Why did CBS censor The Smothers Brothers? How did The Smothers Brothers respond to CBS’s attempts at censorship? How did questions of what constitutes appropriate content for network TV play out in the late 1960s and early 1970s and how do they play out today?
CBS censored the Smothers Brothers because as their series wore on, especially noticeable in the third season, the Brothers took more and more overtly leftist political stances. This was in sharp contrast to the clean-cut, all-american image that they had fostered previously (under the guise of which they subversively made hippie and drug culture references often). Footage such as the Chicago Democratic Convention police beatings got cut by censors partly because it evoked, just the footage by itself, a leftist political stance, which the network did not want to explicitly make. As the political stance of the show became more obvious, affiliates of CBS started dropping the show from their orders. CBS was mostly concerned with moments in which the Smothers Brothers "editorialized" as opposed to "entertaining"- in this way CBS defined their network and programs as "apolitical".
ReplyDeleteThe Brothers responded to critics by not only growing more overtly political over the run of the series, but by making fun of the critics very explicitly as well. As we saw in screening, the Smothers' had prepared a skit in which censors reviewing a program made ridiculous cuts and were overall made fun of (the Bodroghkozy details other censor-oriented jokes as well). This skit didn't make it to air and in the end the brothers presented the script itself, in paper form, as an even further way of poking fun at censors. It should be noted that these blatant attacks on censors (including those hilariously delivered by Pat Paulsen) were part of a gradual trend stemming from the Brothers frequent finding of loopholes within the system. Though over the years they had used censor boundaries to shape their comedy, while simultaneously subverting these boundaries, and it was only once they got explicitly political that they got cancelled.
Questions of what's appropriate for network TV in the late 60s and early 70s would have focused on anything deemed propagandistic. With the Smothers' explicitly condemning the Vietnam War and aligning with drug-culture and youth dissent, their content was no longer apolitical. Nowadays if a show, SNL for example, were to make fun of the President or reference drug culture, it would be allowed to do so overtly. This is at once a sign of overall progress towards the diminished power of censors and also a sign of the importance of time slots. Surely, obvious drug references wouldn't make it onto Sesame Street, but perhaps a political stance would. In other words, nowadays, I don't think that the binary of "editorial" vs. "entertainment" is still in play. Opinions are not condemned necessarily, rather a show can have an agenda and still be entertaining.
The Smothers Brothers made enemies with CBS because of their transparent criticism of government policies, of the Vietnam War, and drug references, and their progressively leftist approach to coverage. Their coverage and comments were far more to-the-left than the network wanted to make as a whole, which resulted in things such as riot coverage, and a particular skit on censorship itself, getting cut. Their hippie-drug-references (still underground for adult audiences) fell positively on the ears of young viewers, but appealed too strongly to an editorial stance than a more neutral, strictly entertaining stance.
ReplyDeleteIn response to censorship, the Smothers brothers and their writers took their unseen skits to the public through means of newspapers and other media sources--if they couldn't get the word out through their show, they would do everything they could to get it out through the media. In this way, they bridged television with the media and urged young TV viewers to become informed citizens, and those informed citizens to be critical of the current social and political climate (or at least be able to satirize it).
Present-day shows such as John Stewart's "The Daily Show" and SNL are free to voice their opinions and open satirize moves by politicians, and make overt drug references without any backlash of the networks, which is far from the case in the 1960s and early 1970s. NBC, in this way, has certainly taken a more leftish stance with most of their shows, where ABC remains a tad more neutral, and CBS even more-so. Networks have this ability today moreso than they did forty years ago. Censorship today seems to center more around children's shows and keeping those shows appropriate and apolitical. However, The Daily Show as an editorial must remain appropriate, and SNL must remain more entertaining than political, which is the ultimate goal regardless of political stance.
The Smothers Brothers encountered censorship from CBS due to its inappropriate content and countercultures related to current political issues such as the gun right, the anti Vietnam War, and psychedelic drugs. The Smothers Brothers show criticized government policies, talked about the issue of drugs, and even the Civil Rights Movement by using jokes, because it wanted to target at 16 to 24 year old teenagers who were the major population of the counterculture movement.
ReplyDeleteDue to the fear that the credibility of the American government as well as the authority would decrease, CBS expressed their dissatisfaction towards Smothers Brothers and took actions. The audience thought that the show was “over the edge of tastelessness” and criticized it of being too radical. The Smothers Brothers even makes jokes on the censors. For example, in the show, through making jokes, they showed the audience a script that was cancelled by the censor. Even though they did not perform it and the audience was not able to see the content, they challenged the censor in a satirical way.
Censorship today also targets at the contents including drugs and violence, but it allows for space for political satires.
CBS attempted the Smother's Brothers as they leaned towards a far more leftist agenda in their programming. Although the program began as a relatively neutral show, it became increasingly political in its next two seasons, leading to its cancellation. The content that originally drew the ire of censors were references to the underground drug culture. CBS was in the position where they did not want to condone illegal drugs but were in a position so far behind the writers in terms of drug related lingo they found it difficult to catch all the references to drugs.
ReplyDeleteCensorship increased as the Smothers Brothers started becoming more political. They started leaning to the left and criticizing institutions. Such criticisms were aimed at the Vietnam War and police repression of protests. One skit involved one of the brothers getting dressed in a gas mask and other equipment in preparation for college. CBS began censoring these criticisms because it could go back to CBS. Eventually in the shows third season CBS claimed the Smothers were becoming more editorial than entertaining as their left leaning ways became obvious.
The Smothers responded to the criticisms by criticizing CBS and censors. A scene lecture depicted censors taking every funny part of a script out till it was empty of substance and humor. The clip above goes on to criticize censorship as a violation of the Bill of Rights.
In the end the "Smothers Brothers" were cancelled because of editorialization. This airing of their political allegiance during times of relative civil unrest made networks uneasy as they could divide sponsors or undermine the fact that networks were part of the system. Today censorship focuses more on the appropriateness of content. Censors seem to look for obscenities and other things that be offensive to parents or families. Editorialization is embraced in several programs most notably comedy shows. One example is "South Park" whose creators tend to insert their world and political views. However, most of the complaints and attempted censorship of the show aren't aimed at the political content but rather the more obscene content , such language or sexual content. Other shows like the Colbert Report, The Daily Show, and SNL are blatantly editorial.
CBS censored the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour because the show crossed the fine line it was walking in its first season as it continued to air into its second and third seasons. In the show’s first season, the brothers managed to balance guests and sketches that would appeal to the older television audience, and references and guests for the younger audience. As the show went on, the Smothers Brothers began to push the envelope towards a further left leaning political point of view, and a more biting political satire. Complaints came rolling in, and CBS began heavily censoring the show, airing episodes later with contentious material cut out (like the Joan Baez episode) or asking the brothers to dilute their sketches down to make them more palatable to the audience.
ReplyDeleteThe Smothers Brothers responded to this censorship by writing sketches (such as the
one mentioned in the reading and also viewed in class) that criticized the CBS censors. They also featured characters such as Goldie O’Keefe, who could slip references to things like drug culture past the censors. Innocuous things mentioned in the faux-domestic sketches such as “roaches” and “heads” meant nothing to the older generation, but appealed to the burgeoning drug culture of the youth in the 60s.
The question of what’s appropriate for television in the 60s and 70s was largely based around the political strife and the youth counterculture. Much of the what was censored on the Smothers Brothers show was politically based, and meant to attract viewers from the growing hippie counterculture. The ideas of free love and free drugs, as well as the far left political leanings of this culture were all targets for censors. In the present, network TV censorship is more lax, and (I think) mostly revolves around sexual issues. Drug use is common, political ideas are common (although there are not many politically charged network tv dramas, unlike say a cable show like Homeland), and heterosexual sex is common. Although explicitly graphic sexual content is not allowed, it seems as though every year more and more is allowed to be shown on network television.
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour was a show that lasted 3 seasons in the late 1960s. Originally appearing as a television show that appealed to the mass audience (including the older generation), the Smothers Brothers would go from being a highly rated program beating out competitors to being censored and consequently pulled from the air. During its first season the show would often feature guests such as George Burns that would be immediately recognized by the older generation. The show would occasionally reference psychedelic drugs through a play on words and other loop holes that would not be filtered by the network. However, transitioning into the second and third seasons the show aimed its political affiliations with the dissident youth, college students, dropouts, and hippy cultures. CBS decided to censor The Smothers Brothers after receiving complaints about the shows offensive material and rigid left-winged political stance. The Smothers Brothers responded at attempts of censorship through comedic skits and would generally “poke fun” at censorships. This strong-armed approach by CBS runs antiparallel to the Quiz Show Scandals of the 1950s where sponsors had a weaker impact on the shows that were aired. CBS ultimately canceled the show after incidents such as Folk Singer Joan Baez’s announcing the reason for her husband’s imprisonment over the air. She stated that her husband was imprisoned for refusing selective service and for his open opposition to the Vietnam War. The episode that she announced this was ultimately pulled off the air but later aired with censorship for the reason of Baez’s husband’s arrest. This was viewed as a breach of the first amendment by the press and displayed how much of an impact the show had with its youth audience (often portrayed in the background during the third season as its audience). Television ultimately became more progressive and contemporary shows often display values from the entire political spectrum.
ReplyDeleteCBS censored The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour more and more along the show goes on to second and third season. From the beginning of the show, the Smothers Brothers’ show were political sensitive but in a subtle way while it placed some jokes in their skits. However, the show’s leftist political view and the countercultural references grew more and more presence into its second and especially third season. As a broadcast network, CBS grew to concern about the controversial editorialized skits of the Smothers Brothers rather than entertaining. CBS tried to censor the show to trying to avoid the show to offend the mass audience.
ReplyDeleteThe Smothers Brothers responded to the censorship quite aggressively by using the censor as a joke in their skits. The show while was being censored still managed to slip through some leftist political jokes, drug reference and other countercultural point of views under some masquerade of generation gap. For example, the “roach” joke was masqueraded under a domestic setting with double layers of meanings of the word “roach” for different generations. Only when they get more and more political explicit on their skits, CBS had to cancel the show as it was inappropriate or politically incorrect for a network.
Appropriate content on network TV from late 60s to 70s was surrounded by the mainstream culture and the Vietnam war. Networks should serve the public interest and not to offend anybody, also networks should serve the patriotic service during the sensitive war period. Nowadays on network TV, there is rule of 50/50 for two parties. Entertainment shows like SNL plays the political jokes without too much censorship. But it is placed into the late night slots. Although mass audiences are more acceptable to hot botton political issues on networks, it is still not quite often to see extreme attitude or opinion on any broadcast networks. Cable news shows like Colbert Report and Jon Steward, on the other hand, could be an example of voices nowadays.