achievement in Special Visual Effects (episode: "Michael Writes a Story")
  9. Outstanding Achievement in Hairstyling for a Series

1990 Winners:

  1. Lead Actress in a Drama Series — Patricia Wettig
  2. Directing in a Drama Series (tied with Equal Justice).

It also received the following nominations in 1990:

  1. Drama Series
  2. Supporting Actor in a Drama Series — Timothy Busfield
  3. Supporting Actress in a Drama Series — Melanie Mayron
  4. Guest Actor in a Drama Series
  5. Guest Actress in a Drama Series
  6. Writing in a Drama Series
  7. Art Direction for a Series
  8. Achievement in Hairstyling for a Series
  9. Achievement in Costuming for a Series

1991 Winners:

  1. Lead Actress in a Drama Series — Patricia Wettig
  2. Supporting Actor in a Drama Series — Timothy Busfield
  3. Achievement in Costuming for a Series

It also received the following nominations in 1991:

  1. Drama Series
  2. Supporting Actress in a Drama Series — Melanie Mayron
  3. Supporting Actor in a Drama Series — David Clennon
  4. Writing in a Drama Series
  5. Guest Actress in a Drama Series

[edit] References

Philadelphia Portal
  1. ^ http://www.tvacres.com/ethnic_jewish_s_z.htm
  2. ^ http://home.kc.rr.com/bobfahey/lb-30s/articles/article06.htm
  3. ^ http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is_n10_v22/ai_6652864/print
  4. ^ http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/834.html

[edit] Further reading

[edit] External links


thirtysomething cast/characters
Michael Steadman • Hope Steadman
Melissa Steadman • Elliot Weston • Nancy Weston • Ellyn Warren • Gary Shepherd • Susannah Shepherd
fr:Génération pub

sv:Livet runt trettio

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