All That Glitters

All that Glitters was short lived, but WAY ahead of its time as Norman Lear who's the "king of controversial sit com television" placed this out there for audiences to see. As I was a female young kid at the time, and "women's lib" was supposedly established, here Lear brought it to fruition. A women run society. And the women were as ruthless, sexual and cut throat as men. Boy, did people have a major cow. This show as very short lived.

Between this show and another short lived network show I liked called "Executive Suite", America - even a very small portion of it - wasn't ready for things like women executives, heterosexual male secretaries & interracial pairings, abortion issues. "All That Glitters" focused on the woman dominated society. But that is the history of early television and the masters, male and female, behind it all. And Norman Lear was one of the leaders.

One that that is important to note: there wasn't such thing as "syndication" as we all know it back then. Syndication didn't come into play until the 1980's -- with a block of shows like "Small Wonder", a new life to "It's a Living", "Out of this World", "The New Gidget", etc. that were being packaged and sold to fill time -- and networks were poo-pooing the concepts, but an audience was out there for these shows....AND 50's & 60's actors realizing that their shows were being played ad-nausea on UHF, local channels and the new medium Cable-TV and its "Superstations", and they weren't getting paid! That's when everyone realized that syndication became ... lucrative - but the whole point of this is that Norman Lear took advantage of the medium way early of this to express a broader artistic view of programming. I'm sure he knew the networks were having a cow. But even back then, "All That Glitters" is one of the most controversial programming of that time, even light-years more than his "All In The Family".

But it was brilliant, it was inspired. It was very short lived but again...the talent! Linda Gray, Gary Sandy, etc. Now that DVD and Blue Ray is alive and well, I hope audiences can take another look at this. I'm not sure if it will "hold up through the years" with HD, etc. but the theme and genius of the concept is there.

And I am still waiting to see "that show" and "that acceptance" in which female executives and CEO's run the country ...

"All That Glitters" was undoubtedly Norman Lear's most cutting edge work. To say that this show was ahead of its time is an understatement. Staying very much in the vein of Lear's trademark "social commentary" brand of humor, the society into which this show's characters were cast portrayed women as dominant and men as submissive and oppressed.

The key to its charm was the blatant inversion of traditional gender power dynamics as well as the complete inversion of gender-based rituals and ceremonies. I recall one episode where a wedding took place where the groom--still dressed in traditional tuxedo--came down the aisle with his bouquet in hand to meet his bride waiting at the altar.

As a first run syndicated television show, "All That Glitters" never had a regular "national" primetime slot which would have made more of the public aware of its existence. But one thing was sure: the sexism inflicted by the women on the men in this show didn't look any better than it has coming from men. By switching the typical gender roles, Lear managed to make both a humorous and serious statement about the ugly side of sexism without preaching––an all too rare occurrence in television. This one ended much too soon.

I really hope that "All the Glitters" is rerun or that videos are made available. It was such a good show! I would love to see it again. It was intelligent and definitely ahead of its time. Norman Lear is a national treasure. I miss Dark Angel also. So many of the actors in All That Glitters were top notch and went on to do other things. Most of my friends missed All That Glitters when it was on tv. It's hard to explain to them how well done it was. I also felt maybe I had imagined it when it disappeared so fast. Maybe a cable channel will rerun it. Tina

My sister and I lived together in Florida in 1977 and fell upon this show one night after the news. After that we NEVER missed an episode. If we were out, we rushed home by 11:30 for the show. The best part was how absolutely perfectly it was cast. Poor submissive Bert, the hotty secretary (who knew how to work it), and of course, gorgeous and strong executive women. The subject matter was razor sharp. Then out of nowhere it was gone. At the time, we couldn't figure out how such a good show had died. We kind of thought it was the time slot. It was years later that we found it was intentionally yanked. Such a pity. Please, please get it back. Someone somewhere can figure it out. On DVD at the very least. I really need to see how Bert makes out...really.

I have always been a fan of Norman Lear, with his vision and unique sense of humor. "All That Glitters" was one of his best, and I really missed it when it vanished so abruptly. It's a shame that the networks are so quick to pull shows that are unconventional before they have a chance to prove themselves, despite rabid fan bases. (Examples (in alphabetical order): All's Fair, Early Edition, Earth 2, Family Law, Firefly, First Monday, Freaks and Geeks, Golden Years, L.A. Doctors, Ned and Stacey, Nightmare Cafe, Now and Again, Pretender, Prey, Push Nevada, Reasonable Doubts, Relativity, Space:Above & Beyond, Sportsnight, Strange Luck, The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, Tracker, Vengeance Unlimited, VR.5, Witchblade, and possibly Mister Sterling) (You can't tell I'm a SciFi fan, can you?)

It's gotten so bad that I won't watch new shows that I've heard are great until it's been on at least 3 seasons - It seems that every time I get hooked on a show, it disappears... Of course, now, I just get the DVDs of the complete series. (That's how I've watched Angel, and will probably watch 24.)

Okay, done ranting now!