COLD OPEN
INT. 
FAMILY 
ROOM 
– 
AFTERNOON
LITTLE 
SISTER 
(7) 
hurries into the room, out of 
breath. Her aquamarine “The 
Little 
Mermaid” 
backpack 
unceremoniously plops to the 
ground as she kicks off her 
shoes and makes a beeline for 
the couch, GoGurt in hand. BIG 
SISTER (10) is already lying 
across the opposite couch.
LITTLE SISTER
Did I miss it? Did it start yet? 
Big Sister shakes her head NO 
in confirmation. 
LITTLE SISTER
(sighing, in relief)
Oh, good.
(then)
Can you turn the sound on? 
Where’s the remote? 
Big Sister shrugs. Little Sister 
begins to search the couch 
cushions, pulling out a few hair 
ties and some change before 
spotting the remote underneath 
the couch Big Sister is sitting on. 
She quickly dives for it, raises the 
volume, then jumps back to her 
seat. 
TV ANNOUNCER (V.O.)
…from viewers like you. Thank 
you.
Little Sister pops open her 
GoGurt and nods contentedly 
to the TV, gratified by her 
contribution. 
As a kid, I used to follow 
the same routine almost every 
afternoon: I’d drop my bag, 
grab a snack and book it to the 
family room. I knew the after-

school PBS schedule by heart; 
my sister and I would watch half 
of “Cyberchase,” followed by 
“Arthur” and then “Fetch! with 
Ruff Ruffman.” If I was lucky, 
I’d catch a rerun of “Curious 
George” before the evening news.
I knew exactly what would 
play and when. I loved my little 
TV routine as a constant, fixed 
rhythm in my weekday. Most 
of all, I liked that the shows 
themselves followed their own 
resolute patterns, each episode 
varying little from the last. Even 
today, 
situational 
comedies 
remain a comforting, steadfast 
source of entertainment for me 
in an otherwise entropic world. 
Any time I watch “Seinfeld” or 
“Everybody Loves Raymond,” 

my mind drifts back to weekend 
mornings with my dad, the sound 
of his laughter reverberating 
through 
the 
room, 
mine 
instinctively chiming in to follow 
suit. I wasn’t quite able to grasp 
the jokes yet, but it didn’t really 
matter; that rhythmic humor 
absorbed me into the feeling all 
the same. 
Sitcoms 
are 
perhaps 
the 
most generic form of seriously 
crafted television in the game. I 
don’t mean that as a dig, but an 
observation: They are structured 
to a tee. The laugh track tells 
you 
when 
to 
laugh. 
Audio 
sweetening tells you precisely 
which moments are meant to 
be heartfelt or hilarious or 
horrific. And most importantly, 

the characters lead normal lives 
with mundane jobs and familiar 
conflicts, ever-relatable to the 
average viewer. 
The beauty of these shows 
is in the monotony itself, in 
their ability to work within the 
audience’s expectations and still 
tell a story in 22 minutes. A good 
sitcom knows not to color outside 
the lines of such a surefire 
formula to success. A great one 
knows how to draw a masterpiece 
within.
ACT ONE
EXT. BRADY BACKYARD – 
DAY
The Brady kids are playing in 
perfect harmony. An assortment 
of toys, bikes and hoola-hoops are 
strewn across the grass. PETER 

and JAN push BOBBY and CINDY 
on a swing set. MARCIA and 
GREG toss a ball back and forth. 
They are the poster children of 
familial bliss. Everything is as it 
should be.
INT. BRADY KITCHEN – DAY
ALICE 
is 
hard 
at 
work, 
preparing 
breakfast 
for 
the 
family. 
CAROL 
is 
standing 
around looking motherly without 
actually doing anything. MIKE 
waltzes 
in, 
newspaper 
and 
briefcase in hand. The parents 
visibly relax, lulled into a false 
sense of security and peace. It’s 
only so long before –
A LOUD CRASH comes from 
outside.
Cindy races into the kitchen, 
Bobby a beat behind her.

BOBBY
(pointing at Cindy)
She started it!
CINDY
No, he did!
BOBBY
It’s not my fault you all moved 
in last week.
Cindy promptly bursts into 
tears. Mike and Carol wear 
appropriately 
concerned 
expressions.
CUT TO – ALICE
ALICE
Now, who wants breakfast? 
The Brady Bunch are one of 
the most, if not the most, iconic 
families in American television to 
date. Everyone knows their story 
(and if you don’t, you can catch up 
in about 60 seconds): Two single 
parents meet, fall in love and 
merge their families into one. 
Total “guy with three kids 
meets 
girl 
with 
three 
kids 
widower/divorcée to husband/
wife classic,” huh? 
Beyond the Bradys’ squeaky-
clean, picture-perfect reputation, 
they were foremost a blended 
family — a fairly radical premise 
at the time. The notion of not 
only featuring a slightly unusual 
family set-up but normalizing it 
in a sitcom was groundbreaking 
to see. Sure, having the kids call 
their new step-parents “mom” 
and “dad” from the get-go was a 
bit much, and Carol’s ex-husband 
was never mentioned out of the 
network’s fear of controversy, 
but conforming to TV ideals 
is 
precisely 
what 
gave 
this 
nontraditional family its staying 
power and ingrained them in the 
popular cultural landscape.

Greeting cards are art. They 
are mass-produced, but are sent 
just to you; the sender is only 
“thinking of you.” 
Greeting cards line my shelves 
and walls like artwork: a dog 
with a toilet joke from my sister, 
scoops of my favorite ice cream 
flavors falling from the sky from 
my parents, eight reasons my 
grandmother loves me (written 
by a copywriter), a joyful Yom 
Kippur message from a well-
meaning Christian relative, a 
“drink up, it’s ur bday” from my 
hometown friends. The people 
who gave me these little works 
of art were loved ones who knew 
how much I would enjoy them.
In an interview with The 
Michigan Daily, Aaron Ahuvia, a 
University of Michigan-Dearborn 
marketing 
and 
U-M-Ann 
Arbor Art & Design professor 
and leading expert in non-
interpersonal love, described the 
impetus behind gift-giving and 
gift-loving. 
“You’re 
dating 
somebody, 
and they give you some sort of a 
present, a nice decorative item, 
and you are happy to display it in 
your home and you really love this 
item,” Ahuvia said. “And the two 

of you break up … you are gonna 
like to get rid of it … the object 
really was a reflection of the kind 
of relationship you had with the 
person.” 
A card that carries a message, 
even one not written by the giver, 
reflects the giver’s love. It’s a 
preservation of that love forever 
— a reminder, a preserver and a 
keepsake.
In Britain, Valentine’s Day 
cards have been a pure expression 
of love, adorned with lace, flowers 
and paper embellishments, since 
the early 19th century. These 
cards were far too expensive and 
time-consuming for the middle 
and lower classes to access, 
restricting 
these 
handcrafted 
expressions of love to the upper 
echelons. 
Then, 
in 
1849, 
love 
began 
its 
oddly 
beautiful 
commercialization 
when 
Massachusetts 
entrepreneur 
Esther 
Howland 
created 
a 
Valentine’s card assembly line. 
She 
made 
elaborate 
pieces 
from 
scratch 
pairing 
ornate 
illustrations with ribbons, silk 
and lace. The business soon 
expanded to New Year’s and 
birthday cards, as well as May 
baskets. 
Howland 
became 
a 
multi-thousandaire 
while 
spreading love and well wishes 
with beautiful handcrafting. 

Louis Prang, the so-called 
“father of the Christmas card,” 
also began selling cards in 1875, 
selling a reported five million 
yearly by 1881. Prang held design 
competitions for artists to share 
their work and Christmas wishes 
on a large scale (and receive a high 
payout for winning). Participants 
included artist John La Farge, 
architect Stanford White and 
designer Louis Comfort Tiffany. 
Designs varied in whimsy and 
fun, solitude and celebration. The 
cards of the early 20th century 
reflected each artist’s message 
but were personal to the card 
giver and receiver. 
Ahuvia described the earliest 
conceptions of art as “the creation 
of 
something 
beautiful 
that 
exists purely for its decorative 
or beautiful effect.” Early cards 
were sold on the market but 
were certainly works of art. The 
new world of greeting cards 
allowed the American public to 
give something beautiful to their 
loved ones. No longer did they 
need delicate handcrafting skills 
or extreme wealth to spread love 
and happiness in a tiny envelope. 
The emerging world of greeting 
cards created a new art form with 
infinite possibilities — and put it 
into millions of hands.
In 1910, the Hall brothers, 
Joyce (J.C.), Rollie and William, 

began selling their greeting card 
designs out of two shoeboxes in 
Kansas City, Mo., and grew in 
size until their business caught 
fire in 1915. They reopened in 
1917, intending to further the 
personal, intimate nature of 
letter writing. This meant selling 
cards held within envelopes 
and cards that folded, rather 
than the traditional open-faced 
cards. This allowed for surprise 
messages and longer love notes 
hidden behind a card’s cover. 
During World War I and II, 
people turned to the card’s short, 
sweet letters to wish others well 
across the world. The business, 
later named Hallmark Cards Inc., 
took off. In “Hallmark: A Century 
of Caring,” J.C. Hall said, “Many 
more men became permanent 
buyers of cards than ever before. 
And I saw something else in the 
custom — a way of giving less 
articulate people, and those who 
tend to disguise their feelings, a 
voice to express their love and 
affection.” Anyone who could 
not express the extent of their 
love in their own words could 
do it through someone else’s art, 
whether for the holidays or an 
everyday occasion.
Greeting cards had become art 
for the masses — which meant it 
was no longer considered art.
According 
to 
Ahuvia, 
if 

something 
was 
created 
not 
out of “inspired desire” but 
to 
“communicate 
something 
or 
create 
demand 
for 
the 
marketplace to make money, that 
disqualified it from being art.” 
This has now begun to change, 
he said, as “that idea of art 
disqualified a lot of things that 
are important to non-elites.” This 
leads to populism, he said “not in 
the political sense,” but regarding 
popular 
music, 
art, 
sitcoms, 
greeting cards, “The Bachelor.”
“These could all be taken 
seriously,” Ahuvia said. “I like the 
democratic spirit of that.”
Be it “The Bachelor” or a cheesy 
valentine, populist art represents 
the popular conception of love. It 
expresses love through common, 
widespread imagery, humor and 
far more whimsy than a long love 
poem or romantic play. The art of 
the greeting card, while far from 
“elite,” is made more beautiful by 
the messages of love it can spread 
and the sheer volume of love and 
joy the “mass-produced” art can 
spread, regardless of class or 
taste.
In 1932, Disney and Hallmark 
united for one of the most subtly 
influential business deals ever, 
irreversibly 
corporatizing 
the 
somewhat personal greeting card 
industry while creating a new 
market for children. The Disney 

cards now allowed parents to give 
cards their kids would love and 
cherish. With Mickey Mouses 
and Disney princesses, the cards 
connected to more than a moment 
in time or a simple message 
— they depicted kids’ favorite 
characters and stories of a single 
year. As technology progressed, 
cards became a new form of pop 
art. New, whimsical elements 
adorned cards for children and 
adults alike, including complex 
pop-ups, musical cards, light-up 
embellishments and mechanical 
cards.
Greeting cards also became 
a new form of comic, hiding 
humorous greetings and wishes 
in their new, joke-style Hallmark 
Shoebox Greetings line. While 
not the most advanced humor, 
this artful, subtle humor has 
reached millions of homes and 
hearts since its conception.
Corporations, like art, forever 
transform 
our 
beliefs, 
for 
better or worse. They shape our 
knowledge of holidays and form 
our emotional ties to them. 
“If something is created by a 
corporation, for the purpose of 
making money, it doesn’t feel 
authentic,” Ahuvia said. But does 
that lack of authenticity stop us 
from loving something?

Design by Leah Hoogterp

6 — Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

When I was nine years old, I took 
on my first role in live theater as 
Scuttle in “The Little Mermaid Jr.” I 
never could have imagined that nine 
years later I would prance around 
onstage in drag, complete with a 
child-size royal cape and a bright 
blue glitter beard as King Arthur in 
“Monty Python’s Spamalot.”
This is one of the many moments 
I look back on when I try to 
remember why I ever thought I 
was a cisgender woman. At the 
time, I thought the confidence I felt 
embodying King Arthur came from 
the ability to be silly in a show full 
of comedic bits and ridiculousness. 
After all, I haven’t been in a show 
since “Spamalot,” where I’ve had 
the opportunity to slice someone’s 
obviously fake arms off with a 
wooden sword or gallop across 
the stage on an invisible horse 
voiced by a pair of coconuts. Now, 
I realize it was that ridiculousness 
that allowed me to express myself 
and my gender unabashedly, glitter 
beard and all. In my years at a 
private elementary school, I did 
everything I could to customize 

my uniform so I wouldn’t blend 
into the sea of red polos and khaki 
skirts, donning tights with the 
most garish patterns I could find 
and sunglasses that would put 
Elton John to shame. Looking 
back, I realize how much power 
that form of expression gave me. 
Today, I embrace it wholeheartedly. 
Whether it’s a school uniform or 
the unwritten gender norms of 
society, I don’t let those restrictions 
stop me from being myself. 
So, today, I want to share with 
you my secret to the perfect glitter 
beard and the maximum amount of 
gender euphoria.
Step One: Primer! Skincare is 
always essential, especially when 
applying heavy makeup like a glitter 
beard. This step is particularly 
important when wearing this look 
in front of a crowd. A show-stopping 
number can make you sweat, and 
we don’t want your fabulous glitter 
beard melting away!
Step Two: Outline your glitter 
beard with eyeliner pencil. This is 
your time to be precise and make 
sure your look is exactly how you 
want it. The shape I used is simply 
inspiration; you can add as much 
flair in your beard’s shape as you 
like.

Step Three: Use a brush or 
sponge to fill in your outline with 
water-activated makeup (like the 
Mac Chromacake that I used) in 
the color of your choice. I chose my 
favorite shade of royal blue. Use 
more than one coat for maximum 
coverage.
Step Four: It’s time for glitter! 
For fine glitter, mix with a gel 
mixing medium or primer and 
apply with a flat foundation brush 
or fingers. Make sure you don’t 
miss any spots. You want to look 
as sparkly as possible.
Step Five: Setting spray is the 
key to making your glitter beard 
stick, especially as you proudly 
show off your beauty to the world, 
whether that’s onstage in a dance-
heavy number like the Act I finale 
of 
“Spamalot,” 
appropriately 
titled “Run Away!” or strolling 
through the aisles of your local 
convenience store.
Step Six: If you’d like to add 
chunkier glitter, apply spirit gum 
in small sections and immediately 
add your glitter with a fan brush. 
Again, make sure that your entire 
beard is covered evenly. You don’t 
want to look patchy!
Step 
Seven: 
Add 
finishing 
touches to complete your look and 

really make it your own. Find a 
glittery eyeshadow that matches 
the color of your beard — or one 
that completely clashes. Whatever 
floats your boat. Add lipstick that 
pops. Fill in your eyebrows for 
a little bit of extra sparkle. Put 
your hair in a gravity-defying 
updo. 
Accessorize! 
Keep 
in 
mind that this look is completely 

customizable. Blue was my choice, 
but if purple or green is more your 
style, who am I to stop you?
This tutorial is about more than 
applying a neat glitter beard for a 
role. Take these techniques and 
apply them whenever you feel 
the need for a little extra self-
expression. We live in a time and 
place where being oneself can be 

contentious, to say the least. Now, 
more than ever, it is important to 
show the world exactly who you 
are whether anyone else likes it 
or not. Enjoy the look you create, 
no matter your gender, race, 
sexuality or any other aspect of 
your identity. I hope that your 
glitter beard adds a bit of euphoria 
to your life.

A makeup tutorial for gender euphoria

SERENA IRANI
TV Beat Editor

Not-your-average family sitcom pilot

MAX NEWMAN
Daily Arts Contributor

The unconventional art in greeting cards

KAYA GINSKY
Senior Arts Editor

Design by Evelyn Mousigian

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Read more at MichiganDaily.com