I once appeared on the dais of a panel discussion on the media, and the whole thing was broadcast on C-SPAN. The very next day, two people in random places recognized me, and I thought, Oh, so I’m famous now. Better get used to this.
Spoiler alert: I didn’t have to get used to it.
But every now and then, I am recognized on the street or in restaurants following an appearance on something obscure and offbeat, which just goes to show you that even when you think no one is watching, someone is watching.
The first job I ever had in television — or, really, in life because I was very, very young at the time, and it’s important that you bear that in mind when you start doing the cruel how-old-is-he math in your head — was as a staff writer on the most popular comedy of the time, Cheers.
There was a time when the general response to that announcement was something like, “Oh, I love that show!”
“I love that show” shifted, over time, to “I used to love that show,” which itself shifted over time to “I used to watch that show with my parents” and has now settled into “That was my grandfather’s favorite show,” which really ruins my day when I hear it. Though as the Stoic philosophers have taught us, that’s pretty much the destination of everything we know and love — memory fading into obscurity and eventually totally forgotten.
Or, maybe, these days, with so many channels and so many shows, the obscurity phase comes first. No need to go through all of those other phases — I love it. My parents watched it. My grandparents loved it — a show now can premiere and remain almost totally unknown and still be considered a hit. I’m in the television business — I promise, I really am — and fully three-quarters of the shows I hear about, from colleagues on writing staffs and the media, I’ve never heard of and could not find on my television without very careful, detailed instructions.
When Amazon first started putting on shows, or delivering content, I guess, is the term, I couldn’t find any of them. I would go to Amazon and search around for the shows and then give up and order six cartons of Tom’s of Maine toothpaste, which come to think of it may have been the original idea.
Often, I know the name of the show I want to watch and I know roughly where to find it, but I am baffled and disoriented by the complications involved in actually getting it to play on my screen.
My friends John T. Edge and Wright Thompson, for instance, have been making a terrific television show for a few years. It’s called True South, and it’s an exploration of Southern food and culture that’s funny, moving, human, dazzling — really, one of the best television shows on the air.
It’s on the SEC Network, though if you don’t have that you’ll do what I did and Google the show to find out where to watch it. You may end up on Hulu, which will lead you to ESPN, which will require you to sign up for ESPN+, and when all of that logging in and password resetting and subscription buying is done, in my case about 30 frustrating minutes later, you will be transfixed by just how wonderful and uplifting and true True South is.
All of that extra work to find a show is not necessarily a bad thing, not at all, in fact, if it means we keep getting interesting and unexpected shows to watch, but it does seem a little similar to me at a coffee shop getting recognized by a couple of people because I was on C-SPAN the day before while the rest of the place was probably wondering who that guy is who is not famous. I am, however, obscure for a reason. True South, on the other hand, is a hit worth discovering.
Rob Long is a television writer and producer and the co-founder of Ricochet.com.
