"I Love Lucy" and "Modern Family" TV Shows Analysis

The roles of men and women changed drastically between the 1950s and today. I Love Lucy and Modern Family are two television shows that show this drastic gender change. The 1950s is viewed as a period of conformity, in which both men and women observed strict gender roles and complied with society’s expectations. The 2000s is a time period in which women were no longer stay at home moms, but rather went to work.

I Love Lucy

I Love Lucy is a TV sitcom which takes place in the 1950s.

The main characters are Lucy and Ricky who are a not so typical married couple living in a New York apartment. Ricky, Lucy’s husband believes that a woman’s place is in the house. Lucy is portrayed as a naïve and ditzy character, who is unlucky and is constantly getting herself and her husband in trouble. Lucy is a typical housewife who cooks and cleans and provides her husband a home cooked meal when he arrives home from work.

Modern Family – a Newer Approach

Modern Family is a TV show that began in 2009 the show consists of a blended family. The main characters Claire and Phil, are a married couple living in Los Angeles. Claire is the chief executive of “Pritchett’s Closets and Blinds. She is shown to be smarter and more intellectual than her husband. Claire is seen as the leader of the family, as she is the one to organize all family gatherings and is seen as the voice of reason.

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Phil is often portrayed as silly and childlike, making ‘dumb” family decisions. He is constantly causing accidents at the expense of his wife or his intelligence.

One episode that I watched of I Love Lucy was called “The Ricardos Change Apartments”. In this episode Lucy tries to convince Ricky that they should switch apartments with the neighbors upstairs because it is bigger. Ricky refuses because it will cost 20 dollars more a month if they move, so Lucy tries to go behind Ricky’s back and move anyway. The relationship between Ricky and Lucy shown in this episode of I Love Lucy is that of a typical husband and wife stereotype. Ricky oversees the finances and what his wife can and cannot do. Lucy is the typical housewife; she takes care of the baby and cleans the house. She has no say in what is done for the family and even has an allowance that her husband gives her. She is considered silly and Ricky is the practical one.

I also watched the episode of Modern Family called “First Days” in this episode the children begin their first day of school. Claire also begins her first day back to work at her father’s closet company. In this episode, Claire has a difficult time returning to work as well as juggling the daily responsibilities of her family. Claire is portrayed as uptight and bossy and the one who wears the pants in the family. She is a perfectionist and is able to deal with problems during stressful times. She is often getting into silly arguments with her husband Phil, who is laid back and in love with her. Claire has a habit of always trying to take charge and can be arrogant and hostile at times.

Modern family also changes the gender roles by introducing a gay couple who ends up adopting a chinese baby. The show also portrays an interracial couple with a biracial child and a huge age gap between the married couple. The 1950s was a time period of conformity there was no crude or sexual humor and all shows were kid friendly. The woman dressed very modestly wearing skirts and looking very “feminine” they showed very little skin and no cleavage.

As opposed to I Love Lucy, the clothing is extremely provocative and sexy the language is not filtered and the characters can pretty much say whatever they want. This show deals with topics such as drugs and alcohol in one particular episode Alex’s parents ask her if she wants alcohol and later they ask the waiter what he is doing and he says “getting high”. Not only are these topics acceptable to speak about on TV but they’re also accepted in real life.

Both Lucy and Claire portray a loving mother, yet both have very different roles in the family. In the 1950s, women were typically stay at home moms, while the men went to work and ran the family. This role has changed drastically since then, as seen with Claire, a working mother, with three children, and a decision maker for the family.

I love Lucy and Modern Family teaches us the value of family although they have their fights and disagreements the friends and family come back together and shows us what a value of true family is like. Although many things have changed in the past 65 years these two shows emphasize that the value of a family has not changed much at all.