Israeli drama: constructing the Israeli ‘quality’ television series as an art form

Abstract

The current study focuses on the social construction of definitions of quality in the field of the television drama series in Israel. By doing that, this work challenges Pierre Bourdieu’s claim that since artifacts of ‘popular culture’ industries are not regarded as ‘autonomous’, according to the autonomy-of-art ideology, they cannot be consecrated as works of art. Bourdieu’s thesis was challenged before, but the television field has not yet been extensively studied from this point of view. My study of the broad empirical corpus, including television reviews and interviews with acclaimed Israeli television creators, reveals that artistic quality and commercial appeal show less tension than Bourdieu had suggested. Furthermore, my findings indicate that the autonomy-of-art ideology can be reconfigured to accommodate commercial (e.g. capitalist) considerations. Within this reconfiguration, the ‘quality’ television series can be redefined to include elements of ‘autonomous’ art, such as authenticity, innovation and the input of ‘genius’ creators, alongside such capitalist requirements as profitability.

Keywords

art Bourdieu cultural industries popular culture quality television

Television, which brings certain performances of ‘high’ art into the home, or certain cultural institutions (such as the Beaubourg Centre or the Maisons de la culture), which briefly bring a working-class public into contact with high art and sometimes avant-garde works, create what are virtually experimental situations, neither more nor less artificial or unreal than those necessarily produced by any survey on legitimate culture in a working-class milieu. One then observes the confusion, sometimes almost a sort of panic mingled with revolt, that is induced by some exhibits – I am thinking of Ben’s heap of coal, on view at the Beaubourg shortly after it opened – whose parodic intention, entirely defined in terms of an artistic field and its relatively autonomous history, is seen as a sort of aggression, an affront to common sense and sensible people. (Bourdieu, 1984: 33)

For Pierre Bourdieu, who regarded ‘high art’ and ‘artistic taste’ as institutionalized social constructs reflecting class struggles, television was a low form of cultural expression. Television, for Bourdieu, could not be defined as ‘art’. Furthermore, television could not be a mediating tool between products of ‘high art’ and the masses or the working class. It seems that Bourdieu labeled television as a negative cultural force (1993, 1998) in an almost essentialist way, one at odds with his own sociology.

Nevertheless, Bourdieu (1984, 1990, 1993) was among the first sociologists to call for an investigation of culture and art from a perspective which treated artistic taste and artistic value as social constructs. From this perspective, the value of cultural works is a result of sorting struggles over definitions of quality between social agents in the field of cultural production.

Bourdieu regarded the cultural field as divided between a field of ‘mass’ capitalist production in which position holders fight over financial capital, and a field of ‘restricted’ artistic production in which position holders fight over symbolic capital such as artistic recognition (Bourdieu, 1993). The first sphere, including the electronic media in general and television in particular, was empirically neglected by Bourdieu (Hesmondhalgh, 2006).

Accordingly, as a cultural field of production, the media, in Bourdieu’s view, follows an economic logic of practice at the center of which is economic capital (Bourdieu, 1993). The art field, by contrast, follows an autonomous logic of practice at the center of which are the modern ideology of the autonomy of art and the practice of ‘art for art’s sake’ (Alexander, 2003; Regev, 1994). For Bourdieu, no product of the media – always part of an industrialized and popular cultural field with economic capital at the center of its logic of practice – could thus be socially constructed as a work of art (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993).

Nevertheless, sociologists of popular culture and media scholars have increasingly turned to Bourdieu in recent decades. Cultural sociologists such as Motti Regev and Shyon Baumann have shown, for example, how works of rock music (Regev, 1994) and film (Baumann, 2001) can be constructed as autonomous works of art despite being part of capitalist-industrial popular culture.

More generally, Nick Couldry (2003) has adapted Bourdieu’s concept of field and theory of the state to develop a theory of media power, while David Hesmondhalgh (2006) has sought to incorporate within Bourdieu’s field theory the cultural industries approach which denies that art and industry are necessarily antithetical (Hesmondhalgh, 2002; Hesmondhalgh and Baker, 2008).

In Hesmondhalgh’s (2006) view, all cultural fields, including the art field, are characterized, nowadays, by global commerce and capitalism (Hesmondhalgh, 2002); nevertheless, Hesmondhalgh believes that the Bourdieusian distinction between mass (capitalist) production and restricted (artistic) production has much to offer to media studies despite its admitted limitations (Hesmondhalgh, 2006: 221). Hesmondhalgh specifically notes ‘quality television’ as a case in point (2006: 222). In his view, the emerging academic and journalistic discussion of ‘quality’ television series in particular (Creeber, 2001, 2004; Mazdon, 2005; Nelson, 2006) implies that the field of restricted production, which for Bourdieu has an autonomous logic of practice that consecrates its products as works of art, is being reconfigured in the context of television production.

Furthermore, a recent study (Roberts, 2010) has shown that decision-making strategies in television production indicate that commerce and ‘artistic’ logics interplay rather than counter each other. Nevertheless, by concentrating on organizational stages, the research neglected to examine the discourse of the fields’ creators and critics. This enhances the need to follow Hesmondhalgh’s (2006) call and study the television production fields discourse out of the point of view of its creators and critics as well.

It is therefore essential to examine this field, which has yet to be studied from this theoretical perspective (Hesmondhalgh, 2006), using the Bourdieusian methodology. That is, it is vital to examine the way in which television drama series labeled as ‘quality television’ are consecrated as works of art by social agents such as creators and critics (Hesmondhalgh, 2006). Such an examination may have the added benefit of producing a socially constructed definition of ‘television quality’, one shaped by the work of social agents within the field of television production rather than mostly by academics (Nelson, 2006).

My own aim, accordingly, is to analyze the emergence of so-called ‘quality television’ (Nelson, 2006) as a case study of the ways in which media products, as part of the culture industries and popular culture, can be consecrated as works of art. By doing so, I also wish to suggest a definition of the quality television series.

The Israeli case study

My case study focused on Israeli television. Established in 1968, Israeli television is a historically young production field. For many years, due to political and financial constraints, Israeli television barely produced dramatic works, let alone drama series (Bargur, 2011). The Israeli drama series, as a genre, emerged in relatively high quantities only in the mid 1990s, in the wake of neoliberal privatization processes, peaking with the legislation of the Second Authority for Television and Radio Law and with the transition from single- to multi-channel television (Liebes, 2003).

In order to prevent the newly born commercial channels from flooding the TV screen with cheap-to-produce programs of ‘low-quality’, high-rating, ‘trashy’ genres, the Israeli legislator distinguished between ‘high-end television genres’, including drama series with higher hourly ‘production values’ (measured by the money and time invested in one hour of product), and ‘low-end’ forms with lower production values. The law required private television channels to produce and air at least 150 hours yearly of ‘high-end’ television content (Bargur, 2011, Lavie, 2011).

Eventually, the emergence of commercial (if still publicly regulated) television in Israel allowed the creation of a significant amount of original production (Bargur, 2011). This development helped institutionalize a hierarchical differentiation between ‘quality’ television, often characterized by higher production values and hence more expensive to produce, yet frequently less popular with audiences and hence less profitable, and content which is profitable but inferior in quality (Lavie, 2011). The Bourdieusian distinction between a ‘mass end’ and a ‘restricted end’ of production (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993) is thus reflected in the Israeli legislation (Lavie, 2011).

Two decades after the advent of commercial television in Israel, the Israeli television production field is still undergoing processes of institutionalization (Lavie, 2011). For all of the reasons noted above, the Israeli television production field provides a suitable case study for an examination of the sorting struggles which help define ‘quality’ in the field of commercial television.¹

Television on the crossroads between art and popular culture: theory and history

The socially constructed priority of art over so-called popular culture is based on the autonomy-of-art ideology, formed socio-historically during the modern era of revolutions (Alexander, 2003; Strinati, 1995; Tanner, 2003) and informed in large part by Kant’s principles of aesthetic judgment (McCloskey, 1987). From the autonomy-of-art perspective, the artist is a ‘genius’ (Heinich, 1996), an independent and innovative creator embodying an autonomous creative spirit. The work of the genius artist is supposed to have an emotional, psychological and social meaning (Regev, 1994). As the representative of an emotional, authentic truth, autonomous art, or ‘art for art’s sake’, is from this perspective socially supreme (Alexander, 2003; Tanner, 2003).

According to the autonomy-of-art ideology, a genuine work of art cannot obey rules of action external to the social field of art, for example the capitalist rules of the financial market (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993). The products of profit-seeking industries, therefore, cannot be defined as works of art. Adherence to the autonomy-of-art ideology thus seems to exclude in advance any attempt to define the products of popular culture, produced as they are almost exclusively by the profit-seeking cultural industries (Hesmondhalgh, 2002), as works of art. In other words, the autonomy-of-art ideology was the source of the institutionalized inferiority of popular culture and its products. This modern social distinction between art and popular culture was also reflected in academic discourse, in which the distinction is still alternatively viewed as essential or as socially constructed (Eyerman and Ring, 1998).

In recent decades, however, academic discourse has witnessed the emergence of theoretical perspectives that are less judgmental towards popular culture and its products. Scholars in cultural studies have analyzed artifacts of popular culture, including television programs, as cultural texts open to multiple interpretations (Fiske, 2000; Hashiloni-Dolev, 1999), some of them subversive and therefore conducive to social change (Radway, 1991). Similarly, media scholars have studied television shows, particularly in the critically derided ‘soap opera’ genre, as meaningful cultural texts (Liebes and Livingstone, 1998; Liebes and Katz, 1993).

Sociology has also seen a turn away from judgmental attitudes towards popular culture (Baumann, 2001, 2007; Regev, 1994). Nonetheless, television has largely remained subject to judgmental attitudes in sociological research (Bennett, 2006; Hesmondhalgh, 2006). One exception has been Eva Illouz’s (2003) work on the American syndicated talk show, The Oprah Winfrey Show. Illouz’s work focuses on the way in which the program reflects the constructed social morality of late capitalism (Illouz, 2003). Yet no study focusing on television has asked sociological questions about the quality of television shows, though, as already noted, scholars such as David Hesmondhalgh (2002, 2006) have suggested that the television field shows creative characteristics equivalent to those of the restricted end of cultural production and the autonomy-of-art ideology (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993).

Defining the television drama series: between trash and art

Television drama programming around the globe has traditionally been based on the television drama series as a major genre.² The television series format, many scholars claim, supplied the medium demanded by capitalism for a continuous flow of programming, whereby loyal audiences could tune in daily or weekly to watch their favorite shows (Creeber, 2004; Nelson, 1997).

Television drama series primarily took the form of the ‘soap opera’ (Creeber, 2001). Rooted in American radio, this ill-reputed genre mostly had a daily format. Its intended audience consisted of housewives who, in keeping with capitalist and male-chauvinist ideologies, were thought to be interested in romantic storylines (Doron, 2006). The label ‘soap opera’ came from the commercials aired during episodes, in which detergents and other cleaning products were featured heavily (Abercrombie, 1996).

Over the years, television series evolved into multiple genres such as the evening ‘soap opera’ aired once a week during prime time, the situation comedy (or sitcom), and more. Yet the common conception regarding the quality of such series remained largely unchanged. Because of their general female-romantic content (Doron, 2006) and compliance with capitalist market demands, such series were deemed incapable of stylistic or thematic innovation (Creeber, 2004: 2), of authenticity or autonomy, and hence, according to the autonomy-of-art ideology, of genuine artistry (Alexander, 2003; Regev, 1994).

It was not until the early 1980s that television drama series first won academic and critical recognition, leading to the rise of the ‘quality’ television series (Feuer et al., 1984; Thompson, 1996; Mazdon, 2005; McCabe and Akass, 2007). This social development is associated in particular with one American drama series, Hill Street Blues.³ Produced by the independent MTM (Mary Taylor Moore) Enterprises and aired on CBS between 1981 and 1987, this police drama was central in shaping the concept of the quality television series as a distinct genre (Creeber, 2001; Feuer et al., 1984; Mazdon, 2005; McCabe and Akass, 2007). Produced by legendary television producer Steven Bochco, the series won critical acclaim and was widely regarded as innovative. Much of the acclaim was due to the show’s pluralistic narratives, large and ethnically diverse cast, and liberal approach to political and social issues, all of which were at odds with mainstream currents of American culture at the time (Kerr, 1984).

In addition, the show was characterized by what many television critics considered a cinematic rather than a television-based aesthetics (Creeber, 2001; Feuer et al., 1984; Mazdon, 2005). The producers’ primary motives remained capitalist, of course, with the show’s perceived quality intended to target the more sophisticated niche audience of educated, financially established viewers (Kerr, 1984). Yet this commercial logic did not prevent the series from being recognized as possessing quality.

Other series which followed in the footsteps of Hill Street Blues included Steven Bochco’s lawyer drama LA Law, the semi-comic detective drama Moonlighting, the yuppie-midlife-crisis drama Thirtysomething, and the thriller Twin Peaks, created by acclaimed film director David Lynch, which uniquely fused such disparate genres as the soap opera and the low-budget horror movie (Creeber, 2001, 2004). All these series helped define the ‘quality’ television drama series as a unique television genre in which a large and socially diverse cast, complex dramatic narratives, and a cinematic aesthetic combined with such distinct television elements as the forms and narratives of the ‘soap opera’ to create television quality (Hilmes, 2003: 99).

In recent decades, the Anglo-American television production field has seen the evolution of drama series pre-branded as quality television (McCabe and Akass, 2007), most prominently, perhaps, in the case of the celebrated American cable television channel HBO. To win over new cable subscribers from among elitist audiences who snubbed commercial television, HBO (with its slogan ‘It’s not TV, it’s HBO’) marketed itself early on as an opposition to television of the latter sort. The series produced, financed, and aired by HBO, including such successful shows as mob drama The Sopranos, morbid family drama Six Feet Under, and violent prison drama Oz, were pre-branded and marketed as both innovative and authentic (Jaramillo, 2002; McCabe and Akass, 2007; Leverette et al., 2008). Since innovation and authenticity are essential components of the autonomy-of-art ideology (Regev, 1994), the shows, thus characterized, could also be viewed as artistic.

Moreover, as a cable channel HBO was free both from strict censorship regulations and from the demands of advertisers. The channel’s relative freedom enabled it to produce series that dealt with controversial issues such as death, violence, crime, and sex in a bold and socially subversive way, further contributing to the shows’ reception as television works of ‘quality’ (Jaramillo, 2002; Leverette et al., 2008; McCabe and Akass, 2007).

Indeed, HBO’s pre-branding of its own series as works of art helped bolster the institutional definition of ‘quality television drama’ (Nelson, 2006) and label it as artistic. As already noted, this concept has yet to be explored properly and to be analyzed through a sociological lens which regards artistic categories as social constructs (Bourdieu, 1993 Most definitions of ‘quality television’ still regard the term ‘quality’ in an essentialist-naturalistic manner (Geraghty, 2003; Nelson, 2006); it is crucial, however, that we take a sociological approach to these definitions.

My aim in this article is to extend the sociological discussion of popular culture and its products as forms socially definable as art (Baumann, 2001; Frith, 1996; Hesmondhalgh, 2006; Regev, 1994) to the less explored field of television production (Hesmondhalgh, 2006), taking Israeli television as a case study. I will seek to identify the social sorting system and the practices of social agents that contribute to the definition of ‘television quality’. In doing so, I will also try and produce a more pragmatic definition of ‘quality television,’ one informed by the Bourdieusian view that definitions of ‘quality’ are socially constructed and do not represent a naturalistic essence.

Study claims and methodology

Two general claims lie at the center of the current paper: first, that the television drama series emerged in Israel as a ‘quality’ genre bearing the characteristics of works of art; second, that the labeling of such series as instances of ‘quality television’ involved a certain revision of the autonomy-of-art ideology and, with it, of the Bourdieusian distinction between ‘mass’ and ‘restricted’ cultural production. (For discussions of Bourdieu’s distinction in the context of popular culture, see Baumann, 2001; Frith, 1996; Regev, 1994.) This revision, I claim, helped to define the contours of the so-called ‘quality television series’.

To assess my broad theoretical claims, the current article takes the Israeli television drama series as a case study, examining the social processes that have helped shape the reception of Israeli drama series as works of art. This case study may then serve as a model for further research covering similar cultural fields.

Furthermore, in keeping with the Bourdieusian view of art critics as social agents with the power to enshrine cultural artifacts in the artistic canon (Bourdieu, 1993; Hesmondhalgh, 2006), the present article is based on qualitative content analysis of around 200 reviews and articles about four leading television drama series labeled as demonstrating high quality: Weekends and Holidays, The Bourgeois, Love Hurts, and In Treatment.⁴ The articles and reviews were published between 1999 and 2008⁵ in two key daily newspapers, Yedioth Aharonoth and Ha’aretz. Ha’aretz was chosen because it is Israel’s most prominent highbrow newspaper and is read by Israel’s socio-political, cultural, and economic elites (Lavie, 2011); as such, it exerts powerful influence on the shaping of cultural capital in Israel and is a dominant force in the consecration of works as works of art. (For the elite media’s decisive impact on cultural capital, see Bourdieu, 1993.) Yedioth Aharonoth was chosen, first, because it is Israel’s most popular daily newspaper, with often decisive influence on public taste and opinion, and, second, because its pieces of television criticism share many of the central features of those in Ha’aretz (see Lavie, 2011); the newspaper’s television reviews were therefore added to the research corpus.

In addition, using a purposive sampling method (Babbie, 2001), I interviewed ten leading award-winning Israeli television creators, including the creators of the four drama series mentioned above. These creators’ voices and conceptions of art are important: all of them are major position holders within the field of Israeli television production and, as such, have participated in that field’s sorting struggles. All the interviews were conducted face-to-face (except for one conducted by telephone) and lasted between one and a half and three hours. I used a qualitative method of analysis whereby the material was classified into several categories.

The art of making artistic television

My analysis of the extensive empirical corpus shows that the autonomy-of-art ideology is a powerful force in the commercial production of Israeli television drama series, providing the criteria for much of what is deemed ‘quality television’. For critics and creators alike, quality television drama series are works characterized by ‘autonomy’. Autonomy, in turn, is understood as a super-category consisting of certain attributes: authenticity, innovation, social engagement, and the input of ‘genius creators’. (For the connection between these features and the concept of artistic autonomy, see Alexander, 2003; Bourdieu, 1990, 1993; Heinich, 1996; Regev, 1994; Tanner, 2003). These features are often contrasted with the attributes of ‘mass’-produced works, which are understood as obeying an economic logic of practice centered on financial profit (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993).

In my discussion, I would like to demonstrate how the above features of the autonomy-of-art ideology – the attributes of authenticity, innovation, social engagement, and ‘genius’ creativity – find expression in the discourse of the field’s critics and creators. (Note, however, that despite my analytic distinction between the various components, some of them overlap in practice.)

Authenticity: realism and social critique

Defining a cultural artifact as authentic, as true and real (Benjamin, 2009), is one of the major ways in which social agents occupying certain positions within a cultural field and struggling over that field’s capital construct the artifact as high-quality, as artistic in nature, and therefore as canonic (Regev, 1994). My findings show that television creators and critics alike consider authenticity essential to a drama series’ artistic status. The claim for authenticity is discernible, for example, in a review of The Bourgeois written by the acclaimed Israeli author Batya Gur and published in the daily Ha’aretz:

The Bourgeois is the finest and most important Israeli television drama series to emerge so far. The restlessness it elicits in its viewers stands in proportion to its credibility as a mirror reflecting our lives.… Its blunt realism often soars to metaphorical levels.… In the [show’s] first episode… Dalia [one of the main female characters] prepares dinner for her friends and family. After she accidently cuts her hand with a knife and her blood pours into the roast, she wins praises from her husband, friends, and father for ‘finally learning to cook like her mother’. A realistic scene thus becomes a metaphor: no longer abstract, a woman’s blood, sweat, and tears become the everyday price Dalia has to pay in order to preserve her marriage with Yoni, a common Israeli macho.… It is at this moment that the drama soars beyond its meticulous realism, using that realism to create a grotesque social satire. It is one of many moments [during the show] in which our reflection in the mirror of reality elicits in us mixed emotions. (Gur, 2000, emphases added)

In an established practice of consecration (Bourdieu, 1993), Gur confers her own artistic fame on the television series. Thus, several other features of the autonomy-of-art ideology are evident in this review, in particular the view of art as authentically mirroring everyday life (Brinker, 1982). Furthermore, Gur’s theoretical remarks about realism’s transformation into metaphor illustrate Sean Baumann’s (2001) claim that intellectualizing the discourse about artifacts of popular culture can help canonize such artifacts as works of art. Gur’s review further establishes the show’s artistic credentials by calling attention to its commentary on controversial social issues (the subservient status of women, Israeli male chauvinism) – another hallmark of genuine works of art according to the autonomy-of-art ideology (Regev, 1994).

The genius creator

Another feature mentioned by the creators I interviewed was the presence of a ‘genius creator’ (Heinich, 1996). Dana Modan, the creator of Love Hurts, described her creative work as stemming from her authentic spirit:

For me, creativity is something divine that flows through you.… Something in my writing is connected to my subconscious.… I start writing consciously on the basis of my everyday life and then I connect to my subconscious.… As I grow more concentrated in my writing I connect to my subconscious and there lies the divine and the most beautiful part of my writing …

In keeping with the classic Kantian stance regarding art (Alexander, 2003), Modan defined her authenticity as something divine. Whether wittingly, or not, she embraces here another aspect of the autonomy-of-art ideology, namely the standpoint of the artistic ‘genius’, the inspired innovator who intuitively serves as a conduit for creative work originating in nature itself or in some supernatural being (Brinker, 1982).

Modan also described her writing process as free of mundane considerations and her motivation and logic of practice as autonomously artistic:

I knew I wanted to do something worthwhile, not just to be on TV.… I wanted to do something of my own.… I’d had opportunities to work on things that weren’t my own, but I passed because I wanted to do my own thing, I wanted to do something worthwhile and explode with it on the screen.… I wanted to express myself. I knew I had a lot of things to say about life and society, and I knew I had some solutions to offer …

Modan presents her ‘genuine’ work as independent of such individualistic-capitalist motivations as fame and fortune. Also, in keeping with the autonomy-of-art ideology, and like Gur in her rave review of The Bourgeois, she feels her work to be part of a social mission and a bearer of social critique (Regev, 1994). As we can see, the characteristics of a ‘quality’ television series, in the discourse about Israeli television, are in accordance with the attributes which fit the ‘restricted’ end of cultural production, according to Bourdieu (1993).

Autonomy above all

The discourse surrounding the highly successful and critically acclaimed In Treatment (the show was purchased by and produced in an English-language version for HBO) underscores the necessity of autonomy in a dramatic way. In a review of the series published in the highbrow Ha’aretz, acclaimed Israeli journalist Gideon Levy, known for his highly controversial left-wing radicalism, writes:

Allow me, for once, to join the chorus and express my delight at the television drama series In Treatment. True, it is the fashionable thing to say, but it is so nice to be able to say it [along with everyone else].… The show’s second season shines even brighter than the first, ever more so with all the nonsense and trash that surrounds it on television, with the empty noise of all the ‘reality’ shows. How lovely it is to sit back and enjoy smart scripts and superb acting. Do we have to remind the television moguls that things can be done differently, so far removed from celebrity culture? That one can succeed without prostituting oneself, without insulting people’s intelligence? That the combination of a smart script and good acting is enough and that one can do without the mumbo-jumbo of ‘ratings’, ‘promos’, and the copywriting discourse? … This is a true contribution to society. This is what real Survivors do: they return with a second season, as good as the first, while in the background the march of folly continues in full force. (Levy, 2008)

Apologizing for saying the culturally ‘fashionable’ thing along with everyone else, as if doing so were in itself a mark of populism, Levy stresses the elements that, for him, make In Treatment an important cultural work. Levy notes the qualities he finds in the series in order to shine a spotlight on the ‘illnesses’ of an Israeli culture ruled by capitalism. Intellectualizing the discourse about the series, Levy stresses the quality of the script and the acting as standing in stark contrast with television’s ascendant ‘reality’ genre. By stressing that the series, now in its second season, is a true ‘Survivor’, Levy, alluding here to the globally popular ‘reality’ show, emphasizes the series’ authenticity and its autonomy from the ‘mumbo jumbo’ of capitalist jargon. The series, he says, does not belong to ‘the march of folly’ of TV ‘trash’.

To use Bourdieu’s terms, Levy distinguishes here between ‘mass’ and ‘restricted’ production within the field of capitalist television production, drawing a distinction between ratings-driven programs, such as reality shows, and quality productions capable of resisting the capitalist logic of profit, such as In Treatment. Levy distinguishes between the ‘entertainment’ provided by shows belonging to the former category and the higher, more ‘artful’ form of television provided by certain drama series. By hailing the latter as veritable works of art which transcend mere entertainment, Levy illustrates here the power of the autonomy-of-art discourse – a discourse which in Bourdieu’s (1993, 1998) view is nonexistent in the field of television production.

Innovation

Another technique of artistic canonization is the labeling of a cultural artifact as aesthetically and creatively innovative (Bourdieu, 1993; Regev, 1994). The analysis of the reviews and articles at hand show that this technique of canonization is evident in the Israeli production field of television drama series.

In a review in Ha’aretz, Rogel Alper, one of the leading television journalists in Israel, wrote about Weekends and Holidays:

Rani Blair’s direction reminds one of a Polaroid shoot. The viewer feels that the characters are presented almost without mediation, like a live broadcast from the bedroom or the living room.… The spectrum of the series is very narrow. Nothing spectacular ever happens. It is almost life itself, the unexceptional lives of several people living in Tel Aviv. Yet, this unexceptional nature, this lack of uniqueness, is itself something unique and new. (Alper, 2000)

The series’ uniqueness, what makes it innovative or ‘new’, is a combination of aesthetic qualities and an exceptional way of telling the unexceptional stories of what Alper views as very real Israelis. In addition to innovation, then, Alper seems to emphasize here the importance of being ‘real’, that is, of authenticity.

A different conception of innovation is evident, however, in an article about In Treatment. ‘The genius of this series’, Rutha Kupfer writes in Ha’aretz, ‘is that it is both genius and commercial’ (Kupfer, 2006). Others have described the series as innovative by virtue of inventing a new format. With its fictional therapy sessions all shot in one location, In Treatment used the format of the so-called ‘telenovela’ – a very cheaply produced genre of romance-based daily television drama series originating in Argentina (Creeber, 2001). Like these ill-reputed shows, In Treatment was very cheap to produce thanks to its single location. Unlike the telenovelas, however, the series could boast complex dramatic developments and sophisticated scripts (Shaked, 2005). In an interview for the financial section of Ha’aretz, Hagai Levi, the series’ creator, said: ‘Of course In Treatment represents an innovation in television production. It is a patent that makes possible very cheap productions at the highest dramatic standards. If this format had been expensive, HBO wouldn’t have bought it …’ (Shargal, 2006).

By combining considerations which are often seen as conflicting – creative innovation on the one hand, financial viability on the other – Levi’s statement implicitly challenges the autonomy-of-art ideology and the Bourdieusian dichotomy between ‘mass’ and ‘restricted’ cultural production (Bourdieu, 1990, 1993). In the next section, I wish to show how the tension between these two ideological logics can be resolved. To do so, the classic Bourdieusian distinction between art and commerce must be reconfigured. Such a reconfiguration would allow us to form a more empirically informed definition of ‘quality television’. My above analysis of the data has focused on the power exerted by the autonomy-of-art ideology and on the binary distinction between ‘quality’ and ‘lower’ forms of television. In the discussion that follows, I try to show how this distinction can be reconfigured through the synthesis of commerce and art.

The art of synthesis: resolving the tension between commerce and art

The format of a daily drama is commercial, first and foremost, but there is no reason it should not also have some quality, and that’s how the idea [for In Treatment] was born.… I told myself that the same [daily drama] format could work with much better texts and ideas.… Television is a world of concepts and I felt that television is, for me, more intimate than film, a place where you can innovate. If there is no innovation, you may as well leave it be.… I come from a place of dialogue and text, and with In Treatment I felt I brought [those elements] to their most refined state.

In the above passage from my interview with Hagai Levi, the creator of In Treatment explicitly blends the logic of commerce with that of autonomous art. Employing the strategy of canonizing television by putting it above an already canonized medium, film (Baumann, 2001), Levi here merges the most intimate, and therefore authentic, expression with the dictates of financial innovation. In Treatment, he believes, has been innovative in turning a commercial television genre like the daily telenovela into a quality one.

As another critically acclaimed television creator, Roni Ninio, stated:

Some people will say that television is purely commercial, but I know how to handle myself in [that medium] … I know where to draw the line before I succumb to the television moguls’ quest for money. I don’t compromise in terms of script or casting. If they try to change my script or force a ‘talent’ on me, if I feel it goes against my inner core, I’ll resign.… As a television director I have both the social responsibility to create art and the financial responsibility to make money for the television franchise.… The moguls call what I create a television product and I call it a work of art, and that’s the difference between us. One has to take note of this difference and think how money and art might work together after all, because I need the capitalists for their investment and they need me for my talent …

Similar sentiments were voiced by Rani Blair, the creator of Weekends and Holidays:

I have a physiological need to tell stories, and I do that in television.… I write from my soul, and I found myself in television because that’s where I got a job after studying film.… Clearly, the financial element is also very important to me. Television is a bit more secure than film, and I’m a human being with children to raise and family responsibilities and I never forget that. But if someone interfered with my dialogues or tried to mess with my scripts, I wouldn’t be there.… That’s where I draw the line.

A cultural industry as thoroughly capitalist as commercial television, the creators quoted above all stress, can be artistic by the standards of the autonomy-of-art ideology – innovation, social responsiveness, and authenticity. In having these features, they all point out, that ‘television of quality’ distinguishes itself from its entirely commercial, profit-driven counterpart. While they accept the need to adhere to the financial logic of the field in order to be able to create, they all stress the superiority of authenticity, which, they admit, is more difficult to maintain in the television field – a difficulty which, according to the myth of the ‘genius’ creator (Heinich, 1996), makes their work all the more significant. Real genius, they imply, expresses itself in the ability to remain authentic within a capitalist field, a feat accomplished either by drawing clear, inviolable lines or by inventing a new format, at once authentic and commercially viable. Inevitably, the discourse of creators and critics alike has engendered a constant synthesis between the opposing sides of the socially constructed antithesis between capitalism and art in a way which resonates in the definition of a ‘quality’ television drama.

Conclusions and discussion

The current study supports Hesmondhalgh’s (2006) view that definitions of artistic quality and commercialism in the field of television production evince less tension than has been suggested by Bourdieu (1990, 1993). In place of the strict dichotomy of autonomous art versus commerce, of ‘mass’ versus ‘restricted’ production (1990, 1993), we find a reformulation of the autonomy-of-art ideology which allows for a synthesis of art and capitalism. The reformulated ideology succeeds in containing within itself a commercial logic of practice, sometimes even as part of its very definition of quality. At the same time, the commercial discourse manages to contain within itself the autonomous logic of practice. As a result, art becomes commerce and commerce becomes art.

My analysis of the case of Israeli television also makes possible a more refined definition of the so-called ‘quality television series’. According to existing academic definitions, the ‘quality television series’ is a unique television genre in which a large and socially diverse cast, complex dramatic narratives, and cinematic aesthetic values are combined with distinct television elements such as the forms and narratives of the ‘soap opera’ (Hilmes, 2003: 99). Relatedly, works of ‘quality television’ have been identified as works of art, though without an account of the precise features responsible for this elevated status (Nelson, 2006). My analysis of the television field in Israel clarifies what those features are in the mind of many critics and creators. For many, programs qualifying as ‘quality television series’ are characterized by authenticity, innovation and social engagement and viewed as the product of a ‘genius creator’. In other words, they are understood as following an autonomous logic of practice.

My findings suggest, however, that the contrast between autonomous art and capitalist commerce is not as stark as many have supposed (Hesmondhalgh, 2006). Their compatibility is evident in the case of innovation: as my analysis of the discourse about In Treatment indicates, aesthetic and economic innovation can be not only compatible but also mutually reinforcing. Similarly, those described as ‘genius creators’ are often capable of producing works of art within the capitalist market and its financial demands, as long as they take certain precautions to keep their work from becoming overly commercial according to their standards.

As a result we may add the concepts of capitalistic innovation and profit to the hereby constructed definition of ‘quality’ television. That is, a ‘quality’ television series has to be authentic; show aesthetic and commercial innovation; produced by a ‘genius’ creator; characterized by social engagement and along with all this has to meet the minimum economic criteria set by the field.

In reaching these conclusions, we must bear in mind that my study has focused on a particular case, that of the Israeli television drama series. To test the validity and reliability of my findings, other fields of television must be examined using the Bourdieusian perspective.

Finally, my findings suggest that current conceptions of artistic quality in television are the result of a capitalist process, one in which economic and aesthetic logics of practice, long thought to conflict with one another, are synthesized discursively. Understanding definitions of artistic quality in this manner may help us usher Bourdieusian theory into the 21st century and continue to use it as the powerful theoretical and methodological tool that it is – in the ‘classic’ fields of art, in popular culture, and in the business world as well, where entrepreneurs such as the late Steve Jobs have long been crowned as ‘geniuses’ (Brackett, 2003; Martin and Osberg, 2007).

Footnotes

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes

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