The author, John Marek, is a writer and executive director of the Anson Economic Development Partnership.
I was scrolling through the news last week and saw that Frank Bonner had passed away at age 79. If that name sounds familiar, but you can’t quite place it, I’m not surprised. While playing one-off character roles in shows such as “Love American Style,” “Mannix,” “Night Court,” “Cannon” and “Police Woman,” he was best known for his simultaneously under-the-radar and over-the-top role in a late-70s sitcom.
A few days before my 16th birthday, a new television show premiered on CBS to iffy ratings and decent reviews. “WKRP in Cincinnati” was a workplace comedy set in a struggling Midwest radio station. That first episode chronicled the (humorous) turmoil surrounding the station’s format change from easy-listening to rock and roll.
Never a huge hit – it consistently placed near the middle of the weekly ratings – the show nevertheless had its share of iconic moments during its four-year run. It was one of the first mainstream television shows to address homophobia, albeit obliquely, in the episode “Les on a Ledge.” It devoted an episode to the real-life tragedy of the Cincinnati Who concert, at which 11 people died. And in perhaps its best-known and zaniest moment, the show offered a play-by-play description of dozens of flightless birds plummeting to their deaths.
For most viewers of that era, WKRP was a pleasant little diversion, 30 minutes of silliness designed to take your mind off your problems. But it was always just a little bit more for me. The depiction of the odd workplace dynamic and the quirky characters resonated with me; maybe to become successful, you didn’t need to adhere to some button-down code. Perhaps you could be a free-spirited station manager with a penchant for Western wear, or a cynical rock DJ in dark tees and jeans, or even a bombastic salesman in loud mismatched coat and tie.
As mentioned in a previous column, I spent a good portion of my high school years believing I would be a marine biologist or, at the very least, some occupation related to science or research. By my senior year, though, it had become abundantly clear I wasn’t the “right kind of smart” for that. As I groped around for direction, I eventually landed upon radio management, perhaps not entirely because of WKRP, but I won’t deny it had an impact.
One of the more impactful episodes for me was the 15th of the inaugural season, “Never Leave Me, Lucille.” The story features Herb Tarlek (the recently deceased Frank Bonner) splitting up with his wife. He envisions a wild single man’s life of dating and partying and carrying on, but the single men of the station, Dr. Johnny Fever, Andy Travis, Les Nessman and Venus Flytrap, persuade him that in reality, their lives are far less exciting. Venus delivers the line that is still among my favorites, “I watch a lot of TV, but sometimes when I’m feeling really crazy, you know (wink), I’ll go out and pick up … a chili dog.” I didn’t get the Cincinnati-chili connection at the time, but the restaurant where I worked provided a free meal to employees from a limited menu, and one of the things we could get was a chili dog, so I was eating one almost every day. The thing that struck me about the episode, though, was the concept of relevance. Despite the men’s somewhat mundane lives, they remained relevant because of their jobs in radio, and that was what I hoped to emulate.
My “career” in radio was pretty short-lived. I entered Ohio University as a radio-television communications major in September 1980 but never really fit in. The people I met in my classes were not at all like the earnest, good-natured staff of WKRP, and if I’m being fair, neither was I. I changed my major a year later before changing schools altogether in 1983.
Although “WKRP in Cincinnati” lived on in syndication, I never watched it much, and by the time a resurrected “New WKRP in Cincinnati” appeared in the early-90s, I was well past any interest. You could make an argument that “Frasier,” my all-time favorite TV show, borrowed from the tone and structure of “WKRP.” There’s undoubtedly a “familiarity” there, but that’s as far as I would take it. I prefer to think of the original-run years of “WKRP” as a time capsule; the drop shadow italic logo, hairstyles, colors and music all scream 1979. And that’s just the way I want to remember it.