The list of activities that truly make me happy seems to dwindle with each passing year. One that still qualifies is watching compilations of vintage TV commercials on YouTube, particularly those that share a Halloween or Christmas theme. And thankfully we’re now into the season when doing so would seem slightly less strange than watching them in April. But I do that too.
This time, however, I am revisiting my favorite compilations not just for pleasure but also as a scientific analysis. After enduring far too many current commercials, which can lower a viewer’s IQ in just 30 seconds, I was curious to study how many of those 1970s and ’80s ads also featured people acting like idiots.
Before revealing the result I should clarify what “acting like an idiot” entails, as there are many idiots loose in the wild today that see nothing unusual in their behavior. For the purpose of this study an idiot is defined as someone who, if they did what they are doing in the real world and not in a commercial, would draw incredulous stares from everyone in the surrounding area.
I would also like to clarify that I am unaware of any offensive connotation (outside of the obvious) to the word “idiot” and whether it is now discriminatory or intolerant to any subset of humanity based on any pre-existing condition over which they have no control.
Can’t be too careful these days.
I will also not classify all unusual behavior as idiotic if there is a supernatural element involved, as is frequently found in Halloween spots. If a housewife turns into a witch, that’s just seasonal fun.
This is the Halloween video I reviewed. It contains about 80 commercials.
How many of these spots do you think would measure on the idiot scale? Here’s the answer – two. Just two out of ±80. I think that’s a ratio viewers would welcome now, as it means far fewer lunges for the mute button.
Not long after completing my study, I turned on a network with commercials – doesn’t really matter which one – and not three commercials passed before a first ballot hall-of-fame idiot popped up to celebrate his drug prescription. A few minutes later, just two commercials aired before another cringe-worthy exhibition.
Can we learn anything from this? Does it say something about how television has changed, how the culture has changed, or is it merely a result of advertisers having to fight so much harder now to get our attention?
These are the real questions. I’m not sure I have the answers. But as this blog has evolved I hope it has become a place to not just celebrate the wonderful shows of the past, but also to look beneath the surface, and try to understand why television is the way it is now, and why the decisions being made by content producers seem so different from what they used to be.
I understand the pressure of having to pull viewers away from other distractions that did not exist in the Comfort TV era, when the television screen was the only screen in the house. When people watched TV then their focus was not distracted by incoming text messages or the latest viral TikTok upload.
Knowing that an audience was watching and listening (mute buttons were also less commonplace), commercials didn’t have to shout to get your attention. Advertisers hired spokespersons with pleasing voices, or gave us a glimpse into recognizable home and business settings, with a more simple, straightforward message: here’s a product we think you’d like, and this is why.
But that might not be enough anymore, so they yell, or try to compensate for muted sound with visuals so bizarre they hope viewers will restore the audio to find out what’s going on.
Does it work? And if it works for commercials, would it not make sense to try the same strategy for a TV series? I pulled up a list of the 25 best TV series according to RogerEbert.com. I won’t judge them without having watched them, but from the descriptions it’s clear that many feature characters that exist far outside the mainstream, and capable of extreme behavior.
Maybe there is a through-line here, in a time when it’s become fashionable to denigrate the normal. The traditional. The spiritual (Halloween ghosts? Yes! Holy Ghost? No.) And that is the culture television now reflects. It depends on your perspective, I guess. All I know is that the Halloween commercial compilation I watched now has more than 1.3 million views, and has elicited thousands of comments like the following:
“There was never a better time in history to be a kid then the 70's and 80's. Thanks for putting this together. Great memories!”
“There’s something magical about old commercials, like there’s a certain charm about them”
“I would do anything to be able to go back and live in this time period.”
“Little did we know how good we had it back then. Is so different today I wish my kids could have grown up back then.”
“I look back at all these retro commercials with nostalgia and some sadness. It reminds me of those days when we had hope for our lives, our country, our loved ones. Unlike now where it feels like we are on the verge of collapse and our quality of life is deteriorating fast. We don’t have to pretend to be frightened of evil spooks in an imaginary world, we are living that reality now.”
Will today’s commercials – will today’s television shows – elicit a similar response 50 years from now? I seriously doubt it.
Gosh David, this was well written but bittersweet too. I hope you do more commercial themed posts, so much to discuss here. Just off the top of my head I can remember several tv comms my family would pause what they were doing to watch. Dad loved Joey Heatherton and Serta mattresses, Mom loved Paul Anka singing Kodak Times of your Life, James Garner and Mariette Hartleys Polaroid banter... my sisters liked that Dr. Pepper guy.... I could just go on and on. I really wonder what will be nostalgic 30 years from now.
ReplyDeleteAll of the ones you mentioned were wonderful and memorable. And I would add many of the McDonald's commercials from that era, and those with recurring characters - Madge the manicurist, Murph at Union 76. What will be nostalgic in 30 years? Your guess is as good as mine.
DeleteGreat post. I said something similar to one of my kids about the shows my granddaughters watch. Some is on streaming, with no ads, so there won't be nostalgia there. But the ads they do see, like on YouTube, are not at all memorable, they are mindless and forgettable as soon as they end. Lost of what we look back at doesn't exist at all for them, as you pointed out. I don't know what they will think back fondly on. ASMR videos, I suppose.
ReplyDeleteSomeone commented on this piece on Facebook that in 20 years people will be nostalgic for Ozempic commercials. I find that very hard to believe.
DeleteTwo weekends ago, we pulled out the DVD of one episode of the Frank Sinatra Show from 1959 with the original ads. It was sponsored Timex watches. The 'commercials' were simply two minutes of a guy trying to tell me why Timex is the greatest in the world. Too bad we can't get back to a time when one company sponsored an entire show spending only two minutes to sell me something, instead of a zillion companies doing it in ten or twenty minutes.
ReplyDeleteAnd as you know that was also the era where the stars of the show also did their own commercials, sometimes as the characters they played. It was all a lot nicer back then.
DeleteMy dad used to talk about Martin Kane, a TV detective who always went out to buy his favorite chewing tobacco in the middle of a case. Way before my time.
DeleteI'm a sucker for these vintage commercial compilations as well. I've said before, it says something that even the commercials back then were positive and uplifting. In my opinion, people were more intelligent, creative and talented back then and it shows in the advertising, both in print and television.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking those series listed by Roger Ebert's website would be 10+ years old because he's been dead that long, but he apparently has people left to carry on his questionable mission, since the list was compiled for last year. I noticed that not a single series on the list is or was carried on a broadcast network. Of course for me I've never seen a single one of them, nor do I want to. The shows were all on cable or streaming services. As a result they can & do all have very narrow audience appeal.
ReplyDelete