I loved this! The shows I'd never seen were just as interesting to read about as the ones I had. Glassman focuses on each show's creators - producers, directors, writers - more than the actors. Glassman makes a case for each show breaking ground or pushing forward in some way, whether it was showing a wealthy Black family, using a diary format to show a teenage girl's true feelings, having a character come out and showing a same-sex kiss - or generally treating teen characters with the same respect as adult characters.

The Fresh Prince of Bel Air
My So-Called Life
Dawson's Creek
Freaks and Geeks
The O.C.
Friday Night Lights
Glee

Quotes/notes

There is no drama like a teenage drama, in life and in fiction. (xi, foreword by Jennifer Keishin Armstrong)

"When something affects you while you were growing up, it kind of stays in there forever. When you're so permeable and open and trying to figure out who you are...whatever reaches you in those moments really becomes part of you." (Michelle Williams at Dawson's Creek 20-year reunion, xv)

The teens of Capeside were going to speak differently from other teens on television....deeply introspective, with dialogue that was dense, highly articulate, and capped with poetic flourish. Their hearts were big and their vocabularies even bigger....Stupin thought of the show as a form of wish fulfillment. It was how teenagers wanted to express themselves. (58-59)

"...[Joey] doesn't necessarily have to end up with someone."
Fattore agreed. "I don't think that coming-of-age stories for women should be love stories," she said. (84)

"[Friday Night Lights] is a sports show, but it's a relationship show; it's a soap, but it's got social issues. What makes it great makes it hard to market." (160)

"You realize from a dramatic storytelling point of view the hardest thing to do is not change?" (Coach Taylor and Tami's actors arguing against either of their characters cheating, 170)

"I feel like a lot of the time the producers or creatives were pulling from people's personalities and turning the volume up on things they already saw in people, and that was what made the characters so rich and so great." (re: Glee, 199)

"It takes a lot of bravery to look around at the world and see it not as it is but as it should be." (Sue on Glee, 205) ( )

Freaks, Gleeks and Dawson’s Creek: How 7 Teen Shows Transformed Television

I Picked Up This Book Because: Random library find.

Media Type: Audiobook
Source: H County Public Library
Dates Read: 10/29/23 - 10/31/23
Stars: 4
Narrator(s): Christine Lakin

The Story:

I finished this just under the October 31st buzzer. I love books like this. I feel like I learn something, I'm entertained, and the subject matter includes two shows I loved (Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Glee). I’d be interested in seeing this author explore other shows/genres. ( )

A cute if not especially hard-hitting look at behind the scenes gossip about the teen shows of my youth. I learned some stuff (though it was all very sanitized -- no bad guys), and had a nice wallow in nostalgia. ( )