Bill Cosby, Fred MacMurray, Oedipus Rex

Tommy Kirk and Fred MacMurray

Now, a while back, I posted something about My Three Sons. There was an episode where Fred MacMurray was going to spank Ernie even though he was fourteen. Instead, he took him to a police station and forced him to confess to a crime he wasn't even a suspect in.

Still, MacMurray seemed like a better TV dad than convicted serial rapist Bill Cosby.

Maybe there's something wrong with them in general---with men who want to be known as father figures.

I was reading something about Disney star Tommy Kirk. You know who didn't like Tommy Kirk? Fred MacMurray. Kirk thought MacMurray could tell he was gay. He said:

"I really liked him very much but the feeling wasn't mutual. That hurt me a lot and for a long time I hated him. It's hard not to hate somebody who doesn't like you. I was sort of looking for a father figure and I pushed him too hard. He resented it and I guess I was pretty repellent to him, so we didn't get along. We had a couple of blow ups on set... He was a nice person, but I was just too demanding. I came on too strong because I desperately wanted to be his friend."

On My Three Sons, there really wasn't much chemistry between MacMurray and his sons.  Probably because he was never there. It was in his contract that he barely had to work. They would film all his scenes at one time. When we see the kids speaking to MacMurray, they were addressing a mop or a broom held up by a stagehand.

Oedipal conflict is a two-way street. In the play Oedipus Rex, Oedipus's biological father was clearly the aggressor. 

Look at "Charlie X", the first episode of the old Star Trek series. It seemed to be based loosely of Oedipus Rex. Captain Kirk takes Charlie to teach him Judo. Charlie is smaller than him and is being introduced to Judo for the very first time, but Captain Kirk inexplicably feels it necessary to humiliate him with his superior Judo skills.

And Oedipus's biological father was a rapist a la Bill Cosby.