In the years immediately following World War II, NBC's legendary
David Sarnoff and his cross-town equal, CBS's William S. Paley,
decided that American television would be identified with quality
live drama surrounded by news, light entertainment (in the form of
variety and quiz shows), and family-oriented series generally spun
off from radio. That initial vision eroded over the years and
decades, but the dramatic part of this equation endured well into
the 1960s, when, with NBC's Project 120 (which commissioned movies
expressly for television in 120-minute doses), the genres known as
Movies Made for Television and the miniseries emerged. Today, as
Angels in America, Band of Brothers, Into the West, and Lackawanna
Blues continue to draw huge cable audiences, the television movie
and anthology drama is now in a unique position to represent, in a
simple and direct way, the various states of the television
industry itself over the past 60 years. This volume covers all of
the important landmarks in the genre, from Kraft Television Theater
to Roots to Rome, and provides a parallel history of the relevant
events in television and American culture that helped to ensure the
popularity and viability of this genre over time. Until the early
1980s-when Cable began fragmenting the television audience-the
three major networks had the airwaves mainly to themselves; but
with Cable now on the scene, dramatic productions began falling
victim to the bottom line. But just when it seemed that Cable was
finally going to succeed in killing off such programming forever,
it has itself come to play the savior to the genre; and now pay
cable channels like HBO and Showtime (not subject to the same FCC
restrictions as the original networks) thrive on such dramas as
Angels in America, Band of Brothers, Into the West, and Lackawanna
Blues. After making its several transitions across channels and
decades and formats, the television movie is now in a unique
position to represent, in a simple and direct way, the various
states of the television industry itself over the past 60 years.
General
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