Old Pleasures Get Passed By As Today's World Speeds Up

The Boston Herald 

Reality TV wasn't even a glimmer in Hollywood's ever-wandering eyes way back in 1972 when the family drama “The Waltons'' debuted. Television, like the world, was a different place then. There were just three major networks and four kinds of shows: drama, comedy, variety and the newest thing, the movie of the week. “Flip Wilson,'' “Marcus Welby M.D.'' “The Mod Squad,'' “Room 222,'' “Sonny and Cher,'' “All in the Family'' - these were what people were watching.

“The Waltons,'' a family drama about life during the Great Depression, ran from Sept. 14, 1972, until Aug. 20, 1981. Based on writer Earl Hamner Jr.'s memories of growing up in rural Virginia in the 1930s, it was a huge hit. The first year it ran it won five Emmys. Good night, John Boy; good night, Mary Ellen.

America loved this show.

But “The Waltons'' never would make it on TV today and not just because of the subject matter. A family with no money? Grandparents, parents and children all living under one roof? Siblings who are nice to one another? Everyone occasionally happy? Impossible. Bring on ``The Nanny!’' 

“The Waltons'' wouldn't work now because it is slow paced, laid-back, thoughtful - a rowboat on a quiet lake in a grab-your-helmet-and-ride-the-rapids world. I had no idea just how fast we were going, how frantic TV is, until I started to watch this old show on DVD (it was a Christmas gift).

We seldom notice change because it's slow and almost invisible. Children grow up right in front of us. Parents age but we don't notice. It's only when we look back that we see.

I saw the change in television news. I saw how fast paced it had become. But drama? Just listening to the theme of ``The Waltons'' was an exercise in patience. It went on and on. So I fast forwarded it.

But there was no fast forward in 1972.

“American Dreams'' is the show I watch today. And it's so fast paced, cutting from person to person and scene to scene, that you can almost see what everyone is doing on the same time line. The music is fast, too. And I like all this.

But it's made me impatient with things that are slow. Get to the point. Cut to the chase. Hurry up, I think. Meandering is a waste of time.

But is it?

“The `two-minute mind' easily becomes impatient with any material requiring depth of processing,'' Dr. Jane Healy, an educational psychologist, wrote last year in a commentary published by the American Academy of Pediatrics. Kids have trouble paying attention because of the fast pace of TV. But isn't this true for us, too?

My daughter just watched ``The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,'' a movie made for TV in 1974 now released on DVD. And she said the same thing: The movie was good but too slow.

We've changed in many ways in 30 years. Some of the changes are obvious. Others are not. 

“Good night, John Boy. Good night, Elizabeth. Good night, Jason. Good night, Ben.”

Today just one ``good night'' would do.