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As if in line with the project’s setting, a family was also working on the other side of the camera, although in a much smaller number than Pat and Bill Loud with their five children – Alan Raymond and his wife, sound director Susan, performed the duties of the film operator. The idea for the first US reality show came from the mind of director and screenwriter Craig Gilbert. Before settling on the Louds, he had interviewed 24 (!) different families, but the choice fell mostly in favor of the photogenic (in this case, telegenic) Loud children – Kevin, Grant, Delilah, Lance and Michelle, who ranged in age from 14 to 20 for years. Loudu’s luxury family home with a pool and several cars was also useful for attracting an audience.
American Family is 50 years old this year since it premiered on PBS (Public Broadcasting Service), which we could consider as the American equivalent of Latvian Public Media, namely Latvian Television. Gilbert and his team had shot a total of 300 hours of material, but one hour-long episode per week reached the audience for 12 weeks.
In a sense, this project was a perfect representation of the so-called “American Dream”, and with real people, not strangers placed next to each other in a filming pavilion, whose feelings and beliefs begin to be true only after the shutter is closed. The symbolism of the dream was apparently one of the main reasons why the show became extremely popular with viewers, drawing more than 10 million viewers every week. If we remember that this is the very beginning of the 70s, such indicators are truly noteworthy.
