That 70’s Show sitcom does a good job at using cultural icons of that era to make a believable scene made in the 70’’s. With clothing, music, and story lines the audience can relate to and get a glimpse of what life was like in a suburban community for the characters in high school in the 70’s. The earlier episodes use many icons during scene changes to relate back to the 70’s. Some would be flowers, lava lamps, the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, and Farrah Fawcett. Fawcett had a major impact on the culture of the 70’s, as to why she was adapted in many ways on the show. The famous poster Fawcett did is not only hanging in Eric Foreman’s room, but is also used as a way to switch scenes in the sitcom (8:23-8:27). She is in the very first person to be used in the break of scenes furthering her importance in the 70’s and to this show. Laurie, who is Eric’s sister, has the same hair style of Farrah Fawcett. She is not a major character, but is in enough episodes that the viewer can catch on that this was intentional of the creator to have her resemble Farrah as much as possible.
Laurie VS. Farrah
This is an interesting node to add, and I want to make sure you see why. Can you reflect a bit more on who Farrah Fawcett is and what she represents for the 70s? I mean, by adding her here as a reference node, you’re treating her (or at least her iconic status) as a text. This is reasonable, I think, but it occurs to me that that’s a way of treating celebrity status that’s increasingly relevant at the same time that it’s inherently postmodern. Any thoughts?
I think treating her as a ‘text’ per-say is needed in the show, as well as the node. She is not only seen from posters on walls, but they sit around and talk about the show she was on, make references to charlies angles in the series and the daughter, Laurie, is made to represent her. The ages of the main characters on that 70′s show are 15-16, and these are the ages that would have seen her as iconic in a way that they would copy what they see on TV and such at the time. It’s showing what people of that age, and of that time, would be dealing with and who they would be looking up to (music, celebrities). And even after the fact, as now, we can see that she was not just a celebrity with a hit TV show, she was a cultural icon of that decade-everyone in America should have some idea of that poster that Farrah posed for. The TV series saw that was an important pat of that decade and wanted to showcase it-as with other icons like Nixon and AC/DC who are celebrity icons used in the TV series often as well.