ABSTRACT
Fifties situation comedies still seem crude in their pseudorealism, whether crudely bland and conformist (Leave It to Beaver, Father Knows Best, Ozzie and Harriet), crudely antifeminist (I Love Lucy, 1 Married Joan), or simply crude (The Honey mooners). This is not to say that these shows were incapable of stunning farce and amazing characterization from time to time, or incapable of including what is heteronomous: Beaver's Eddie Haskell is Original Sin. He is as insidious as Talleyrand. Still, his worst efforts can cause no more than twenty or thirty seconds of vexation for Ward or June Cleaver. An exception might be made for The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, which toyed with selfreferentiality and Ionesco-like dialogue. On the whole, however, the impression that remains of fifties situation comedies is of something laughably bland and frighteningly conformist.
