0:01

You know, I've spent many

0:03

hours with children who've gotten

0:05

involved with drugs. They

0:07

start your age even younger.

0:11

In March of nineteen eighty three, at

0:13

the behest of a sixth grader named

0:15

Arnold Jackson, First Lady

0:17

Nancy Reagan visited a classroom

0:20

at New York City's PS four

0:22

h six to talk about drugs.

0:25

And they're all tragic stories of kids

0:27

with great potential whose lives

0:29

were ruined.

0:31

But this New York City classroom

0:33

was actually on a Los Angeles

0:35

soundstage, and Arnold

0:37

Jackson was a character played by

0:39

actor Gary Coleman.

0:41

Who children about Missus Rady's.

0:46

Well, I happened to be here in New

0:48

York and I saw that story about

0:50

you in the paper, Arnold. You know

0:52

I'm very concerned about drug abuse, especially

0:54

among the young.

0:56

Missus Reagan was taping an episode

0:58

of the popular NBC sitcom

1:00

Different Strokes to promote her Just

1:03

Say No anti drug campaign.

1:05

In the plot the series, regular Arnold

1:08

actor Gary Coleman gets some help

1:10

from Missus Reagan in his own effort to

1:12

curb drug abuse among students.

1:14

Do you remember when the Nancy Reagan Different

1:16

Strokes episode aired?

1:18

Yes, absolutely, because it was a big deal.

1:20

I mean, it was definitely like, this

1:22

is something that we have to talk about.

1:25

This is Jessica Shawl. She hosts

1:28

the pop Culture Spotlight on Serious

1:30

Exam Radio, and it's written about

1:32

television for decades.

1:35

I mean, I'm gen X.

1:36

The fact that my parents even knew I existed was

1:38

like a minor miracle, you know. So the

1:40

fact that adults were going on

1:43

our shows, they weren't going on

1:45

the news, they were going on our shows to reach

1:47

us felt different and

1:49

kind of.

1:50

Special, very special. Over

1:52

thirty two million people watched

1:55

The First Lady that night. Do

1:57

you remember what your reaction to it

1:59

was.

1:59

I'm sure that I took it kind of

2:01

earnestly as a child, because

2:05

we weren't cynical like children are

2:07

now. Let's say, in like the twenty twenties.

2:10

I think in the eighties there was a little bit

2:12

more of like, oh, I need to listen to

2:14

the First Lady and what she has to say.

2:16

This is Reagan.

2:18

I guess there's something I should say. I've

2:22

tried drugs a few times.

2:25

Thank you.

2:27

That took as much courage as it did for Arnold

2:29

to write a story.

2:30

This feels like the prototypical

2:34

very special episode.

2:36

Yes, I mean absolutely.

2:39

The very special episode a

2:41

mainstay of nineteen eighties and early

2:44

nineteen nineties television. It

2:46

often came with a warning to parents that

2:49

the ordinarily hermetically sealed

2:51

off world of your favorite family

2:53

friendly series was about to get

2:55

injected with a dose of the

2:57

real world. Tuesday, Very

3:00

Special.

3:00

Fullhouse, We're starting a special

3:03

two part show on a very sensitive

3:05

and important subject.

3:06

You figured we'd talk to.

3:07

You kids and your parents two about smits

3:09

kind of hard to talk about.

3:11

The laughs would still be there,

3:13

just more muted. It could

3:16

get awkward.

3:16

Well, I get eight present that I'm doing pretty

3:19

good.

3:21

This was the sitcom itself in an

3:23

in between state, experiencing

3:25

its own well growing pains.

3:28

What happened to his second chance?

3:32

But never fear. The main characters

3:34

would remain safe and unchanged,

3:37

and in the end, all would be back to normal.

3:39

It just might take more than one episode.

3:42

The resolution is a big part of it, and it

3:44

might not be resolved in twenty two minutes because it's a big

3:46

issue. It's a big issue, so it might take two

3:48

whole episodes, which is really enough

3:51

to unpack. Let's see AIDS

3:53

molestation drug use,

3:56

drug use.

3:58

They made headlines and big ratings

4:01

until they were no longer special, just

4:03

cliched. And then the very

4:06

special episode was dropped from the schedule.

4:08

I mean, who needs lessons when you have Seinfeld.

4:11

And just saying basically,

4:14

there are going to be no very special episodes.

4:16

That is the very thing that we will never

4:18

do. I mean, what was the quote, no hugging nor.

4:20

Learning, No hugging nor learning from

4:23

CBS Sunday Morning and iHeart

4:26

I'm Morocca and this is a

4:28

very special episode of mobituaries.

4:38

This moment, the death of

4:40

the very special episode.

4:55

Can you speculate on what was the very first

4:57

very special episode? I would

4:59

speculate that it is a Norman Lear show.

5:02

That's Jessica Shaw again. I

5:04

also would have guessed that the very special

5:06

episode began with the late Norman

5:08

Lear. But we

5:13

found something even earlier than

5:16

the Norman Lear era. It is the February

5:18

thirteenth, nineteen sixty season

5:20

three episode of Leave It to Beaver, Yes,

5:23

Leave It to Beaver, and the episode

5:25

was described as follows. Andy,

5:28

a neighborhood drunk, is hired to

5:30

paint the house and Beaver unwittingly

5:33

gives him some brandy, which

5:35

you know I had to say at the time must have been like,

5:37

WHOA what is this?

5:39

Let me ask you something. Beaver is

5:43

your father? Would

5:48

he have a little bit of whiskey?

5:49

Hero? I'd never seen

5:51

this before.

5:52

First of all, A plus research.

5:54

And it's it's so kind of surprising

5:57

to see Jerry Mathers as

5:59

the Beaver or kind of interacting

6:02

with this alcoholic house painter.

6:04

Once Michael Billy set my father bottle,

6:07

it was all that buttonhead brandiant.

6:10

Well, that's about what I'm talking about Beaver.

6:12

Of course, Beaver's parents find out and

6:14

reprimand him, But big brother

6:17

Wally makes the point that Beaver didn't

6:19

know Andy had a problem. After

6:21

all, Ward and June Cleaver hadn't

6:24

told the boys.

6:25

You and Mom shouldn't be scared to tell us things.

6:28

Somebody's got to tell a guy about all the bad.

6:30

Junk in the world. He's somehow like

6:32

the writer's kind of saying, please,

6:35

please, let us tell stories that

6:37

have a little bit more grit, that are a little bit more complex.

6:40

It also feels like the entire premise

6:42

of a very special episode is built on

6:44

that one line.

6:45

Yes, as Wally Cleaver put it. Somebody's

6:48

got to tell a guy about all the bad junk

6:50

in the world. Ten years later,

6:52

another family sitcom dared to

6:55

do just that.

6:56

Bhy This is Elizabeth Montgomery

6:59

Welcome to be Witch Next on ABC.

7:02

Tonight's show was created in the true spirit

7:04

of Christmas.

7:05

On Christmas Eve nineteen seventy,

7:08

with silent night playing underneath.

7:10

Elizabeth Montgomery, who played good

7:12

Witch Samantha Stevens on Bewitched,

7:15

spoke directly to viewers ahead

7:17

of an episode entitled Sisters

7:20

at Heart.

7:21

My friends at Oscar Meyern Company,

7:23

and I feel it is a very

7:25

special Bewitched, conceived

7:28

in the image of innocence and filled

7:30

with truth.

7:31

That's right. She even called the episode

7:33

very special. That's because

7:36

the usual bad things that happened on Bewitched

7:38

involved spells gone awry, but

7:41

in this instance, magic was used

7:43

to shine a light on racism.

7:46

You've grown the part he said that we shall

7:48

be colors, so we couldn't be sisters.

7:52

She's a big jump. That's

7:54

daughter Tabitha, who is white and

7:56

also a witch. Her new friend, Lisa

7:59

is black. Tabitha ends up

8:01

using witchcraft so she and Lisa

8:03

can look more alike. She first turns

8:06

Lisa white, then turns herself black,

8:08

then turns the both of them polka

8:10

dot. Additionally, Samantha

8:13

puts a spell on her husband's racist

8:15

client. He starts to see everyone,

8:18

including himself, as black, and

8:20

by the end of the episode, he's learned

8:23

his lesson. I discovered

8:25

something about myself. I

8:28

found out I'm a racist. A

8:32

racist.

8:33

Oh not the obvious,

8:35

out in the open type of racist.

8:37

Not me.

8:38

No, I was a sneaky racist.

8:42

I was so sneaky I didn't even know it myself.

8:45

Quick side note this episode was

8:47

co written by a classroom of black

8:49

students at Jefferson High School in

8:51

Los Angeles, making it even more

8:54

special. But the Beaver and Bewitched

8:56

episodes were very much exceptions

8:58

to the rule. The

9:02

sitcoms of the nineteen sixties were

9:05

happily stuck in their own fantasy

9:07

world, completely divorced

9:09

from the reality of the times. Did

9:12

divorce even come up? In

9:14

our season two episode on Television's

9:16

Rural Purge, we talked about

9:19

the country themed shows that dominated

9:21

the airwaves that decade, especially

9:23

at CBS on the Beverly

9:26

Hillbillies and Green Acres. There

9:28

were no anti war protests, no

9:30

racism, since there were rarely black

9:33

characters or political assassinations.

9:37

And how's this for a metaphor. Petticoat

9:39

Junction was a show centered around

9:42

the spur of a railroad that basically

9:44

went nowhere.

9:46

Come ride the little train that is

9:49

rolling down the tracks to the junk show.

9:53

Yeah, where's Norman? Lare was like, Oh, we're

9:55

going somewhere right.

9:56

Right, This train is actually going

9:58

to a real place. My name

10:01

is Norman Lear.

10:03

Norman Lear has changed the face of

10:05

television. Until nineteen seventy one, he

10:07

was a very successful, if largely unheralded

10:09

producer writer in Hollywood, but

10:12

then he burst upon the public consciousness when

10:14

he took on bigotry with his All in the Family.

10:19

All in the Family starred Carol O'Connor

10:21

as Archie Bunker, a man who

10:24

longed for yesteryear, pigheaded

10:26

and yes, bigoted, but also

10:28

surprisingly likable. Every

10:31

episode was special. The series

10:33

regularly addressed racism, sexism,

10:36

anti semitism. It featured

10:38

one of the very first gay characters on

10:40

television, and don't matter the topic,

10:43

Archie Bunker didn't hold back.

10:46

His proud Roger is as queer as

10:48

a four dollar bill and he knows.

10:49

It's not only

10:52

cruel, Daddy.

10:52

That's an outright line.

10:53

Hello, something, Archie.

10:54

Just because a guy is sensitive and

10:57

he's an intellectual and he wears glasses, you make

10:59

him out of I.

11:00

Never said a guy who wears glasses as a

11:02

quia.

11:03

A guy who wears glasses is a four eyes.

11:05

A guy who was a fag is a quia.

11:08

So I have to say, and it might

11:10

be a super unpopular opinion. I'm

11:12

glad they use that word that they use that slur,

11:15

because that's part of what made the show so real.

11:17

Yeah, they didn't shy away from anything.

11:19

Isn't it so interesting that that scene

11:21

could not air in twenty twenty three?

11:23

Right right? The big reveal near

11:26

the end of that episode is that the person

11:28

Archie thought was gay is in fact

11:30

straight, while a pal he had assumed

11:32

to be straight is actually gay. Huge

11:35

numbers of people were being introduced to things

11:38

they were not familiar with.

11:41

Maybe they didn't even think they knew a gay

11:43

person.

11:44

Yeah, absolutely, I imagine that

11:46

was eye opening to them.

11:49

Another Milestone episode from nineteen

11:51

seventy seven was about Archie's wife

11:53

Edith, fending off a rapist. It

11:56

was a two parter called Edith's fiftieth

11:58

birthday, and I remember being talked

12:00

about in hushed tones. I

12:03

didn't have to be told that it wasn't for

12:05

kids. What are

12:07

you going to do? You

12:09

ain't taken off?

12:10

You're close, are you? Yeah?

12:14

Then I'm going to take yours off.

12:15

Wouldn't you like a cup of coffeees?

12:21

Norman Lear became the biggest TV

12:23

producer of the decade, helping to

12:25

create an entire universe of sitcoms

12:28

and.

12:30

Then there's mod.

12:33

On the most famous episode of Maud,

12:35

the title character, a feminist plate

12:38

by b Arthur, became unexpectedly

12:40

pregnant and had to decide whether

12:42

she'd carried the child's term.

12:44

Mother.

12:45

Listen to me, it's a simple

12:47

operation now, But when

12:49

you were growing up, it was illegal and

12:52

it was dangerous and it was sinister,

12:54

and you've never gotten over that.

12:56

Now you tell me that's not true.

12:58

It's not true, and

13:01

you're right, I've never

13:03

gotten note.

13:04

Maud had the abortion. Lear

13:07

was also the force behind some of the

13:09

first sitcoms centered around

13:11

black characters, including Good

13:13

Times.

13:14

You Couldn't help but notice all those bruises on Penny's.

13:16

Back, a nineteen seventy seven episode

13:19

featured a young Janet Jackson playing

13:21

the victim of child's abuse.

13:24

Oh those pennies

13:26

at the awkward age. She's always falling

13:28

down?

13:29

Isn't that true?

13:29

Dear?

13:30

Didn't you fall down?

13:31

Ah? One time I fell out of the

13:34

tree and I landed on my pussy cat and a

13:37

squished them.

13:38

And Pussycat sure leads a tough life.

13:41

What TV shows are certainly a good

13:43

way to talk about these issues and

13:45

call people's attention to them in a way

13:48

that they may not be considering it.

13:50

That's Norman lear from a conversation

13:52

I had with him back in twenty fifteen

13:54

for CBS Sunday Morning.

13:56

Most people in their own emotionally

13:59

crowded lives hear about these

14:01

things, visit it in a

14:04

short conversation, but their

14:06

minds are not really there. So

14:08

I think speaking about it in

14:11

a comedy where they were even getting laughs

14:13

about it can only be a good thing.

14:15

If you control them in with a story. At least

14:17

you can maybe get them to

14:19

then talk about it at.

14:20

Home in the next conversation they're familiar

14:23

with it and perhaps a little

14:25

bit more ready to embrace.

14:28

Norman told me that even decades

14:30

later, he heard from viewers about

14:33

the impact of his shows.

14:35

It's so touching. And

14:38

we watched it as a family. We don't

14:40

watch anything as a family now, and

14:42

we talked about Archie and

14:44

we talked about the subject matter. And

14:48

the one thing that I think the show

14:50

accomplished that I can count

14:52

on because I've heard it through all the years,

14:55

was that there are

14:57

big words to me. We talked

15:00

to the show and we.

15:01

Talked think

15:03

about the things that Norman Lear was able to get away

15:05

with, quote unquote, get away with talking about.

15:08

And he was so powerful at that point

15:10

that I have to imagine that there were I mean,

15:12

there was that whole standards and practices department

15:14

at every network that there must have been people who

15:16

pushed back against certain things, lines

15:18

that he wanted to do, or maybe maybe topics.

15:21

There was indeed pushback to

15:23

many viewers shows like Norman

15:26

Lear's were too candid. Additionally,

15:28

there was outrage over the nineteen seventy

15:31

four Linda Blair made for TV

15:33

movie Born Innocent, which

15:35

included graphic sexual violence

15:37

and aired at eight PM when many

15:40

children were watching TV. The

15:42

networks went on defense.

15:44

The period from seven to nine PM

15:46

is known in television as the family viewing

15:48

period.

15:49

A period during which parents and children

15:51

are supposed to be able to sit together and watch

15:53

television without being made to feel

15:55

uncomfortable or so the networks

15:57

to find the family owner.

15:59

Which meant that in nineteen seventy five,

16:02

shows like All in the Family, which

16:04

had been airing at eight pm Eastern,

16:06

had to move to later in the evening.

16:09

Let's All Sing, the nineteen

16:12

seventy five version of

16:14

those were the day

16:17

the cast recorded a parody of

16:19

their opening number, mocking the

16:21

Family Hour concept and celebrating

16:24

what their later time slot would allow

16:26

them to talk about.

16:28

Seeing Congers.

16:33

Robert Can Propose to

16:35

Build.

16:37

In court, Lear and other writers and

16:40

producers challenged the Family

16:42

Hour. The court ruled that the Family

16:44

Hour concept was a violation of the

16:46

First Amendment, but it also

16:48

said it had no authority to dictate

16:51

how the network's programmed We

16:53

Can Show.

16:54

My Pregnancy and

16:57

John Boy Can Have b D.

17:02

Plus a quick ves sent.

17:07

After nine o'clock. The

17:17

Family Hour wasn't going away anytime

17:20

soon. On the other side of the break

17:23

the nineteen eighties and the heyday of

17:25

the Very Special Episode.

17:27

It was one of those things like can

17:29

we just farm out parenting

17:32

to this show. Yes, cool,

17:34

We're super happy with that.

17:41

Hello, I'm Conrad Vain Tonight

17:43

on Different Strokes, we're starting a special

17:46

two part show on a very sensitive

17:48

and important subject.

17:51

Different Strokes was one of the biggest

17:53

hit sitcoms of the early nineteen eighties,

17:56

airing at eight pm Eastern on

17:58

Saturdays, prying family

18:00

time. So in February nineteen

18:03

eighty three, when Conrad Bain,

18:05

who played the wealthy adoptive father

18:07

of Arnold and Willis Jackson, spoke

18:10

directly to viewers before the episode,

18:13

you knew it was serious.

18:15

Now we urge families, children and parents

18:17

alike to watch both of these informative

18:20

episodes and then to discuss the problem

18:22

presented, which is of deep concern to

18:24

all of us.

18:25

He's saying, this is what we're going to show

18:27

you. Parents, children, sit

18:29

down and discuss.

18:31

This is how America we do very special

18:34

episodes. Okay, So this episode

18:36

was about stranger danger and pedophiles.

18:39

It's Arnold and his friend Dudley, and

18:41

they become friends with the owner of a local

18:43

bicycle shop, mister Wharton.

18:45

You know, guys, you can

18:48

just have an awful lot of fun with your close office.

18:51

Les's of course you live at the North Pole, going

18:53

to freeze your tush off?

18:57

What kind of fun?

18:59

Well, for instance, as Skinny Dippit, mister

19:03

Hohrton gives the kids wine, which

19:05

is later discovered by Conrad Bain's

19:08

character. Here Arnold explains

19:10

what happened.

19:11

Well, while I was there with Dudley, he

19:14

gave us some pizza and wine.

19:15

What else went on there?

19:17

He showed us some pictures.

19:19

Everybody was naked

19:23

naked, and he showed us some kinky

19:25

cartoons.

19:28

What do you mean by kinky?

19:30

Well, you told.

19:31

Me about the birds and bees, but that's

19:33

nothing compared to what those mice were doing.

19:41

Who was laughing? Who

19:43

is laughing?

19:44

Here?

19:44

I know? I think part of the awkwardness is

19:46

that Carrie Coleman was such a star

19:49

and they couldn't resist

19:51

having him show his comedic chops,

19:54

and here it is jarring.

19:56

I wonder if.

19:57

Maybe it's more jarring,

19:59

and if they fell more compelled to make

20:01

sure the laughs were there. Because the audience of

20:03

Different Strokes was a younger audience as opposed

20:06

to the leer shows. Those

20:08

were smart, smart shows, and

20:10

those were smart enough that adults

20:12

were watching they weren't sort of here

20:14

I'm going to spoonfeed us had come to a child.

20:17

That's Jessica Shaw again, and

20:19

she's right. This was a younger audience,

20:22

and this episode did have an impact.

20:25

Newspapers reported the arrest of

20:27

at least one suspected child

20:29

molester in Indiana after

20:31

a young boy recognized and reported

20:34

predatory behavior in an adult.

20:37

Now it's important to note that the term

20:39

very special episode was never actually

20:42

used by programmers. It just

20:44

sort of became a joke later, so there's

20:46

no strict definition. I

20:49

think of it as any episode of a family

20:51

show where quote unquote sensitive

20:54

subject matter was discussed, whether

20:56

or not there was an actual warning from Conrad

20:59

Bain and probably

21:01

no show had more very special

21:03

episodes than different strokes.

21:05

They covered kidnapping, bulimia,

21:08

drinking, and just one month

21:10

after that Stranger Danger episode

21:13

came the Nancy Reagan Just

21:15

Say No episode. The

21:18

Reagan era became the golden age

21:20

of very special episodes, and

21:22

sometimes at the direction of Washington

21:24

itself. In the case of drugs,

21:27

the White House wanted to get the just

21:29

say no message out to as many kids

21:31

as possible. Congress

21:33

was also applying pressure Chuck

21:35

Schumer, than a New York House Rep

21:38

co wrote a letter asking networks

21:40

to devise an intensified campaign

21:43

of public service announcements and

21:45

instructive programs. Author

21:47

Philip Sepanski makes the case

21:49

that the networks were eager to comply.

21:52

This was a period of deregulation

21:55

when the networks stood to get even

21:57

richer. They wanted to show that they

21:59

could be responsible programmers

22:01

without the old rules that forced

22:04

them to be. So it was a win win

22:06

for the government and the networks. Plus,

22:09

kids learned something while their

22:11

parents theoretically received guidance

22:13

on how to explain, as Wally Cleefer

22:16

put it, all the bad junk in

22:18

the world. Here's

22:20

an elegant transition AIDS. It's

22:22

the eighties, so this is right

22:24

when AIDS emerges, obviously

22:27

as a major crisis, and there were very

22:29

special episodes about it.

22:30

Now but Nancy Reagan, I can tell you that much.

22:32

Let's go into Mister Belvidere,

22:35

a show that I must confess I never saw until

22:37

now.

22:38

That's Belvidere, Lynn Belvidere,

22:41

Queen.

22:41

That's a girl's name. Mister

22:44

Belvidere is a British butler who works

22:46

for the Owens family in suburban Pittsburgh.

22:50

Here he is greeting a friend of youngest

22:52

child, Wesley.

22:54

Everyone you remember, where's his friend? Danny?

22:56

Oh?

22:57

Oh, Danny?

23:00

Hi a champ? How's it going well?

23:02

I get eight.

23:03

President that I'm doing pretty good? Okay.

23:07

So it's very direct.

23:09

And I also think at that point, look

23:11

at what was going on in the White House. No one

23:13

was talking about AIDS, so

23:16

you can bet that families weren't

23:18

talking about it either.

23:20

It's true President Reagan didn't

23:22

even mention AIDS in public until

23:24

nineteen eighty five, four years

23:27

into the epidemic.

23:28

Just having a conversation about this

23:31

is usually when you think about what was going on

23:33

in real life with Ryan White.

23:35

Ryan White was a hemophiliac teenager

23:38

from Kocomo, Indiana, who contracted

23:40

AIDS through a blood transfusion and

23:43

was banned from attending school.

23:45

It's a story we're hearing more and more often, a

23:47

story marked by school boycotts and lawsuits

23:50

and students like Ryan White manned from

23:52

school because they have AIDS. Now, I

23:54

think that such a serious issue is not the stuff of which

23:56

situation comedies are made. Were

23:59

but don't tell them, folks, who work on Mister Belvidere.

24:02

This episode aired in January

24:05

of nineteen eighty six, and for a

24:07

network television family show, it

24:09

was pretty radical. For the writers,

24:12

it was personal. They were inspired

24:14

not only by the case of Ryan White,

24:17

but also by their very own talent manager's

24:19

loss. Her three year old son

24:22

had died from AIDS after a blood

24:24

transfusion. In the episode's

24:26

final scene, Wesley stands

24:28

up for Danny, who was not allowed

24:30

to participate in a school pageant.

24:33

Is Daniel and Neion. He was supposed to play linkon

24:35

but he couldn't because he's got AIDS.

24:38

Hey, oh, what are you doing out here?

24:41

Dennis?

24:41

Get away from him?

24:43

Hey, what's now with you people?

24:45

He's not going to hurt you.

24:47

I'm sorry. He feels bad enough forgot everybody

24:49

trying to make him feel worse.

24:50

I have to say, like I was getting

24:53

a little emotional. I felt a little burd in my nose

24:55

watching that scene because adults

24:58

were horrible, and you hear

25:00

them in the audience saying get away

25:02

from him, and then you hear this next

25:05

generation saying no, you're

25:07

being a nightmare and you're

25:09

being a bigot.

25:10

And there's something powerful

25:13

about that.

25:14

And I should point out that the actor

25:16

who played the boy with aids is

25:19

today a trans woman journalist

25:21

at Axios and is very very proud

25:23

of that episode and great that episode

25:25

did.

25:26

Yeah, I think it is powerful and also not

25:28

to be underestimated how much parenting

25:32

was farmed out to network television.

25:35

The drama of very special episodes

25:37

went done right required more

25:39

nuanced performances. The

25:41

best example maybe the nineteen eighty

25:43

four Uncle Ned episode of

25:46

Family Ties. In this scene,

25:48

the lead character of Alex P. Keaton

25:51

played by Michael J. Fox, encounters

25:53

his alcoholic uncle Ned in the kitchen

25:56

in the middle of the night. You'll probably

25:59

recognize the voice, so the actor playing

26:01

Uncle Ned.

26:02

Oh oh, oh oh, here we go.

26:04

Now it may not be million

26:06

time, but it is vanilla time.

26:10

Looking at you, kid. Now,

26:17

remember, don't drive and bake.

26:23

I don't believe this. You'd just strike a whole bottle of vanilla

26:26

extract.

26:27

And so who is it? Very

26:29

famous actor.

26:30

Tom Hanks as Uncle Ned in like,

26:32

by the way, the tightest jeans

26:35

ever.

26:36

Wow, those are tight. Well, first of all,

26:39

maybe I should know this does vanilla extract have

26:41

alcohol?

26:42

I think it does?

26:43

Oh it does? Okay, you know, when I first saw this a

26:45

couple of years ago, many years after it aired,

26:48

I thought, oh, I'm going to watch something

26:51

really, really laughable. But of course Tom Hanks

26:53

is so good that he pulls

26:55

it off.

26:56

Yes, absolutely, I mean that line, don't

26:58

drive in bake.

26:59

It's a good come line.

27:00

But yeah, he's so good,

27:02

and he's so funny, and he's

27:05

so charming.

27:06

This storyline feels organic.

27:09

Towards the end of the episode, a drunk

27:11

uncle Ned blows a job interview

27:14

and Alex tries to remind him

27:16

of his successful past. Then,

27:19

in a pretty shocking scene, Ned

27:21

backhands his nephew across the

27:23

face. Hey give

27:25

me, leave me alone.

27:26

Give me lave me alone. What

27:29

the hell are you, Joyce?

27:31

I don't know, I

27:34

don't know.

27:35

I'm sorry.

27:36

Sorry.

27:38

The Keaton family gives Ned an ultimatum,

27:40

call AA or get out. Ned

27:43

calls AA, and we never

27:45

see him again. Like all Very Special

27:48

episodes, everything is resolved

27:51

five years later. A nineteen eighty nine

27:53

episode of Growing Pains addressed

27:56

drinking and driving, younger

27:58

sister Carol finds out her boyfriend

28:00

Sandy was in a car accident. Sandy

28:03

is played by another soon to be famous

28:05

actor.

28:07

What happened last night?

28:09

Well, this big tree ran right out in front

28:11

of me, and

28:15

I'm gonna be charged with drunk driving.

28:19

I don't understand.

28:19

I mean, it's not like we had that much to drink.

28:21

I know.

28:22

I mean there's been plenty of times I put away a lot more

28:24

than that.

28:25

Nothing happened.

28:26

I guess I just ran

28:29

out of luck last.

28:29

Night, Are you kidding?

28:33

I mean, when you think of what could have happened,

28:36

you were really lucky.

28:38

And so that is Chacy Gold who plays

28:41

the daughter Carol, who's an honor student,

28:43

so she's usually you know, goody two shoes,

28:45

I guess. And that's her boyfriend,

28:47

played by Matthew Perry. Right, so

28:49

it takes on a whole other layer

28:51

of sadness. Let's see how it resolves.

28:54

Carol Sandy just died. Oh

28:57

my god, he said just

28:59

a few minutes.

29:01

Michael Seer, that is the second joke

29:03

that I have ever heard.

29:04

I'm never gonna forgive you.

29:06

Now. I went earlier and I looked

29:09

this is obviously on scientific but I looked

29:11

at comments on YouTube. There's no snark.

29:13

There are all these comments about how

29:16

powerful this episode was

29:18

and what a difference.

29:19

It made what happened to

29:21

his second chance, what

29:25

I happened to his second chance?

29:28

Yeah, and this is one of the episodes that

29:30

people look to and they say, oh,

29:33

this stopped me, or this allowed me to talk to

29:35

my kid about drunk driving, or this stopped

29:37

me from having a drink before getting behind a wheel.

29:39

And I have to say, just the very idea

29:41

of.

29:42

What happened to his second chance is

29:44

so profound, and

29:47

it's so simple.

29:48

It's nothing.

29:49

It's one line, you know, and it

29:51

says everything you want to say, as opposed

29:54

to some of these other very special episodes that are like, well,

29:56

you know, there's so much verbiage there.

29:58

Jeez. That's such a great point because this seems

30:00

to me like the kind of thing

30:03

a parent tries to impress on a child,

30:05

and it's really hard

30:07

to get a child to accept that there's not always

30:10

a second chance.

30:11

Yes, because kids think they're invincible.

30:14

And so when you hear another kid almost

30:16

being like I don't understand, it

30:18

goes right there and it's so understandable

30:22

and relatable.

30:23

You were saying a lot of these very

30:25

special episodes were

30:27

doing parenting for parents,

30:29

but here something that a parent would

30:31

say to a child is actually dramatized pretty

30:34

effectively.

30:35

And better in some ways. I think there were conversations

30:38

that parents should have had with children.

30:40

I have two kids, two teenagers now, and

30:43

there are things that they will

30:46

learn in a way that they will

30:48

listen to more. Their ears will open more

30:50

if they hear it from someone their age, if they hear

30:52

it, you know, coming from culture rather than from

30:55

their mother.

30:56

And this is one of those

30:58

examples.

30:59

By the way, you interviewed Matthew Perry,

31:01

right.

31:01

I did for his memoir, and

31:04

then watching this watching him

31:06

play someone who's

31:08

using alcohol and then who dies,

31:11

I don't know, it kind.

31:12

Of takes your breath away a little, and you know, people

31:14

keep saying it. But in that

31:16

earlier scene he is really good.

31:18

I mean, he was a good actor.

31:20

He could deliver a line, he had great timing,

31:22

and in that moment you can

31:24

see that he had the potential to play

31:27

a little bit of drama too.

31:28

Now, a lot of the shows we've been talking about

31:31

featured suburban white families,

31:33

but in the eighties and nineties, many millions

31:36

of viewers were watching black families

31:38

on the Cosby show, Family Matters

31:41

and The Fresh Prince of bel Air.

31:44

Now this is the story all about

31:46

him. Well, I'd got twins ferns upside

31:48

down and I'd like to take a manager said,

31:50

right then, I'll tell you how it became the prince of a

31:52

town called bell Air.

31:55

Okay, so this is a very special episode from The Fresh

31:57

Prince of bel Air. It

32:00

aired in nineteen ninety. Okay,

32:04

so over thirty years ago. Will

32:06

Smith's character and his cousin Carlton

32:08

the wonderful Alfonso Rovero

32:10

driving in a fancy car to Palm

32:12

Springs and getting stopped by a cop vehicle

32:15

registration. Please just a second,

32:18

But the thing is, officer, this isn't my car.

32:23

Get out of the car, Carlon what he's

32:25

gonna tell us to get out of the car?

32:27

You watch too much TV?

32:28

Will get out of the car, officer.

32:33

Honestly, I don't see the need to

32:35

get.

32:35

Out of the car now. Okay.

32:38

So then they're basically booked

32:40

into a precinct and then

32:42

they're released, and then

32:44

there's this discussion which is really interesting

32:47

between the Will and Carlton characters.

32:50

Were attained for a few hours.

32:52

Dad planned things up, and we were released.

32:54

The system works.

32:57

I hope you like that system because you want to be seeing

32:59

a whole lot of during your lifetime, not if.

33:01

I bring a map.

33:07

You just don't get it, do you.

33:09

No map is going to save you. Neither's

33:11

your glee club or your fancy bel

33:14

air address or who your daddy is, because

33:16

when you're driving in a nice car in a strange

33:18

neighborhood, none of that matters.

33:20

They only see one thing.

33:22

Just the fact that this is still happening.

33:24

And you know, could have beared last week and

33:27

people would have said, oh, this is so timely, is its

33:29

own tragedy. But it's so

33:32

fascinating that scene and

33:35

how the writers go right there.

33:37

It really is.

33:38

And part of what's also interesting, And look, there's

33:40

a kind of subtlety of sophistication happening

33:43

between those two characters. Right they

33:45

don't introduce a white bagot

33:47

character who has the conversation with

33:50

Will. Will and his cousin who's also

33:52

black, are having this disagreement over it,

33:54

and somehow it seems to have more impact that way.

33:56

Yeah, no, I agree. I think it's a really interesting

33:59

scene.

34:00

A conversation between two

34:02

black characters about racism.

34:04

The Very Special episode had come a

34:07

long way since the groundbreaking Bewitched

34:09

episode of twenty years before.

34:12

But by the end of the nineteen nineties, the

34:15

very special episode was dead.

34:18

What killed it?

34:19

I think audiences became kind

34:22

of too hip to what was going on.

34:25

That's next,

34:30

Jesse.

34:31

Those pills are dangerous.

34:32

Yeah, it was, sois geometry.

34:33

You told me you were going to stop taking them.

34:35

I need them to stay awake and study.

34:37

Okay, this is saved by the

34:39

Bell. This is an episode about

34:42

caffeine pills. It's sort of like

34:45

when people don't want to say Kleenex, they

34:47

say facial tissue. They didn't want

34:49

to use the brand name Nodos here, right,

34:51

so instead they're talking about caffeine pills.

34:53

Anything would be okay. I just need one

34:56

of these pills.

34:58

And so this is Elizabeth Berkeley's carearacter

35:00

Jesse, and she's turned to caffeine

35:03

pills to keep up with her studies and her new

35:05

singing group, which is called Hot Sunday.

35:07

I mean, you really are taking drugs.

35:09

You need them, say,

35:12

Jessee, you can't sing the night

35:14

you cat.

35:16

I'm so excited.

35:18

I'm so excited scared.

35:24

Well, first of all, do you think they had to pay for the rights?

35:27

Did she sing enough of the Pointer Sister

35:29

song that they had to pay for it.

35:30

I hope, so they should be paying for something. It's

35:33

super subtle. I love when she's like digging

35:35

around.

35:35

She's like pails pills.

35:38

It's no one ever acted that way

35:40

about nosing their lives

35:42

exactly.

35:43

I was a Jolt Cola person if I needed to finish

35:45

a paper, but I don't remember getting that excited.

35:48

To be fair, producers had originally

35:51

wanted the substance Jesse was taking

35:53

to be speed, but the network wouldn't

35:56

allow it. The nineteen ninety

35:58

caffeine pills episode of Saved

36:00

by the Bell was so memorable

36:02

it was parodied twenty five years

36:05

later on Family Guy.

36:07

You actually are taking drugs, Stuet,

36:09

give me those the contact.

36:11

I need them to sing.

36:13

I'm so excited, I'm

36:15

so excited, so

36:19

scared.

36:25

Screech is going to stab someone on Christmas.

36:28

But even by nineteen ninety four, when

36:30

the movie Reality Bites came out, the

36:32

very notion that a sitcom bore

36:35

any meaningful resemblance to real

36:37

life was sadly by gone.

36:40

I just don't.

36:44

Understand why things just can't go

36:46

back to normal.

36:47

At the end of the half hour, like on

36:50

The Brady Bunch or something.

36:54

Well, because mister Brady died of aides and

36:57

for most kids growing up in the late nineties

37:00

and early two thousand's family,

37:02

our TV seemed alien.

37:05

First of all, the idea that your parents

37:08

would sanction your TV watching was

37:10

donzo, forget about it. I'm watching

37:13

the show I want to watch for me.

37:15

You don't need to know what I'm watching. And

37:17

so that stamp of parental approval

37:20

of like, we're going to have a conversation that adults

37:22

are going to spoon feed

37:25

to you kind of in your language, but kind

37:27

of not, there was a generation

37:29

of kids who are like, no, we

37:31

don't do that anymore.

37:32

Right, I don't need to be introduced to this

37:34

topic on my favorite

37:37

sitcom?

37:37

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and just

37:39

the entire tone of sitcoms

37:42

changed.

37:43

If there was any one sitcom that marked

37:46

the death knell for the very special episode.

37:52

Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld would come along

37:54

saying basically, there are going to be

37:56

no very special episodes.

37:58

That is the very thing that we will never do.

38:00

I mean, what was the quote, no hugging, no learning,

38:02

No hugging no learning, right, So Seinfeld is a

38:04

series was a stand against everything that the

38:06

very Special episode stood for.

38:08

Yeah, there will be zero

38:11

issues, and even in the show within

38:13

the show, that show was

38:15

also about nothing.

38:17

Well, what's the show about?

38:19

It's about nothing?

38:22

No story?

38:23

Forget the story.

38:25

You gotta have a story?

38:26

Who says you gotta have a story. Remember

38:28

when we were waiting for that table in that Chinese

38:30

restaurant that time? That could be a TV

38:32

show?

38:35

How many levels of smart?

38:36

I mean, it's just it's so

38:39

so great and thank god, I

38:41

mean truly, can you imagine if they tried

38:43

to tackle an issue.

38:45

Of course, plenty of new series

38:47

did take on topics that were new

38:49

to sitcoms, but instead of these

38:52

being handled by ancillary characters

38:54

in one off episodes, they became

38:56

part of the fabric of the series itself.

38:59

Take Will and Grace, what decades

39:02

earlier might have been a very special

39:04

episode about an out gay man

39:06

living with his straight female best friend,

39:09

became an entire series. On

39:11

the show, Blackish creator Kennya

39:14

Barris wove into the comedy issues

39:16

as serious as police brutality

39:19

and the use of the N word. Not

39:21

surprisingly, he cited Norman

39:23

Lear as a major influence.

39:26

Yeah or even a show like My Crazy Ex

39:28

Girlfriend, I mean talking about mental

39:30

health.

39:30

Forget it.

39:31

I mean, can you imagine it's sitcom in the eighties

39:34

talking about mental health.

39:35

No, that wouldn't happen today. The

39:37

term very special episode is

39:39

so by gone. It's quaint, used

39:42

almost endearingly here

39:44

on the ABC sitcom Abbot

39:46

Elementary.

39:47

Okay, if you guys are finished with

39:49

this very special episode.

39:52

The very special episode could be

39:54

pretty corny. And let's face

39:56

it, there's only so much any kind

39:58

of sitcom can do to a us some

40:00

real world problems. When Quinta

40:03

Brunson, the creator and star of Abbott

40:05

Elementary, was asked by fans

40:07

to consider a school shooting storyline,

40:10

she suggested they use that energy to

40:12

demand more from lawmakers. And

40:15

yet there's also something to be said

40:17

about a time when families were more

40:20

likely to watch together and

40:22

maybe even learned together. As

40:24

Norman Lear told me about that time,

40:27

we talked. We looked at the show

40:29

and we talked. He's right. We

40:32

may have laughed, we may have disagreed,

40:35

we may have cringed, but

40:37

at least we talked. With

40:40

the exception of the Jesse Saved by the Bell,

40:42

Caffeine pil freak out. I found

40:44

myself looking at a lot of these scenes and I

40:47

don't know, being kind of moved by them,

40:50

Like the good times that mister Belvidere grows

40:53

hands.

40:53

I mean, yeah, and

40:55

Tracy Gold is really good in

40:57

that scene. I agree with you there intense

41:00

and they're dealing with complex

41:03

and profound feeling.

41:05

In the best way that they can in the format.

41:08

Yes, and in a way that somehow

41:11

works.

41:12

And of course not almost it comes had very special

41:14

episodes. There was never a very special episode of Three's

41:16

Company, right, yeah, I mean what would that

41:18

have been about? Like about rent Control?

41:20

I feel like something could have happened with the roper. That

41:22

was a very special episode waiting to happen.

41:24

A Mumoo accident, for

41:27

sure.

41:27

It was flammable and the house burned down. Right,

41:30

let's explore homelesses.

41:35

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41:38

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41:40

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41:46

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41:48

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41:52

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41:54

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41:57

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42:00

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includes plenty of stories not in

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the podcast. This episode

42:12

of Mobituaries was produced by

42:14

Liz Sanchez. Our team of

42:16

producers also includes Zoe Culkin

42:19

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42:22

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42:24

music is written by Daniel Hart. Our

42:26

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42:29

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42:34

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42:39

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42:41

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42:44

as well as the authors of the book, Very

42:46

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42:56

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42:59

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