Craig Gilbert, creator of 'An American Family,' called the first reality TV show, dies at 94

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Obituaries

Craig Gilbert, creator of ‘An American Family,’ called the first reality TV show, dies at 94

By Matt Schudel
April 18, 2020 at 12:41 a.m. EDT

Craig Gilbert, the creator of a groundbreaking 1973 documentary television series, “An American Family,” which examined the inner turmoil of a California family and came to be known as the first reality TV show, died April 10 at his home in New York City. He was 94. ... The death was confirmed by John Mulholland, a filmmaker and friend, who did not know the precise cause.

Mr. Gilbert had worked in television for two decades before embarking on his ambitious series showing the real-life dramas of the Loud family of Santa Barbara, Calif. He interviewed about two-dozen families before he settled on the Louds, who seemed to be living the California dream, with a well-appointed house, five telegenic children, multiple cars and a swimming pool.

{snip}

A film crew spent seven months with the family from May 1971 to Jan. 1, 1972, capturing the marital discord between Bill and Pat Loud and their children’s bumpy journey toward adulthood.

More than 300 hours of film were edited into 12 one-hour episodes, presented in a cinema verité style without narration. The series was “based on the belief that there is considerable drama in the daily lives of ordinary citizens,” Mr. Gilbert wrote in an essay in 1982. “The citizens themselves may be unaware of this, as the Louds were, but it is there just the same, waiting to be captured by the peculiar alchemy of the camera in the hands of anyone with the ability to see and the patience to wait.”

{snip}

The family’s oldest child, Lance Loud, was the first openly gay person to appear on television, leaving many viewers shocked. His mother accompanied him to a drag show in New York and tried, with varying degrees of sympathy and stoicism, to understand him. ... “If I were you, I’d enjoy me while I last,” Lance told his mother in one episode. (1) “Because, honey, I’m not going to last forever.” (He died in 2001 at age 50.)

During the series, the Louds’ house was almost consumed in a wildfire, and Bill Loud’s business — selling mining equipment — became increasingly shaky. Pat Loud pondered her deteriorating marriage, suspecting her husband of infidelity, and confronted him in a painfully direct scene after he returned from a business trip.

{snip}

Matt Schudel
Matt Schudel has been an obituary writer at The Washington Post since 2004. He previously worked for publications in Washington, New York, North Carolina and Florida. Follow https://twitter.com/MattSchudel

(1)

[underpants]

1. It became the template that's still followed

This was a family about to rip apart and the producers knew it from what I've read.