Quote Originally Posted by Colin
Duncan was great on Monarch, but he was also a bumbling boob at times. I don't think the average American household is ready for a kilt wearing main character in a TV series. The kilt would have to be a running joke (and insult) for the show to get acceptance on mass produced mindless TV.
Now that's just damn mean of you. YOU might consider Duncan "bumbling" but it seemed very clear to ME that although he was naive and rough about the edges he was always sincere, loyal and ernest...and it was a TV series, fer God's sake...there has to be that kind of dynamic that creates situations that make it INTERESTING...you wanna watch an hour of "real life"?

Don't look at it so seriously...I think you're finding all the negative aspects of a character whose role was overwhelmingly positive.

And you assume that a kilted character would somehow automatically be a running joke and an insult? Agreed that the vast majority of TV shows pander to the lowest common denominator but the kilt jokes and insults would only occur if they were purposely written in by the writers and that would be at the insistance of the producers. If a character in a series showed up in a kilt and there was absolutely no fuss or comment made about it in the context of the show...if no one asked, "Why is that guy wearing a kilt?"...no one made any jokes at all...everyone just behaved normally...there was no special qualifying dialogue like, "....oh, he's from Scotland..."...the character didn't go off on some diatribe about what his motivation was for being kilted...what would happen?

Not much...maybe there would be a bit more interest in kilts and they might become a little more mainstream (and I hear those of you who don't want that to happen...don't want it to be considered a fad...want it to still remain "special"...) but I don't think that the Dockers people will have much to worry about.

What was that story...Clark Gable took off his shirt in "It Happened One Night" to reveal that he wasn't wearing an undershirt and the sales of mens' undershirts plummeted for the next year? JFK shows up for his inauguration without a hat and that was the end of the mens' hat industry. Who would have to show up in a kilt for that to happen?

This argument is academic...it won't happen...it is a "wouldn't it be nice if" exercise. The truth is that the kilt will always stand out. To just introduce it into a context where it's not the norm will always seem gimmicky and arbitrary.

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AA