Is the Addams Family a Copy of Family Monster
'The Addams Family unit' and 'The Munsters': Which Is Idiot box's True Kickoff Family unit of Fright?
Photos: Getty Images ; Illustration: Dillen Phelps
Star Wars or Star Trek? Beatles or Stones? Marvel or DC? Many an identity is built around picking a side in these pop culture debates. Yous might bond with a co-worker over spending high schoolhouse learning the steps to "Bye Bye Goodbye" instead of "I Want Information technology That Way," or form a easygoing resentment of someone for choosing Friends over Seinfeld (or vice versa). Is any of this good for you? No! Is information technology fun? Sometimes! Can any of us assistance it? Non at all! And when October rolls around, in that location'southward one dreadful dichotomy that people tin can't stop debating: are you lot an Addams Family person or a Munsters person?
With a new Addams Family unit animated feature in theaters right now, this question feels spookily relevant in 2019. You can't think of i without thinking of the other, and I'1000 certain in that location are plenty of confused parents out there looking for tickets to a Munsters movie correct now. It's no wonder the two have ever been paired; they both debuted within a week of each other on Boob tube in 1964, aired for ii seasons, and then came crawling out of the grave every few years/decades with another Idiot box show, cartoon, or characteristic picture show.
Simply—and here's the question I personally wanted to answer—which came start? Did The Munsters ripoff The Addams Family? Was information technology the other fashion around? Was this just another instance of weird popular culture confluence?
Seriously—which came first, The Addams Family unit or The Munsters?
To answer that question, you have to go back in time fourscore years and meet two cartoonists: Charles Addams and Bob Clampett. While working equally a cartoonist for The New Yorker, Charles Addams introduced what would become the Addams Family (a name he never gave to them, by the mode) in 1938. The cartoon was meant to exist a one-off, a 1-panel gag of a salesman cluelessly trying to sell a vacuum cleaner to a gothic woman and her lumbering, fur-faced companion.
Addams' work was generally macabre, so he'd return to these unnamed characters time and time again, rounding out the cast with a pudgy companion in a chalk stripe suit (somewhen named Gomez) in 1942 and ii morose children, an onetime witch, and a bald weirdo. So The Addams Family unit came first. Or did they?
If you take a wide await at pop civilization history, you could say that the Munsters' origin begins in 1931 with the release of 2 Universal monster movies: Dracula and Frankenstein. Both of those films dragged those literary monsters out of the 19th century and gave them iconic iterations that would be mimicked in everything from classroom decor to shop bought costumes.
But unlike the off-brand knickknacks you can find of a light-green-skinned corpse monster at whatever shop, The Munsters actually have a legit connexion to the Universal monsters: The Munsters is a Universal production. In fact, Looney Tunes animator Bob Clampett pitched a cartoon about a monster family to Universal in 1943, just every bit Addams was building out a frightful family of his own in the pages of The New Yorker. Cypher came of Clampett's pitch and production on classic monster movies slowed down in the 1950s while Charles Addams published collections of his New Yorker cartoons, including 1954's Homebodies (more than on that earth-changing tome in a flake).
How did The Munsters and The Addams Family finish up on Tv set at the exact aforementioned time?
The early-to-mid '60s were a wild time for Boob tube. After a decade dominated by the wholesome family one-act like Father Knows Best and the domestic slapstick brilliance of I Love Lucy, sitcoms got weird. Information technology's actually non surprising that The Addams Family unit and The Munsters debuted at the verbal same time when you step back and realize that Bewitched also debuted that same week, and that My Favorite Martian debuted a year before and I Dream of Jeannie a year afterwards. Tv set was filled with witches, genies, aliens, talking horses, possessed automobiles—this was only the thing (but not Thing, non still).
That's probably why a pair of writers approached Universal with a pitch eerily similar to the one Clampett made almost 20 years earlier. Accounts differ beyond diverse sources every bit to who those writers were. Either Gene L. Coons (Star Trek) and Les Colodny (Get Smart) fabricated the pitch beginning, or Rocky and Bullwinkle writers Allan Burns and Chris Hayward did. Either mode, one pair pitched the idea of a monstrous take on The Donna Reed Evidence and the other fleshed it out (Burns and Hayward ultimately got creator credit). Universal head Lew Wasserman wanted to bring dorsum the studios' classic monsters on the modest screen—and this monster family pitch seemed like the correct way to do it. Writing team Norm Liebmann and Ed Haas, who actually wrote for The Donna Reed Show, were hired to write a pilot script titled Love Thy Monster and a pilot presentation was filmed for CBS in early on 1964—in color! The testify was ultimately shot in blackness and white to relieve money.
And so The Munsters came start… sorta?
It depends on what David Levy knew and when he knew information technology. Levy, formerly the VP in accuse of programming at NBC, peaced out of the Television biz in the early on '60s considering he was sick of all the sexual practice and violence on TV at the time. It'south a skilful thing David Levy did not live to see Real World: Las Vegas. According to Addams Family lore, though, he was pulled dorsum into the fray after taking a stroll down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and seeing the cover for Addams' 1954 drawing collection Homebodies. Levy then met with Addams, determined that these disparate-ish characters were all a family, and had Addams himself give them all names (except Wednesday, who was named by a toy manufacturer ahead of the show's debut). It was even Levy'south idea to have a disembodied mitt that had appeared in one cartoon from 1954 and brand him a graphic symbol—Thing—and Levy, not Addams, came up with fan-favorite Cousin Itt.
It's appropriate that Cousin Itt'south cosmos is where dates become fuzzy. It'southward undisputed that Levy created Itt while brainstorming with Addams (Levy actually sued Paramount in 1992 afterwards they used Cousin Itt, Thing, and various other elements from the TV series he co-created in the feature film; it was settled out of court). After Levy came up with Itt, Addams worked the hirsute cousin into a New Yorker cartoon in October 1963, well over a year before Itt debuted on the TV bear witness in early 1965. In fact, we know Itt had to take appeared in The New Yorker before the show debuted because magazine editor William Shawn banned the Addams Family unit from appearing in the high-course publication considering he didn't want information technology to be associated with a mainstream sitcom. So if Levy and Addams were working on an Addams Family pitch in 1963, that means they nigh probable came upwards with the idea independently of what Universal was doing with The Munsters (CBS didn't announce The Munsters until early 1964). Of form, another source claims that Levy heard CBS was developing the Munsters and and then reached out to Addams, but I don't know if those dates line upward with the stone cold facts nigh Cousin Itt.
And so The Munsters and The Addams Family accept nothing to practice with each other?
Not exactly. It's been said that Levy initially pitched The Addams Family to CBS, who passed on the idea because they were already working on the Munsters (other sources say they started piece of work on The Munsters later on the pitch, simply I don't know if those dates line up either). And so when Levy pitched ABC on The Addams Family, information technology'southward said that they were game considering they knew CBS had picked upwardly The Munsters. Then that's why in that location's not a clearcut answer as to which came starting time, The Munsters or The Addams Family, because depending on which source you detect, they both influenced the other network to develop or green light the other bear witness. What does seem authentic is that Universal and David Levy came upwards with the ideas independently.
Which debuted on Idiot box first?
After shooting a pilot presentation in March 1964 (probably just later on The Munsters shot theirs?), The Addams Family debuted first on ABC on September 18, 1964. The Munsters followed on CBS on September 24, 1964.
Even though both families were spooky AF, they had noticeably different tones. The Munsters came from the producers of Exit Information technology to Beaver and you lot could tell from the more traditional, slapsticky plot lines. The Addams Family, however, was run past Nat Perrin, a frequent collaborator with the Marx Brothers who ensured his monster show had an undercurrent of bizarre satire to it. Both shows did well at offset, with The Munsters ending the season ranked #18 in the ratings and the Addamses coming in at #23. Enough of trade followed, as monster-mania hit its pop culture pinnacle.
Why did The Munsters and The Addams Family both terminate after 2 seasons?
You can blame Nazis and Batman. I'thousand actually not joking! It's theorized that both shows became too hot as well fast, and adults burned out on overtly spooky sitcoms (Bewitched was likely spared considering Samantha was all about assimilating). Simply on top of that, both shows faced stiff contest in their time slot—from the others' network! ABC'south newly-launched Batman soundly shell CBS' The Munsters, and CBS' new WWII comedy Hogan's Heroes defeated ABC's Addams Family. They both aired their last episodes in Spring 1966. What a globe!
To sum up, Charles Addams created the Addams Family characters in 1938 while the Munsters were inspired past characters that were re-introduced in 1931. The shows were pitched roughly effectually the same fourth dimension effectually 1963 and probably helped each other go fabricated. And The Addams Family literally debuted on Television receiver first in 1964, although The Munsters lasted slightly longer.
That'due south where the similarities end, correct?
Wrong! Neither family would remain six feet under for long since the shows remained popular with kids. That led to the families coming back over and once again in strangely similar ways. They've both had:
- Feature films: Munster, Become Home! (1966); The Addams Family (1991), Addams Family unit Values (1993), The Addams Family (2019)
- Animated specials: The Addamses in The New Scooby-Doo Movies (1973); The Mini-Munsters (1973)
- TV movies: Halloween with the New Addams Family (1977), Addams Family unit Reunion (straight-to-video, 1998); The Munsters' Revenge (1981), Here Come the Munsters (1995), The Munsters' Scary Little Christmas (1996)
And, the most stunning coincidence of all, both shows had revival series that lasted longer than the 1964 originals! The Munsters Today (1988-1991) lasted 73 episodes compared to the original's 70, and The New Addams Family (1998-1999) lasted 65 episodes compared to the original's 64.
Also, I take to mention that Butch Patrick was both the original Eddie Munster and the second Pugsley in the 1973 variety special The Addams Family Fun-House. My jaw dropped.
What'southward next for The Addams Family and The Munsters?
The Addamses have a movie in theaters right at present, which is their first foray into Idiot box or film in 20 years. The Munsters tried to make a comeback in 2012 with the highly-stylized hourlong dramedy airplane pilot Mockingbird Lane from super producer Bryan Fuller (NBC didn't pick it upwards). But since the Addams Family has an animated feature film, the commencement of either franchise to accept such, it'south probably a safe bet that in that location'south a Munsters drawing feature pitch floating around Universal right now. Yous can't have one without the other, such is their delightful curse.
StreamThe Addams Family(1964) on Prime Video
Where to sentryThe Munsters
Where to watch The Addams Family (1991)
Where to spotterAddams Family unit Values(1993)
Source: https://decider.com/2019/10/14/addams-family-vs-the-munsters-which-came-first/
0 Response to "Is the Addams Family a Copy of Family Monster"
Post a Comment