An American Family 

This was the original "Real World". The show was a weekly documentary which followed the real life travails of the Loud family, a mixed up cluster of suburbanites. The show picked up lots ... See full summary »

Stars:

Patricia Loud, Bill Loud, Lance Loud

Cast

Series cast summary:
Patricia Loud	...	Herself 12 episodes, 1973
Bill Loud	...	Himself 12 episodes, 1973
Lance Loud	...	Himself 12 episodes, 1973
Kevin Loud	...	Himself 12 episodes, 1973
Grant Loud	...	Himself 12 episodes, 1973
Delilah Loud	...	Herself 12 episodes, 1973
Michelle Loud	...	Herself 12 episodes, 1973

Storyline

This was the original "Real World". The show was a weekly documentary which followed the real life travails of the Loud family, a mixed up cluster of suburbanites. The show picked up lots of interesting footage, including an on-camera divorce demand from wife Pat to her husband, and the coming-out of one of the children who was gay.

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Plot Keywords:

gay son | mother son relationship | nuclear family | family relationships | 1970s | 

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Genres:

Documentary | Music | Reality-TV

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Details

Official Sites:

PBS [United States]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

11 January 1973 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Loud Family

Filming Locations:

Bethesda Fountain, Central Park, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Connections

Referenced in Christine (2016)

User Reviews

Groundbreaking, important, shocking in its day... and tedious beyond description

I videotaped most of the series when it reran on WNET some 20 years ago, and I keep trying to like it. But even to this avid TV viewer who lived through that era and is fascinated by cultural anthropology, the show is largely unwatchable.

The problem is that except for a couple of episodes (episode 2 and maybe the one with Lance in Paris), it's dull and slow. What made it shocking in 1973 -- the strangeness of being able to peek into someone else's day-to-day life -- has now been eclipsed by a torrent of tell-all talk shows and contrived "reality shows." Without the show's original voyeuristic shock value, ten of the twelve hours are unadulterated tedium (though I imagine a nifty 100-minute documentary could be culled from the footage).