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11: The Red Buttons Show (Mad About You). 12: The Jack Benny Program (Madman of the People). 13: Life with Luigi (Ellen). 14: Pabst Blue Ribbon Bouts (Hope & Gloria). 15: Goodyear Television Playhouse (Frasier). 16: The Life of Riley (Murphy Brown). 17: Mama (20/20). 18: Your Show of Shows (CBS Sunday Movie). 19: What's My Line? (NBC Monday Night Movies). 20: Strike It Rich (Dave's World).
For younger readers, much of this list will no doubt require annotation:
The Arthur Godfrey programs were variety shows centered on the folksy Godfrey, a performer known for his way with a ukulele, and once celebrated regulars like singer Julius LaRosa.
Texaco Star Theater was Milton Berle's showcase.
The Buick Circus Hour was an odd combination of drama and variety show, featuring an actual circus troupe.
Life with Luigi, The Life of Riley and Mama were somewhat politically incorrect ethnic sitcoms featuring, respectively, Italian Americans, Irish Americans and Norwegian Americans. (Amos 'n' Andy was also big that season and was pretty much the only place on television where you could see blacks.)
Pabst Blue Ribbon Bouts were weekly boxing matches--along with professional wrestling, a pervasive feature of the early TV landscape.
Strike It Rich was arguably the creepiest nonpublic-access program in TV history. A quiz show, it featured contestants who were chosen for their desperate need of money: families who were about to lose their homes, the unemployed, the crippled, people with sick parents (this was before Medicare even existed, let alone needed to be "fixed"). If a Strike It Rich contestant came up empty-handed, all was not lost: the host would urge viewers to call in on the "Heart Line" and pledge money and/or medical equipment. Despite this innovative, Roman circus-like approach to charity, the New York City-based show sparked a furor when local social-service agencies complained that they were being overwhelmed by indigent would-be contestants who had been showing up in Manhattan from all over the nation with no means of returning home.
As we said, one shouldn't romanticize the past. And a closing thought: If Marty, the lovelorn butcher from Chayefsky's teleplay, and his best friend Angie were to fall through a tear in the space-time continuum and wind up in 1995, they wouldn't have to run through their memorably aimless conversation: "What do you feel like doing tonight?" "I don't know, what do you feel like doing?" Today they'd just turn on The Simpsons or Larry Sanders or NYPD Blue and enjoy the best that contemporary American entertainment has to offer. What they would make of Dennis Franz's bare butt is harder to say.
--Reported by William Tynan/New York and Jeffrey Ressner/Los Angeles