The Rowdy Girls

I’ve written before about the very special episodes of the TV sitcoms of my youth, with some sarcasm. But not all were as corny as I made them out to be. One that I first saw in 1989 still resonates with me, and truly did partially shape who I am.

Season 4, Episode 6 of Designing Women was titled “The Rowdy Girls.” In it, main character Charlene introduces the other women to one of her childhood friends, Mavis. By chance Charlene stumbles upon Mavis’s husband physically abusing her. When confronted by Charlene about it, pregnant Mavis knows that it’s wrong, but claims she can’t leave because she doesn’t have any money of her own, all her credits cards are in her husband’s name, and where would she and her three young daughters go? She’s embarrassed, humiliated, and feels helpless to change her situation.

The next day Charlene comes to see Mavis again, and hands her an envelope of money from herself and the other women. The money is to allow Mavis to leave her husband, and Charlene tells her where and when to meet up with her, and she would find them a safe place to go.

Mavis is stunned when she looks inside the envelope. She asks, “Why would your friends do this? They don’t even know me.”

Charlene answers, “Because that’s the kind of people they are...and that’s why they’re my friends.”

As a teenager, I didn’t know anyone who was being abused. It was something I only learned about on TV talk shows or in school assemblies. I never knew anyone who needed to get out of a dangerous situation like that. But I was still affected by this show, and every time I watched it in reruns years later I had an emotional reaction.

As an adult, I eventually came to know friends who needed a way out of something, be it an abusive relationship or an unhealthy living environment. I remembered Mavis and Charlene, and I made a mental note to be a Rowdy Girl myself. I decided that I would be “that kind” of person; the person who sees when a friend is in trouble and makes the step to show her a way out and give her the necessary help without being asked for it. The friend who helps quietly and unselfishly, not for thanks but for the sake of doing the right thing.

On the show, Mavis does eventually leave her husband, and when she meets up with Charlene later, The Supremes’ song “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” is playing prominently. I just heard that song on the radio yesterday, and even 20 years later it still calls to mind this episode and reminds me of my aim.

I still strive to be “that kind of friend.” The friend who sees through the excuses and coverups, one who listens to the shaky voices and realizes I’ve been placed in that moment for a reason, and that I can and should make a difference. It’s not always easy to see the need, and sometimes I feel as helpless as those who need the help. But I keep trying.

Where Everybody Knows Your Song

TV sitcoms used to be events. They used to have theme songs that everyone knew and could sing along to in their entirety. Theme songs told the back story or the premise of the show so that even if you’d never seen the show, you knew what you were getting into simply by watching the opening credits. They gave the emotional feel of the show and they were contagiously singalongable. Find me a Gen X-er who can’t still sing the entire theme songs from Cheers, WKRP in Cincinnati, or my personal favorite, The Facts of Life. When the TV was on, you heard the theme song begin and you knew you had about 45 seconds to finish brushing your teeth, yell to the rest of family “IT’S COMING ON!!!” and run to the living room before you missed anything.

Now, there are no theme songs. You better have your arse on the couch at precisely 9 p.m. or you’ll miss the whole plot.

And remember how exciting it was to start the new fall season and see all the revamped show intros? In them we’d get a sneak peak of clips of upcoming episodes, and then all season you’d watch in anticipation for when you’d finally see the episode where that clip of Tony Danza in the shower acting like he’s doing a TV commercial with his shampoo comes from! Or, why is Tootie covered in paint? What kind of hijinks ensued to create such a scene? The anticipation! My 10-year-old mind could hardly wait!

Why, network gods, did you do away with the sitcom theme song!? Why have you forsaken our love of schmaltzy rhyme with upbeat tempos? These theme songs made me believe in the human spirit! They made believe that yes, I, too, can be standing tall on the wings of my dreams, just like Balki Bartokomous! When the world never seemed to be living up to my dreams, suddenly I was finding out the facts of life were all about ME.

I beg of the network execs, bring back the sitcom theme song! If you did, you would see the biggest gift would be from me and the card attached would say, thank you for being a friend.

Sit, Ubu, sit.

Comedy Wtih a Conscience...or Just Uncomfortable?

I miss the days of the Very Special Sitcom. It was a night of television history that every family in America should not miss. Just about every sitcom from the late 1970s through the early 1990s had at least one Very Special Episode. In these half-hour treasures, comedy was suspended in order to teach us a lesson, attack a current social issue, or to just be preachy. Arnold and Dudley were almost molested on Diff’rent Strokes; Tootie was recruited to become a NYC prostitute on Facts of Life, and my personal heartbreak favorite was when a pre-Friends Matthew Perry tragically died in a drunk driving accident on Growing Pains. Two social issues in one episode! The teenage girls in my school were still crying the next day at school after his character, Sandy, died. Ahh, the memories...the nightmares…the misconceptions they wrought.

Very Special Episodes led me to sincerely believe that half the kids I went to school with were being abused by their parents, were runaways living under assumed names, or were hopped up on speed. I wasn’t allowed to date until I was 16, most likely because my parents watched the Very Special Mr. Belvedere episode where a young man got fresh with Heather at the prom.

Nobody did the VSE quite as masterfully as Family Ties, though. We had the pleasure of the Alex Hooked on Speed episode, the Mr. Keaton Has a Heart Attack episode, the Mallory’s Teenage Friend is Pregnant and Can’t Talk to Her Own Mother episode, and of course, the Tom Hanks as Uncle Ned the Alcoholic who Drank Vanilla Extract episode. Nothing says family togetherness quite like desperate substance abuse paired with uncomfortable studio audience laughter on cue.

A college friend and I used to see couples sitting in restaurants having what looked like “the talk,” and we’d joke that they were having a very special episode of their own. Or if somebody had a particularly stressful weekend visit home full of family issues…it was a very special episode vacation. You didn’t really have to be in on the joke to figure out what it meant. If you watched TV anytime during the ‘80s, you understood.

But as much as I miss these non-comedic comedies that taught me so much about how life can suck, I supposed I’d prefer there not be any Very Special Episodes these days. How ticked off would we be if we turned on the tube this Thursday night to find a Very Special Episode of The Office, all about Pam’s miscarriage? Yeah, not exactly must-see TV.