The 1970-1971 Television Season: When the Networks Tried to Be "Relevant"

For the 1970-1971 television season, the broadcast networks' key words were "youth," "now," and "relevance." That season CBS, ABC, and, to a lesser degree, NBC debuted several television shows that starred young casts and dealt with topical, social issues, shows such as The Storefront Lawyers, The Young Lawyers, and The Psychiatrist. This certainly was not because the networks wanted to appear "relevant" after years of criticism for airing primarily escapist television. Instead, the networks were hoping that these new shows would attract the key demographic of 18 to 49 year old viewers most valued by Madison Avenue. Despite this, while featuring young casts and dealing with topical issues, most of these shows were designed to have some appeal for the broader television audience in an effort to maximize their ratings.

Despite all the networks' ballyhoo about shows that dealt with topical, social issues, in many respects it was nothing new. Shows that touched upon the issues of the day had aired earlier than the 1970-1971 season. In the Fifties it was not unusual for such anthology shows as Studio One and Playhouse 90 to occasionally deal with various hot topics of the time. The Twilight Zone often addressed various social issues and human nature in general. Debuting in 1961, The Defenders ushered in a small cycle of socially conscious television shows, and dealt with such topics as the Civil Rights movement, conscientious objectors, and mercy killing. One of its episodes, "The Benefactor," which addressed abortion, was so controversial the show's regular sponsors (Brown & Williamson, Lever Brothers, and Kimberly-Clark) refused to sponsor it. The Defenders was followed by such socially conscious shows as East Side West Side, Channing, Mr. Novak, and For the People. At the same time as these socially conscious shows were airing, the sketch comedy show That Was the Week That Was, based on the British show of the same name, often dealt with the politics of the day.

Even after the socially conscious dramas of the early to mid-Sixties faded away, there were still some shows that would touch upon social issues. From the beginning the Western Bonanza occasionally addressed such issues as racism and mental illness, and this would only increase as the Sixties progressed. At the time Star Trek  was known for addressing social issues through the lens of science fiction.  The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour proved controversial because it insisted on addressing politics and topical issues. Rowan & Martin's Laugh In also addressed politics and topical issues from time to time.

In some respects, then, it should have come as no surprise when a spate of shows dealing with socio-political topics in their episodes debuted in the 1970-1971 season. Indeed, it is likely that such shows as The Young Rebels and The Interns owed their existence to one show: The Mod Squad. The Mod Squad centred on three, young undercover detectives ("one black, one white, one blonde"). The Mod Squad was one of the earliest shows to deal with the counterculture in a serious manner, and it dealt with such issues as abortion, child abuse, domestic violence, racism, and the Vietnam War. It debuted on September 24 1968 on ABC and proved to be a hit. For its first season it ranked 28 in the Nielsen ratings for the year.

The impact of The Mod Squad was felt during the 1969-1970 season, with shows debuting that dealt with the hot topics of the day. Room 222 was a comedy-drama that debuted on ABC on  September 17 1969. It was set at the fictional Walt Whitman High School in Los Angeles, and starred Lloyd Haynes as a young history teacher. From time to time Room 222 dealt with such topics as feminism, homophobia, racism, and the Vietnam War. While Room 222 occasionally dealt with topical issues, they were at the core of the short-lived The New People. The show centred on a group of young people stranded on an island meant for an above-ground nuclear test but never used. The show followed the characters as they attempted to create their own society. Debuting on ABC on September 22 1969, it only lasted until January.

While Room 222 and The New People both debuted on ABC, NBC would also debut a show that dealt with socio-political topics in the 1969-1970 season. Airing on NBC, The Bold Ones was an umbrella title for four rotating shows. When one of the original shows, The Protectors, was cancelled, it was replaced by a show called The Senator, starring Hal Holbrook as a United States Senator from an unnamed state. Because of its very nature, The Senator often addressed social issues, including air pollution, anti-war protests, and the welfare system. In addition to Room 222, The New People, and The Senator, two medical dramas debuted during the 1969-1970 season that occasionally touched upon social issues, Marcus Welby, M.D. (on ABC) and Medical Center (on CBS).

The first of the shows featuring young casts and dealing with social issues to debut in the 1970-1971 season was Storefront Lawyers. Storefront Lawyers debuted on CBS on September 16 1970. The show starred Robert Foxworth as a young lawyer, David Hansen, who leaves a prestigious law firm to found a non-profit called  Neighborhood Legal Services. Working with him were Deborah Sullivan (Sheila Larken) and Gabriel Kay (David Arkin). A legal student, Robeto Alvarez (A. Martinez) worked as their law clerk. Storefront Lawyers differed from The Mod Squad (and most of the other new, socially conscious shows that season) in that it lacked an older character who acted as a father figure. Set in Century City, Storefront Lawyers dealt with such issues as domestic violence, affirmative action, racism, and illiteracy.

Storefront Lawyers received mixed reviews, with the majority tending to be negative. Worse yet, the show did not perform particularly well in the ratings. CBS then revamped the show as Men at Law, in which David Hansen returns to his old law firm. It did no better in the ratings, and was cancelled at the end of the season. Curiously, while Storefront Lawyers was meant to appeal to a younger demographic, according to the book Archie Bunker's America: TV in an Era of Change, 1968-1978, its "strongest audience" was "those over fifty."

The second new, socially "relevant" show of the 1970-1971 season also debuted on CBS. The Interns was a medical drama loosely based on the 1962 film The Interns and its 1964 sequel The New Interns, which were in turn based on the novel The Interns by Robert Frede. Despite this, The Interns shared no characters in common with the two movies or the novel, although it was set in the same hospital as the movies, New North Hospital in Los Angeles. While inspired by the movie The Interns, the show owed a good deal to The Mod Squad. Like the young characters on The Mod Squad, the young characters on The Interns reported to a father figure--in the case of The Interns, Dr. Peter Goldstone (Broderick Crawford). Of the five interns on the show, one was a woman, Dr. Lydia Thorpe (Sandra Smith). Another was Black, Cal Barrin (Hal Fredrick). Yet another was married. Dr. Sam Marsh was played by Mike Farrel, now best known for M*A*S*H, while his wife, Bobbe Marsh, was played by Elaine Giftos. The remaining interns were Greg Pettit (Stephen Brooks) and Pooch Hardin (Christopher Stone).

For a show meant to appeal to a young demographic, CBS scheduled the show at a time when it was likely they would not be watching television. It debuted on Friday, September 19 1970 at 7:30 PM Central/6:30 PM Central. It is perhaps for that reason it did not do very well in the ratings. Its first episode ranked 45th out of the 80 shows on the air, and the ratings did not improve from there.  The Interns received largely negative reviews from critics. Jack Gould of The New York Times described it as "one more hospital drama of scant distinction." From descriptions of The Interns, it would appear to be an uncomfortable blend of medical soap opera and social relevance. Not only did episodes deal with racism, abortion, riots, drugs, and mental illness, but one of the doctors was in a serious car accident, another doctor was accused of having an affair with a woman by her husband, another doctor was accused of murder, and most of them appear to have been sued at some point. The Interns would not survive the 1970-1971 season.

The Interns was immediately followed by the next new show to deal with social issues. Headmaster (also known as The Headmaster) debuted on CBS on September 19 1970 at 8:30 PM. Headmaster was unusual among the socially "relevant" shows to debut in the 1970-1971 season in that its regular cast was all over 30. Headmaster starred Andy Griffith as Andy Thompson, the headmaster of Concord School, a small private school in California. His wife, Margaret (Claudette Nevins), also worked at the school as an English teacher. Jerry Van Dyke was the school's football coach, Jerry Brownell, while Parker Fennelly was the school's custodian, Mr. Purdy. Despite the casting of Andy Griffith and Jerry Van Dyke, Headmaster was not a sitcom, but a comedy drama. Indeed, it was a sharp contrast to The Andy Griffith Show.  Its first episode guest starred Butch Patrick (best known as Eddie Munster on The Munsters) as a student who succumbs to peer pressure to do drugs. Despite starring Andy Griffith, Headmaster dealt with the issues of the day.

If CBS was hoping that Headmaster would be Andy Griffith's triumphant return to television, they would be sorely disappointed. Headmaster was lambasted by the critics. In no less than The New York Times it was referred to as "Modern TV waste." Audiences apparently did not care for Headmaster either. In the beginning, probably on the strength of Andy Griffith alone, its first episode ranked 20th out of the 80 shows on the air for the week. In its second week it dropped all the way to 38th for the week. After that, its ratings got even worse. With it clear that Headmaster was a failure, it was replaced in its timeslot by another show starring Andy Griffith. The New Andy Griffith Show was a more traditional rural comedy much like The Andy Griffith Show.

While CBS's new socially relevant shows did not receive sterling reviews, none of them were met with as hostile a reaction from critics as The Young Rebels. Debuting on ABC on September 20 1970, it may have received the worst reviews of any show debuting that season. The Young Rebels was set during the Revolutionary War and centred around a group of young guerillas known as the Yankee Doodle Society. It starred Richard Ely as Jeremy Larkin, leader of the Yankee Doodle Society; Louis Gossett Jr. as Isak Poole, a former slave turned blacksmith; and Alex Henteloff as Henry Abington, who developed explosives and various devices with which to fight the British. They were often aided by the young he Marquis de Lafayette, played by Philippe Forquet.

Despite being counted among the youthful, socially relevant shows of the time and being an obvious attempt by ABC to appear socially relevant, only the first episode of The Young Rebels acknowledged contemporary social issues (in that case, protests by the youth). Afterwards the show became essentially another family action show, closer in spirit to Daniel Boone than The Mod Squad. Regardless, critics were largely hostile to The Young Rebels at worst and indifferent to it at best. Viewers were not impressed, and The Young Rebels suffered from low ratings. Of course, this might have been the case even if it was a quality show. It was scheduled against extremely popular family shows, Wild Kingdom and the first half of The Wonderful World of Disney on NBC and Lassie on CBS. The Young Rebels ended its run after only 15 episodes.

The Young Lawyers, debuting the next night, Monday, September 21 1970, fared somewhat better than The Young Rebels. The Young Lawyers was patterned somewhat after The Mod Squad. Its title was also somewhat inaccurate, as its young protagonists were only legal students rather than full-fledged lawyers. The Young Lawyers starred Zalman King as Aaron Silverman, a legal student who opens the Neighborhood Law Office, a centre for legal aid. Joining him was fellow legal student Pat Walters (Judy Pace). They were assisted by lawyer David Barett (Lee J. Cobb). A new character, Chris Blake (Phillip Clark) was introduced to the show at mid-season. In hopes of higher ratings, ABC wanted changes made to The Young Lawyers, including toning down the socially conscious stories and the introduction of a WASP character (Aaron Silverman was Jewish and Pat Waters was Black). The changes did not sit well with writer Stephen Kandel, who named the new WASP character "Christian White," according to fellow writer Harlan Ellison. Stephen Kandel's script would go through several drafts before ABC's censors caught on and insisted the name be changed.

Unlike some of the relevance shows of the 1970-1971 season, The Young Lawyers received somewhat respectable reviews. The critics' general opinion of The Young Lawyers may best be summed up by Rick Du Brow of UPI, who wrote of the series, "..the show, while nothing great, has a rather nice feel to it." Unfortunately, The Young Lawyers would not do well in the ratings, probably because ABC scheduled it in the worst possible time slot. In the Eastern and Central time zones, it aired immediately before Monday Night Football (then in its first season)  at 7:30 PM Eastern/6:30 PM Central. To make matters worse, in the Eastern and Central time zones it faced stiff competition in the form of Gunsmoke on CBS and the first half of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In on NBC. On the West Coast it aired after Monday Night Football at 8:45 PM Pacific. There it faced Mayberry R.F.D. and The Doris Day Show on CBS and the first part of NBC Monday Night at the Movies on NBC. The end result is that The Young Lawyers did very badly in the ratings. It lasted the entire season, but it would not get a second season.

ABC's next relevance show to debut starred a familiar face to television viewers. Then as now, Vince Edwards was best known as Ben Casey. It was on March 8 1970 that the TV movie Dial Hot Line aired on ABC Movie of the Week. It starred Vince Edwards as social worker David Leopold, who was in charge of a crisis hot line. The TV movie would inspire the series Matt Lincoln, although several changes would be made from the television movie. The character David Leopold was renamed "Matt Lincoln" and he was a psychiatrist rather than a social worker. In addition to the crisis hot line, Dr. Lincoln also operated a free walk-in clinic. In the TV movie David Leopold was assisted by Tag (Chelsea Brown), Jimmy (Felton Perry), and Ann (June Harding). who were retained in the TV series Matt Lincoln as Dr. Lincoln's assistants. On the television series further help came in the form of  Matt Lincoln's father, Dr. Matthew Lincoln, Sr. (Dean Jagger). The series covered such issues as heroin addiction, pollution, and alcoholism, among others.

While Ben Casey had proven to be a smash hit in the Sixties, lightning would not strike twice for Vince Edwards. Matt Lincoln had the misfortune of airing against Family Affair and the first half of The Jim Nabors Hour on CBS and the smash hit of the 1970-1971 season, The Flip Wilson Show, on NBC. It only managed to last half a season, ending its run on January 14 1971. It was replaced by the Western Alias Smith and Jones.

Unlike ABC and CBS, during the 1970-1971 season NBC did not invest heavily in relevance shows. Its only new show during the season to deal with social issues was The Psychiatrist. Even then it did not air the whole season. The Psychiatrist was one of four shows that aired under the umbrella title Four In One. Four in One differed from other umbrella titles, such as The Bold Ones and The NBC Mystery Movie in that its shows were not rotated weekly. Instead, the entire run of a show would be aired over several weeks before going onto the next show. The Psychiatrist was the last of the four shows to air on Four In One. The Psychiatrist starred Roy Thinnes as Dr. James Whitman, a psychiatrist who often used unusual methods to help his patients. Luther Adler played Dr. Bernard Altman, with whom Dr. Whitman worked. During its run of six episodes, The Psychiatrist dealt with such issues as drug addiction, abortion, and racism.

The Psychiatrist received largely positive reactions from critics, but the umbrella title Four In One did not fair particularly well in the ratings. Much of this may have been due to its competition on CBS, the high-rated Hawaii Five-O. The Psychiatrist, along with another show that aired under the umbrella series, San Francisco International Airport, would not see another season. McCloud would join NBC's brand new umbrella title, NBC Mystery Movie, the following season. Night Gallery would be spun off as its own series.

While "relevance" was among the broadcast networks' key words at the start of the 1970-1971 season, by the end of the season every single one of the relevance dramas were cancelled. As television journalist Les Brown remarked in his 1971 book Televi$ion: The Business Behind the Box, "Relevance may have been the shortest program cycle in the history of the medium." While the broadcast networks (particularly CBS and ABC) were wrong about youth-oriented, relevant dramas being the wave of the future, they were right about one thing. Relevance would play a role in television in the Seventies. It was on January 12 1971 that the sitcom All in the Family debuted. The show dealt with such issues as racism, the Vietnam War, antisemitism, homosexuality, feminism, and so on. As a mid-season replacement CBS did not have high expectations for the show, and it initially received ratings low enough to warrant cancellation. Fortunately the show received seven Emmy nominations, which probably saved it from the chopping block. The following season it would become the no. 1 show on the air.  All in the Family would be followed by other socially relevant sitcoms, such as Maude and Good Times. The youth oriented dramas dealing with social issues may have failed, but All in the Family insured relevance would still have a place on American television.

As to why the youth oriented, relevant dramas failed, much of it may have been because many of them were not very good. With a few exceptions (The Young Lawyers, The Psychiatrist) most of the shows did not get good reviews. In most cases the various shows were nothing new, featuring the same old, tired storylines with socially relevant angles grafted onto them. Indeed, most of the shows belonged to already established television genres, such as medical dramas (The Interns, Matt Lincoln) and legal dramas (Storefront Lawyers, The Young Lawyers). Even The Young Rebels, set during the Revolutionary War, fit in quite nicely with previous frontier dramas and Westerns. Making matters worse, there was a sameness about many of the shows because they were obviously patterned after The Mod Squad: a small group of young people (at least one of who was usually Black and another a woman) with an older father figure to serve as guidance.

Of course, much of the reason the socially relevant dramas of the 1970-1971 failed was also bad scheduling. The vast majority of the shows were placed in the 7:30 PM Eastern/6:30 PM Central time slot, a time when the conventional wisdom is that children have control of the television set. I rather doubt kids in 1970-1971 were much interested in watching Storefront Lawyers or The Interns. This scheduling also somewhat limited the shows in how they dealt with their subject matter. With children possibly watching, there were many topics with which they could not deal in a matter befitting the seriousness of the subject. Even when a show was recognized by critics as being of some quality, such as The Young Lawyers, it was done in by poor scheduling.

While the youth oriented, relevant shows of the 1970-1971 season failed, they would have a lasting impact on television in the Seventies. It wasn't simply sitcoms such as All in the Family and Maude that dealt with social issues. Medical shows such as Marcus Welby, M.D. and Medical Center would continue to do so. Such diverse dramas as The Waltons, Bonanza, Little House on the Prairie, Kojak, and Lou Grant dealt with such topics as racism, drug addiction, feminism, and so on. Since the Seventies various television shows have touched upon social issues from time to time. The youth oriented, socially relevant shows of the 1970-1971 might have been failures in the ratings, but they proved to have a lasting impact after all.