The Castaways: How Producers Lost Their Independence and Conjured Up the Outsider Sitcom

In the early 1960s a new style of situation comedy took over primetime as Bewitched, Gilligan’s Island, Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., I Dream of Jeannie, My Favorite Martian, and other “Outsider Sitcoms” featuring alien characters disrupting their TV environments shot to the top of the ratings. Departing from a critical approach that understands these series as reflections of the decade’s many social disruptions, The Castaways reveals the programs as emotional responses by their creators to a more personal upheaval: their loss of influence in the broadcast industry. As network executives turned increasingly to audience research, independent producers felt the ability that had been most crucial to their success in broadcasting was being devalued: gut creative intuition. Drawing on memoirs, show treatments, and other original documents, The Castaways uncovers how leading characters on the programs served as emotional proxies for their creators’ fears of industry irrelevance as they were cast out from the corporate halls of power where their series’—and personal—fates were decided. Read more