Unlike his one-dimensional, prime-time creations, Aaron Spelling
was a complex character. The late television producer, best known
for '70s fluff shows Dynasty, Charlie’s Angels,
Vega$, Starsky and Hutch, The Love Boat,
and Fantasy Island arguably had more influence on my
generation than any other individual, save Ronald Reagan. As the
NBC Nightly News succinctly put it: “Aaron Spelling spent the prime
time of his life influencing ours.” If I watch little or no
television today it is because I grew up in the '70s, a small,
portable black and white TV with a coat-hanger antenna always
playing in the background and usually turned to some vacuous
Spelling production (Hart to Hart, The Rookies).
For that, the Prince of Prime Time’s ashes deserve my sincere
thanks.
The son of poor East European Jewish immigrants, Spelling
specialized in obtuse, escapist fare served on a faux-silver
platter to blue collar Americans. From his first hit, 1968’s
The Mod Squad to his last 7th Heaven, Spelling
produced more fluff than a Mexican pillow factory, while snobbish
critics charged he wasn’t so much mirroring public taste as
lowering standards. Despite having nearly as many hits as Lou
Gehrig, Spelling felt the continual need to justify his labor. “I’m
proud of what I’ve done,” he told an interviewer in 1992. “I think
there is a need for escapism. I think it is a release valve that
keeps people from blowing their brains out or having nervous
breakdowns.” How true. And I, for one, owe my sanity to Aaron’s
genius and Farrah’s happy smile.
Spelling, fresh from a tour of duty in WWII, arrived in
Hollywood in the 1950s, found a few bit parts, but failed to catch
on as an actor. In his own words, he looked too much like a
“weirdo.” After a few years writing scripts for '50s westerns and
playhouse theaters, Spelling turned to producing where his real
genius lay. His magic, according to critic Ian Ferrell, hid in the
blend of glamour, sex and cattiness he sprinkled liberally over
multiple, simultaneous plot lines; “a rich blend eagerly devoured
by an audience yearning for escapism.” Thanks to this formula, his
flops were few and far between.
Aaron Spelling was everything his audience was not: well-read,
articulate and charming. Acting may not have been his strong suit,
but he played the obligatory role of Hollywood liberal with aplomb,
and was a six-time recipient of commendations by the NAACP for his
encouragement to black actors. To maintain his liberal bona fides
and justify his billions, he’d occasionally tackle politically
correct social issues. His Mod Squad featured the first
black guy-white girl smooch. And Dynasty was one of the
first shows to feature a gay character.
Spelling spent his final months battling oral cancer and
struggling to salvage his reputation by suing a former nurse for
defamation. The nurse claimed the celebrity octogenarian had
repeatedly harassed her, asked her to dress like a hooker, fondled
her, whatnot. But what really set Spelling off him was the survey
she mailed to 600 actresses, titled “Survey on sexual harassment by
Aaron Spelling,” though a court found it hard to defame a man who’d
spent a lifetime producing crap.
THERE WERE ONE or two exceptions: the shows Twin Peaks and
Family, come to mind. In 1984 Spelling presciently told a
group of critics: “I wish all my shows were as great as
Family. But I know that when I die, the headline will be,
Charlie’s Angels producer dead.” The obvious follow-up
should have been, ‘Well, why weren’t they?” Anyway, he couldn’t
have minded too much. Spelling worked hard for the money,
oftentimes producing four shows at a time, and he had a great deal
to show for his work, including the largest home in California.
(What home is complete without 123 rooms, a bowling alley, ice
rink, and a doll museum?)
As popular as his shows were in the U.S. they were even more
popular overseas, where the images of wealthy, glamorous white
Americans transfixed viewers in developing nations. Living in
Poland in 1992, I was told the entire country turned into a ghost
town at 7 p.m. Tuesday nights. That was the night Dynasty
came on.
I wouldn’t want to be the one to make the case that our culture
is the better for having known Aaron Spelling. Still, his shows
were relatively harmless. Mind candy, he called them. Mindless
candy, replied the critics. And in retrospect, compared to today’s
idiotic reality shows, they seem rather mild, though they did pave
the way for worse things to come. S.W.A.T was incredibly
violent for its time, and Charlie’s Angels with its busty
babes in wet bikinis anticipated Baywatch by two decades.
“I think [my shows are] clean,” he told an interviewer. “I hate to
talk about that, but, boy, where some of the shows are going today,
it’s amazing. I’m ashamed of my wife seeing some of these shows,
much less making them. I don’t even want the cast of my shows to
see some of those other shows.” Then he went out and made the
steamy, sexy Melrose Place.
Aaron Spelling’s version of the American dream was to make a
billion dollars producing junk. Does this make him a bad man? No.
But it certainly doesn’t make him a great man. Just one whose June
23 obituary headline read: “Charlie’s Angels’ Producer Dead at 83.”
Just as he predicted.
