In current-day sitcoms, the father is always the dumb one.  The mother isn't quite as dumb as the dad -- but even she's no match for her smarter-by-far-than-any-stupid-parent-or-adult children.

I suppose that it's always amusing to turn reality on its head.  Make the fictional world upside-down from the real one.  Where the problem comes in lies in the fact that some people are dumb enough to be influenced by the sitcoms into thinking that's how things actually are...........so why should they listen to their stupid parents, anyway?

And in ones produced from 1930 to the mid 1960s, the wife was pretty much always the ditz. :: shrug :: O temps, o mores... (to be said with a few bars of the Brandenburg playing in the background)

There weren't many television sitcoms produced in the 1930's.......but for anyone who's seen movies from the time -- the wife wasn't always depicted as a ditz.  And sometimes the father was depicted as a ditz.

Or, as in the case of the 1940's era Blondie movie series -- BOTH husband and wife were depicted as ditzes.  Or as in the 1940's Bonita Granville Nancy Drew series -- the girl was depicted as the smart one, and she was constantly lording it over her dumb and dull-as-dishwater boyfriend (Why was a smart girl like her interested in a loutish neighbor boy like him, anyway?).

The reference might be somewhat more accurate if it's applied to 1950's TV sitcoms -- but even there it doesn't always hold true.  But that was a different era.  We've advanced far beyond such backwards thinking these days..........and we are beginning to pay the price for it.

Oh, yeah -- and I should add that in the 1960's, sometimes the family maid was the smart one (Hazel), and sometimes the wife was both smart and had all of the real power (Bewitched).  Or perhaps the woman was dumb, but still had all of the power (I Dream of Jeanie).

One reason I like the "Cosby Show" is that while Clare was obviously smart, productive, wise and independent and Bill could be the clown, he was still the king. Not "King" as in dominating the woman, just King of the house. She knew his faults but she never used them to diminish her husband.

I reject the "plug and play" thing everyone is spouting. There is no reason to believe he did not paint the actual body parts of Bach.  He may have been uncreative in his portraits in their "style" or 'look,' but there is no way he could have painted all his commissions with the same face.

Also, this totalizing phrase "SuperComposer, with a chiseled jaw and steely eyes and perfect hair and perfect skin?" is out. No one, including myself, is suggesting that. You are equating body parts with expression.

To restate my point: in addition to an expressionless forensic bust and in place of a painting with a bewildered expression, there should have been a painting, based on the skeletal reconstruction, of Bach with an expression equal to the music.

::::: Opera :::::

I'm a huge Bach admirer, too.  There are some who claim that he was the greatest of all of the composers -- although some Mozart aficionados might disagree.  But I'll say that Mozart was a far less admirable man than Bach.

Quote - One reason I like the "Cosby Show" is that while Clare was obviously smart, productive, wise and independent and Bill could be the clown, he was still the king. Not "King" as in dominating the woman, just King of the house. She knew his faults but she never used them to diminish her husband.

Excellent point.  And Cosby has gone on to demonstrate that in real life he's in a large measure the same as the father character which he portrayed on television.  Which has cost him.  It's not PC for him to think like that or to be like that -- it just doesn't fit into the accepted PC template for what he's supposed to think.  And it's a thought crime for which he must be punished, by today's lights.

Bill Cosby has enjoyed great success in his life.  But it's not been any bed of roses.  It rarely is for the honorable......like Bach.  Or like Clarence Thomas.