When it premiered
on ABC in 1969 The Brady Bunch garnered mostly negative reviews.
From that date until 1974, its entire network run, the series never
reached the top ten ranks of the Nielsen ratings. Yet, the program
stands as one of the most important sitcoms of American 1970s television
programming, spawning numerous other series on all three major networks,
as well as records, lunch boxes, a cookbook, and even a stage show
and feature film.
In an era in
which situation comedies emphasized how social climes were changing,
The Brady Bunch was one of the few series that hearkened
back to the traditional family values seen in such sitcoms as Leave
It to Beaver and Father Knows Best. Executive producer
Sherwood Schwartz conceived of the premise: a widower, father of
three boys, marries a widow, mother of three girls. The concept
worked as a springboard for dramatizations of an array of childhood
and adolescent traumas. The cluster of children--Greg (Barry Williams),
Marcia (Maureen McCormick), Peter (Christopher Knight), Jan (Eve
Plumb), Bobby (Mike Lookinland) and Cindy (Susan Olsen)--provided
a male and female version for three separate stages of youth. With
this group the show managed to portray the typical crises of orthodonture,
first crushes, neighborhood bullies and school plays, as well such
homebound issues as sibling rivalry and problems with parental restrictions.
Father Mike Brady (Robert Reed) was always there with a weekly homily
that would explain to the children the lessons they had learned.
Although mother Carol Brady (Florence Henderson) was initially written
as a divorcee, and episodes of the first season did deal with the
problems of children getting used to a new mother or father, the
half-hour show repeatedly and firmly upheld the family as a tight
unit of support, love and understanding.
Unlike All
in the Family or even Julia, The Brady Bunch tried to
steer clear of the political and social issues of the day. Rarely
were non-white characters introduced into the series. Women's liberation
and gender equality were boiled down to brother-sister in-fighting.
The counterculture of the 1960s was represented in random minor
characters portrayed as buffoons--or in Greg trying to impress a
girl with hippie jargon.
The representation
of childhood in the series as a time of blissful innocence was in
marked contrast to what was happening off camera. Many of the boys
and girls playing the Brady children dated each other secretly,
making out in their trailers or in the doghouse of the Brady's pet,
Tiger. Oldest boy Barry Williams attempted to date Florence Henderson
and filmed at least one episode while high on marijuana. All these
incidents (as well as Robert Reed's homosexuality) occurred behind
closed doors, coming to light only a decade after the series originally
aired.
The decided
emphasis of the series on the Brady children made it very popular
among younger audiences. ABC capitalized on this appeal, programming
the show early on Friday evenings. This popularity also resulted
in various attempts to create other profitable spin-off products:
"The Brady Kids," a pop rock group (patterned on "The Archies"
and "The Partridge Family"), a Saturday morning cartoon called The
Brady Kids (1972-74), and regular appearances of the young actors
and actresses (particularly Maureen McCormick and Christopher Knight),
in teen fan magazines.
Following its
initial network run, The Brady Bunch became inordinately
popular in rerun syndication. This success can be attributed in
part to children's afternoon-viewing patterns. Often programmed
as a daily "strip" in after-school time periods, the show found
new viewers who had not previously seen the series. The age distribution
of the cast may have created appeal among a range of young viewers,
and as they aged they were able to take a more ironic viewing stance
toward the entertainment of their childhood.
The ongoing
success of the Brady characters has continually brought them back
to television. The Brady Bunch Hour, produced by Sid and
Marty Krofft from 1976-1977 on ABC, had the family hosting a vividly-colored
disco-oriented variety series. The Brady Brides, on NBC in
1981, was a half-hour sitcom about Marcia and Jan as they dealt
with their new husbands and the trials of being married. In December
1988, CBS aired the TV-movie A Very Brady Christmas, which
became CBS' highest-rated TV-movie that season. This led in 1990
to a short-lived hour-long dramatic series called simply The
Bradys.
Although the
dramatic series faded quickly, a live stage parody of the original
series quickly became a national sensation after its debut in Chicago
in 1990. Playing the original scripts as camp performance, "The
Real Live Brady Bunch" seemed to tap into viewers' simultaneous
love for and cynicism towards the values presented by the series.
The stage show and the subsequent film The Brady Bunch Movie
(1995) reveled in the kitsch taste of 1970s culture, complete
with "groovy" bell bottoms and day-glo orange and lime green color
schemes. Yet, although the stage production and the film gleefully
deconstructed the absurdity of the wholesomeness of the Brady family,
an admiration remained. Many children who grew up with the show
came from families of divorce, or were "latch-key" children with
both parents working. Consequently, some of those amused at the
naiveté of the series also admittedly envy the ideal nuclear family
that they never had and that the Bradys represent.
Much
like Star Trek, another Paramount-produced television series
of the late 1960s, The Brady Bunch was underappreciated by
critics and network executives, but fan loyalty has made the series
a franchise for book deals, memorabilia and feature films. A cultural
throwback even in its time, the family led by "a lovely lady" and
"a man named Brady" has become celebrated in part precisely for
its steadfast obliviousness to societal change.
-Sean
Griffin
Bellafante,
Gina. "The Inventor of Bad TV: What Would the '70s Have Been Without
Sherwood Schwartz? (interview)." Time (New York), 13 March
1995.
Briller,
Bert. "Will the Real Live Brady Bunch Stand Up?" Television Quarterly
(New York), Spring 1992.
Steele,
Scott. "Bringing Up Brady." Maclean's (Toronto, Canada),
7 February 1994.
Williams,
Barry, with Chris Kreski. Growing Up Brady: I Was A Teenage Greg.
New York: Harper Perennial, 1992.
Zeman,
Ned. "Seventies Something; The Era that Gave Us Bell-Bottoms, Abba
and The Brady Bunch Is Coming Back. Have a Nice Decade."
Newsweek (New York), 10 June 1991.
