As many of you probably know I come from Oklahoma, but what you may not know is I spend my summers in Michigan teaching kids how to sail. This means every summer my two sisters, two dogs, parents, and I get into the car and drive eighteen straight hours to Michigan. We have been making this drive since I was seven months old. My parents learned very quickly that the only way to keep my younger sisters and me entertained was to put a movie on. When we first started making these drives my dad took a TV and strapped it to the middle consul because cars didn’t have built in DVD players. The road trips were very long and we did not even have headphones at first, until my dad couldn’t stand the noise any longer so he pulled over and invested in the headphones you see pictured below.
Now after making this drive every summer you get a little tired of the same movies! To make matters even more complicated all the Blockbusters went out of business and Netflix wasn’t around, so my parents had to figure out how to keep us entertained because watching the same movies over again wasn’t cutting it. That is when they had the idea to make us watch the “good stuff”, old TV shows like Gilligan's Island, Bewitched, The Brady Bunch, Little House on the Prairie and my favorite I Love Lucy. These TV shows were perfect because they provided us with endless entertainment and it was unlike anything we had ever seen before. As we watched these shows we would make little dances to the intro songs. Little things like this helped keep us entertained and for this my parents were grateful.
This is one of my favorite clips from I Love Lucy. No matter how many times I watch it I can never stop myself from laughing. I love the faces Lucy makes as the conveyor belt speeds up and she has to start eating the chocolate. Whether I am laughing because of the superiority theory or the incongruity theory, I am not completely sure. I personally think that it deals with both theories. I find myself laughing because I feel superior to Lucy and her struggle to get all the chocolate wrapped and at the same time, and I am laughing because Lucy is so out of place. I Love Lucy is a show that could be watched with people of all ages, something so innocent that it brings laughter to everyone. There was never a show that used any form of foul language or crude humor. As my sisters and I watched I Love Lucy in the car sometimes my parents would want to hear what was happening in the background because it remind them of watching it with their siblings, when they were younger, and laughing with them.
While I Love Lucy is a show that is scripted it is also a show that remains timeless. It remains hysterical without getting too graphic. I Love Lucy first aired in 1951 and that was completely different time period than we are at today. Maybe that is why I Love Lucy has such innocent humor. I love that I Love Lucy has a humor that can be passed down through the ages. It will forever be my favorite.
Did you have a favorite TV oldie? Why do you think they are so funny? Is it because of its innocent humor? Or is it because of the memories it brings with it?
I talk about Lucille Ball in my paper because she is such a comedy icon. She really changed the comedy game for women in particular. I remember watching I Love Lucy when I was little and cracking up at the innocent, yet still funny gags and situations. Although I will point out how there are some things that are a little weird that don't hold up through the passage of time like how the married couple has twin beds in their bedroom and other things of the same ilk.
ReplyDeletePart of me still appreciates the Three Stooges, Looney Tunes, and all that, but now that I think about it those too have a good dose of violence, and occasionally some racist depictions (Looney Tunes at least). I wonder if there is such a thing as truly innocent comedy. One of the recurrent jokes in the show was Desi spanking Lucy. It sounds innocent, and in some ways it is...but of course, it probably wouldn't exactly happen today. Though who knows. Whenever I try to find a children's cartoon for my son, even the ones directed at kids often seem too violent. Maybe our hyper sensitivity and our culture of offensive humor go hand in hand on some level.
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