Leave It To Beaver TV Show
There have been, over the last few decades, many running jokes and many more satires, pans, and mocking skits about the Leave it to Beaver TV show. The first one I remember was the one where a pseudo Ward and June Cleaver are doing something sexually related, something obviously opposite the wholesome, asexual behavior of the Leave it to Beaver TV show parents. One of the punch lines then includes the comment to, shake head in disgust, leave it TO the beaver.
An especially brilliant indirect allusion to the Leave it to Beaver TV show -- and others of its ilk -- was featured on a brilliant episode of Roseanne: the fifties, sixties, and even later period mothers gathered in Roseanne's kitchen to coo and cackle and bristle over Roseanne's mothering style. Roseanne does retort to June Cleaver (Barbara Billingsley, actually), who has scoffed at the way Roseanne is raising her wild kids, that at least she --didn't name [her] kid "Beaver". -- But further, in the process of discussing such acts as Roseanne kissing a lesbian (Mariel Hemingway), Roseanne -- in true postmodern style --becomes not the character but the actress, engaging all the pre-liberation matrons in Roseanne's 1995 salary (which she whispers to them). In response, Good Times mother/actress Isabel Sanford says something funny and Barbara Billingsley, as both herself and the alluded to June Cleaver, says, "I'd kiss a chick for THAT kind of dough!" So much for the spoofing of old black and white sitcoms like the Leave it to Beaver TV show.
But The Leave it to Beaver TV show does more than remain a punching bag sitcom. It soothes those of us just old enough to have watched The Leave it to Beaver TV show when it originally aired and who watch it in rerun now on TV Land, Nick at Night, or elsewhere. The grainy greys, the sharp defines, the simplicity of lines, the fashions, the fathering (by a father who was actually quite a grump), the mothering (by a mother in heels and pretty dresses and pearls) -- all contribute to a sense of safety, of well-being, of sanity for the now adult child. Maybe I speak only for myself or speak the obvious, but those old balck and whites, those few shows that showed at limited times on a limited number of channels (no VCRs, PPV, TiVo, etc., of course) give the overworked, overreacting, or overstimulated 40- and 50-somethings a temporary tranquilizing. They bring back the maybe rare or maybe consistent coziness of childhood, the comfort of chocolate chip cookies baked from scratch, the Sunday roasts, the quiet support, even the occasional rambunctious riling instigated by the ever-smarmy Eddie Haskell counterpart.
Of course, in speaking of the Leave it to Beaver TV show and similar shows, I had to bring up the "My, don't you look especially lovely today, Mrs. Cleaver" snake-tongued Eddie Haskell. Gee, Beav, are you in trouble.
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