Road to Reality

1 9 6 0 – 1 9 6 1 (USA)
72 x 30 minute episodes

Road to Reality was an ABC daytime soap opera anthology revolving around the problems besetting five or six people in fictional group therapy sessions.

Using tapes made by a New York psychoanalyst with his patients’ consent as the basis for scripts, the show aired Monday through Friday and presented such characters as marriage-phobic Vic (Robert Drew), frigid yet desperate-for-love Joan (Judith Braun), perfectionist Harry (Salem Ludwig), and unhappily married mother Margaret (Eugenia Rawls) discussing their neuroses with Dr Lewis (John Beal) and each other.

Later additions were Lee (James Dimitri), an occasionally nasty man who hated his mother, and Chris (Kay Doubleday), who had problems with “acting a way a woman should act.” At least one group member, Rosalind (Robin Howard), overcame her fear of her father and left the group before the end of the show’s run.

Dr Edward Ziman, president of the Association of Medical Group Psychoanalysts, wrote in TV Guide that his organisation endorsed the series because it “comes as close as possible to the portrayal of actual case histories as well as response to treatment” by psychoanalysts.

Some psychiatric training centres even asked for copies of the show’s scripts to use in teaching group psychoanalysis.

In fact, the show – taped in New York City – had everything except viewers. The housewives were busy watching Art Linkletter’s House Party and re-runs of The Loretta Young Show on rival networks.

The show folded on 31 March 1961.

Dr Lewis
John Beal
Joan
Judith Braun
Vic
Robert Drew
Harry
Salem Ludwig
Margaret
Eugenia Rawls
Lee
James Dimitri
Chris
Kay Doubleday
Rosalind
Robin Howard