Why Can’t We Hear About Fidelity for a Change?

At CNN, Laura Sessions Stepp wonders why pop culture doesn’t present a favorable view of fidelity :

If you were to ask me the names of married couples on TV who are monogamous and enjoy a lively, contented if sometimes contentious relationship, I’d be hard-pressed to come up with any other than Eric and Tami Taylor on “Friday Night Lights.”

And FNL is going off the air on Friday.

Maybe TV screenwriters and producers think only cheaters and marriages in crisis draw viewers. And maybe they’re right. FNL, which will be shown in reruns on ESPN, was fabulously received by critics but did not do so well in the ratings.

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Pop culture doesn’t make it easy: Television execs love infidelity. For example, “Desperate Housewives,” the award-winning ABC show going into its eighth season, has plenty of it, Bree Van de Kamp, who has a seemingly perfect marriage, and Gaby Solis, who cavorted with a 17-year-old gardener, being two examples. In the CW’s “Gossip Girl,” almost all the major characters, adults as well as teens, have cheated on their partners in some fashion.

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