Just about every TV season has one: The low-rated quality
drama that’s blessed by critics, adored by loyalists and eventually saved (albeit
temporarily) by an intense letter-writing campaign or phone poll.
The last two years have seen at
least three of these shows: NBC’s I’ll Fly Away, CBS’s Brooklyn
Bridge and ABC’s Homefront. All barely made the cut last season to
return this fall. Bridge has since been yanked.
All three series have suffered
some or all of the usual prime-time indignities: impossible time slots,
merciless schedule shuffling, lack of front-line promotion and, in the case of Homefront,
many pre-emptions.
In fact, Homefront has
not aired consecutively since Oct. 1 and 8. That’s bad news for any show, but
almost certain death for a continuing drama.
The show’s creators and writers,
Lynn Marie Latham and Bernard Lechowick, say they understand ABC’s decision to
pre-empt their post-war drama during the crucial November ratings period in
favor of those better-rated, home spun Matlock mysteries.
They even submitted a recent Homefront
script to ABC bearing a phony front page: “Matlock, The Early Years.”
But last week when Homefront
was pre-empted yet again by a country music variety special, the husband -wife
writing team decided humor was not enough. So they issued a gentle plea to the
news media: Please help us bring this series to the attention of viewers,
particularly tonight’s new episode confronting the polio epidemic of the 1940s.
Consider it done.
Homefront’s return this
week should enlighten many young people about what was a frightening era.
Polio, a mysterious scourge that struck viciously, was not unlike AIDS in its
random destruction of lives. It crippled and killed for nearly 20 years until a
vaccine became available in 1955.
The episode, titled ‘Life Is
Short,” features the usual fine ensemble acting, top-notch writing and a sense
of accuracy in its look and feel that is unmatched by other period dramas.
Wendy Phillips as Anne and Ken
Jenkins as Mike are standouts, as her polio and his mid-life crises are set
against one another to define life’s brevity.
That it all comes together so
seamlessly is primarily the result of dogged research and some of the most
genuine writing on television.
“Without research I just don’t
think your stories are believable,” said Lechowick, who, with Latham, once
shepherded “Knots Landing.”
“The problem with TV and film
writing today is that they’re all writing from film and TV instead of from
life,” Lechowick said of scriptwriters.
“That can leave a piece well
crafted, yet it feels completely empty. The better stories come not from a
stereotype or generalization you have seen before. It is in the research, the
reading and the listening.”
Such devotion to quality is
admired by ABC executives, but merely keeping Homefront on the air
sporadically – as if it were a charity case, or quality loss leader - isn’t
enough.
“We started the season with four
consecutive episodes and we built (in the ratings) admirably,” Latham said. “If
we’re just left alone for a while, we can do it again.”
She is looking forward to
January and February when the network has promised seven consecutive airings –
enough time to hook viewers with intriguing story lines about a young girl’s
escape from Auschwitz and the changing American landscape as a result of the
suburban housing boom.
“Homefront also always pays off to the single-time viewer,” Lechowick says, “And it promises more if you come back, and doesn’t punish you if you either haven’t been with us or can’t be here next week.”