During a typically tense scene around the dinner table on last week's "Brothers and Sisters," any awkward pauses were filled by refilling wine glasses.
"Anybody want more wine?" offered sister Sarah (Rachel Griffiths) when things got particularly painful. She was met with a unanimous chorus of "Yes!"
"Bring two bottles," recommended matriarch Nora (Sally Field).
The upper-middle-class Walker family has a great number of problems: infidelity, deception, illegal business practices ...
When things are bad, they drown their sorrows. When things are good, they toast their good fortune.
The youngest son, Justin (Dave Annable), returned from Iraq with drug and alcohol problems. He worked hard to get sober -- but is a saint not to drink with this group.
It doesn't help that the family owns a winery. Or that so many of them are actually more likable when they have been imbibing.
We have to ask: Is ABC's "Brothers and Sisters" the drinkingest show on TV?
If so, it has a lot to answer for. A new study from Radboud University in the Netherlands linked drinking in entertainment with drinking in real life. Two groups of 20 male students watched movies in close proximity to a refrigerator filled with soft drinks and alcohol. The group that watched the film "American Pie" -- which featured 23 alcoholic scenes, not to mention alcohol ads in between -- had three beers on average. The group watching the dryer "40 Days and 40 Nights" drank on average 1.5 beers. Two more groups watched the movies without advertising.
Rutger Engels, the lead researcher, concluded: "Our study clearly shows that alcohol portrayals in films and advertisements not only affects people's attitudes and norms on drinking in society, but it might work as a cue that affects craving and subsequent drinking."
SeaSide Palm Beach is a Florida luxury addiction treatment center that caters to families like the Walkers. Lately, they've seen a spike in patients from the world of finance. But TV doesn't help, either, they say.
"If TV shows are going to show people drinking, they should get real," said Dr. Michael Weiner, the center's CEO and clinical director. "No one is passed out on the bar, throwing up in the bathroom, making a complete jerk of themselves or driving home drunk. Whenever alcohol use is shown on TV, there's nothing accidental about how it's displayed -- the people drinking are usually very attractive, well dressed, articulate and sophisticated, and they're drinking from fine glassware and wearing expensive jewelry." There are usually minimal consequences, if any.
When it comes to drinking, "Brothers and Sisters" has plenty of competition. Some of the wetter shows out there:
• • "Three Sheets," the cult hit travel show about mastering local drinking customs, which used to air on MOJO HD and is rumored to be coming back elsewhere.
• • "Mad Men" on AMC revives a business culture where every office had a personal bar.
• • "Damages" with Glenn Close on FX would be a good fit on an "All Scotch, All the Time" channel.
• • "Days of Our Lives" features constant drinking, even though it's aired on NBC during the day.
• • "How I Met Your Mother" on CBS raises the question, Is it even possible to find love without alcohol?
• • "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" on FX is set in a bar.
• • HBO's "The Sopranos" inspired a new line of wines. Its makers say, "The Sopranos Wines are an unprecedented testimonial to the enduring legacy of this celebrated series and its reflection of wine's time-honored place in Italian family tradition."
• • "Gossip Girl" on the CW shows rampant underage drinking at New York's hippest establishments. Ashley Dos Santos, a pop culture and tween social marketer for Crosby-Volmer, thinks that "Gossip Girl" has an even greater impact and potential for irresponsibility than "Brothers and Sisters," since it targets such a young demographic.
"However, 'Gossip Girl' is written in such a way that it leans heavily toward educational much more so than irresponsible," she says. "Nearly every time one of the main characters drinks, it's either during a negative situation made worse by drinking or becomes a negative situation where the character has to reap the consequences of his/her wayward behavior. While glamorizing the Upper East Side lifestyle, the main message is that when you drink and/or do drugs, you will have to pay the price." For "it" girl Serena (Blake Lively), that means accidentally getting married in Spain.
On "Brothers and Sisters," says Dos Santos, the adult audience is watching adult characters who ultimately take responsibility for their own behavior. Drinking is a big part of the show, but it's done correctly, she says.
Dr. Lane Neubauer, Associate Dean of Students for Counseling and Health services at La Salle University in Philadelphia, disagrees. "My gut tells me that, yes, TV influences what individuals consider 'normal' and 'acceptable,'" he says. Then again, he says, "I think TV also influences behavior around sexuality, body image, sexual decision-making, gender-related behavior," and so on.
From a producer's point of view, the presence of alcohol on a program isn't necessarily about decadence. Bill Kelly, who hosts "Upscale TV" on WWME-Channel 23 and hosts and produces "William Kelly's Sportsaholic" on Comcast SportsNet, considers himself one of the drinkingest men on TV. "All true comedy has to be based on people's real experiences," he says. "The great comedians and entertainers -- from Red Skelton to Dean Martin and Jackie Gleason -- focused on and explored vices, and alcohol in particular. That's how they connected with people. But over the last few decades, the censors have increasingly tried to erode what we can show and say on TV. It's gotten worse, not better."
Maybe we're overthinking it, says cultural critic Paul Levinson, professor of communication and media studies at Fordham University. Today's controversy about alcohol on TV isn't so different from the situation in the '40s, he says, when it was thought that kissing in movies encouraged teenagers to kiss. "The truth then, and now, is that teens do not need the movies to make them want to kiss," says Levinson.
"Peer groups are the main influence," he says. "The bottom line is that one word from a real person is worth more than a thousand images on the screen."