At Home with the Webbers

On Thursday, January 11, 1973, the first broadcast of An American Family changed television history forever. A 12-hour documentary series on PBS, An American Family chronicled seven months in the day-to-day lives of the William C. Loud family of Santa Barbara, California. An audience of ten million viewers watched in fascination the unfolding real-life drama of Bill and Pat Loud, and their five children, Lance, Kevin, Grant, Delilah and Michele.

The series challenged conventional views of middle class American family life with its depiction of marital tensions that led to divorce, an elder son's gay lifestyle and the changing values of American families. Prior to An American Family, the staples of television family programs such as The Brady Bunch profiled a model of the perfectly happy family that seldom faced any crisis. The broadcast of An American Family in 1973 proved to be a groundbreaking watershed that forever changed American television programming and led the way to more complex family portraits such as Roseanne, One Day At A Time and even The Simpsons.

TV Guide magazine acknowledged An American Family as the first reality television series and named it among "The 50 Greatest Shows of All Time." Lance Loud, the eldest son of the family, was the first openly gay person to appear on television as an integral member of American family life. Alan and Susan Raymond, the filmmakers of the original An American Family PBS series, remained friends with the Loud family and have continued to chronicle their lives for the past 30 years. They produced and directed An American Family Revisited in 1983 and bring audiences this "final episode" of the Loud family saga.

This movie was dark, quirky and sexy. Way better than The Truman Show or EDtv. And judging by the date in the credits - it was made several years before either of the other movies. Looks like the "big guys" ripped this little flick off.

I could listen to Jennifer Tilly's voice until the Sun became a red giant. I don't know if this movie has become a Midnight Movie cult classic anywhere, but it deserves to be for her solo song/dance. I rarely laugh outloud viewing a video alone. I did on frequent occasions for this flick. Jeff Tambor's silent takes..so classic. Robby Benson was repulsively vile as the rep of mindless media intrusion. I'd not heard anything about the movie and just picked it up at the library because of J.T. Now I'd recommend it to anyone who wants a quick elevator out of the dumps.

Okay, the movie does get a little out-of-hand in the latter part, primarily due to poor over-acting by other-than the primary characters.

But Jennifer Tilly's self-obsessed artist character, on a quest to make penis-molds of every conquest, is hysterical-- a true classic!

I agree with someone else's earlier comment, this movie has been ripped off by some major Hollywood productions-- and yes they were better-made, but I saw this movie on a demo-video before it was even released, and the raw idea for a reality-tv show of an actual family (a la The Osbourne's) started here, with this movie-- a true classic original.

If you're a fan of Jennifer Tilly, this is definitely a "must-see." Hopefully I can re-watch this movie at some point, and add some of the classic quotes to this IMDB listing.

This movie is sarcastic yet good-hearted. It sticks it to the bad reality TV guys and has the nice guys come out alright in the end. Jeffrey Tambor is brilliant as the father. Rita Taggart as the mom. The children are well played as well. Leslie Sachs deserves special mention for a sensitive and endearing turn. Made in 1993 this movie is more relevant now than it was then. Then it was a (unheeded) warning and now it's a rueful look at the moronic new millennium.