Unsung is a feature in which I take a look at a pop culture phenomenon (be it music, TV, literary, whatever) that has been forgotten or underappreciated. In this installment, I take a look at ABC's Afterschool Specials, an anthology series that ran for 25 seasons.
The concept of the latchkey kid is mythologized by Gen Xers such as myself, but it was a real thing. For those of us whose parents both worked full-time, it was just a part of everyday life. I'm sure there are still kids who come home from school to an empty house and are left to their own devices until their parents get home, but the term really caught on in the 1970s as more mothers began working instead of staying home with the children. The term actually came up in a CBC Radio program all the way back in 1942, discussing the phenomenon of kids left home alone during World War II when the father was away at war and the mother would need to get a job.
For me, it began in the mid-'70s when my family moved into our first house in Pickering, a suburb of Toronto. I was 7 and in second grade and would walk a mile to and from school every day. With both my parents working during the day (usually; sometimes my mother would work a different shift at the hospital), I would have my own house key and let myself in after school. My younger brother would be with a babysitter down the street until my mother got home, so I was on my own, making myself a snack and either playing street hockey in the driveway or watching TV.
With the latter, I remember watching a lot of reruns of shows like Happy Days and Gilligan's Island, but another show I would occasionally check out was the ABC Afterschool Special. These were hour-long mini movies that ran once a month during the school year and often focused on a hot-button topics like divorce, AIDS, rape, drunk driving, teen pregnancy, drugs and even child molestation. They were designed to be educational and entertaining and occasionally controversial. I didn't watch them all the time, but every so often I'd catch one. I didn't watch them after the early '80s, when I was either doing homework or playing sports after school.
The specials weren't always standard movies; sometimes, they were animated or were done as documentaries. The series won 51 Daytime Emmy Awards and four Peabody Awards over the years. Of course, when the ABC specials started doing well, CBS followed with Schoolbreak Specials in 1980 and NBC ran similar programs called Special Treat from 1975-1986. ABC also aired Weekend Specials from 1977-1997, but these were often adaptations of children's stories.
ABC's Afterschool Specials featured a lot of early appearances of actors who went on to bigger things. In the '70s, this included Jodie Foster, Kristy McNichol, Lance Kerwin, Leif Garrett, Rosanna Arquette, Anthony Kiedis (under the name Cole Dammett), Wendie Jo Sperber, David Paymer and Melissa Sue Anderson. In the '80s, the shows featured Melora Hardin, Rob Lowe, Dana Plato, Nancy McKeon, Scott Baio, Amanda Plummer, Helen Slater, Matthew Modine, Meg Ryan, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Cynthia Nixon, River and Leaf (later known as Joaquin) Phoenix, Sarah Jessica Parker, Yeardley Smith (who later became Lisa Simpson), Justine Bateman, Val Kilmer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Mare Winningham, Ajay Naidu, Viggo Mortensen, Lisa Bonet, Kyra Sedgwick, Jennifer Grey, Ben Affleck, Marisa Tomei and Sherilyn Fenn. The '90s featured early appearances by Will Smith, Sam Rockwell, Adam Sandler, Lacey Chabert, Freddie Prinze Jr., Jessica Alba, Kevin Connolly, Lauryn Hill and Sara Gilbert.
Oprah Winfrey's production company took over the series in 1991, with Winfrey introducing the episodes, which included panel discussions on relationships and race relations. But by this time, youth-oriented sitcoms and dramas were regularly producing "Very Special Episodes" that focused on similar hot-button issues for much larger audiences. Eventually, the Afterschool Specials were canceled in 1996, with the last episode running in January '97.
The series didn't shy away from difficult topics and tried not to be preachy, unlike, say, Nancy Reagan appearing on "Diff'rent Strokes" to tell kids to just say no to drugs. There were definitely seriously heavy shows and then more lighthearted stuff, like 1987's The Day My Kid Went Punk, starring The Love Boat's Bernie Kopell and featuring a truly ridiculous premise (nerdy kid who plays violin is rejected by girl he likes and decides to become a "punker"). Or 1980's Stoned, in which Scott Baio starts smoking weed. Or 1984's Summer Switch, in which Robert Klein plays a dad who does a "Freaky Friday" personality switch with his teenage son. Or "Wanted: The Perfect Guy" from 1986, in which a 13-year-old Ben Affleck places a personal ad for his widowed mom.
"One Too Many" first aired in prime time before becoming an afterschool special in May 1985, starring Val Kilmer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Lance Guest and Mare Winningham as four high school friends whose lives are changed after one of them drives drunk.
Of course, all these aired during the era where TV choices were limited to the three big networks, PBS and a handful of UHF channels (as well the burgeoning pay cable stations like HBO and Cinemax that emerged in the '80s). Now there are so many options and ways to watch shows, it's hard to keep up. But when I would get home from school in the late '70s, I would toast up a Pop Tart and pour a glass of milk and watch some TV, which might have been an afterschool special starring Robbie Rist as a rich kid granted seven wishes by a genie.
