Golden Ages are relative. The problem with remembering the mid-Century period as a time when things were better is to ignore that they were also a period in which women, people of color, and queer people were oppressed in ways that were (to varying degrees) objectively worse than they are now. We also have a much more sophisticated understanding of mental health and pharmaceuticals today than we did even when I was growing up, and the mixture of cheap travel and the internet means that we are more engaged with global cultures (at least within our urban enclaves) than seems to have been the norm in the very ra-ra American days of 1950.
As a gay non-binary person with anxiety-depression married to a non-binary foreign national of color, I'm incredibly happy to be alive now, rather than 50 years ago.
And also, I think our theater is pretty good. Yes, there are some absolute classics from the Golden Age that still hold up today, but there are also many shows that get bandied around as Golden Age marvels that I don't think hold up so well once we extract the nostalgia factor. Meanwhile, there is of course lousy stuff being made today, but there are also marvels of the form that I think will continue to be watched 50 or even 100 years from now - including a jukebox show or two. |
