Respect Authority

Despite the fact our little recession just recently celebrated its one-year anniversary, I’ve been pleased to note that the financial fallout has yet to hit pop culture in any significant way. The Real Housewives are still spending $10,000 per shopping trip, The Apprentice doesn’t seem concerned with The Donald’s umpteenth bankruptcy and personal finance has yet to replace butts and bubbly as the subject of 50 Cent songs.  

So it’s rather ominous to read of ABC’s plans for two potential recession-related sitcoms. The first is an untitled project starring Kelsey Grammer as a Wall Street executive whose layoff forces him into a “Mr. Mom”-like role at home with the family he hardly ever saw. The other, Canned, is Friends on a budget - with several younger Gen X peers lamenting their recent firings from an investment bank. 

“You can’t pick up the paper and not read about people going through this,” Canned producer Kevin Etten told Advertising Age. 

Indeed Kevin, which is exactly why when I put down the paper and turn on the TV, I’d much rather watch people who seem insulated from whatever’s going on in the “real world.” Chandler and Joey were too busy adopting ducks and inventing new sports with household items to be concerned with things like “politics” or “current events” - and I don’t remember any sitcoms addressing 9/11 from their less-than-lofty perch atop a summit of canned quips and witty banter. 

ABC of all networks should understand this much-appreciated distinction between entertainment and current events: its most popular fare includes surreal shows like Lost and Life on Mars. Coupled with nonsense comedies such as Ugly Betty and Desperate Housewives – where real-life concerns play second fiddle to who is sleeping with whom, and how awkward it is to wear adult braces  – ABC seems to grasp that both fantasy and laughter are at the heart of good television these days, particulary as everything else collapses. The last thing I want is to see a once-affluent Frasier supplanting his luxurious taste and pricey apartment for time at home with the kids. 

I’ll be the first to admit that people watch(ed) Sex and the City, and even Friends, to relate to the characters - to chuckle at the complexities of urban living as portrayed on screen. But even as we nodded knowingly at Carrie’s use of her oven for sweater storage, we loved the serenity of a world where big concerns were shoes over mortgage payments, or Foosball over firings. Show me a sitcom about the recession, and I’ll show you the movie I’m going to watch instead.