Roc (TV series)

CTL-E-5460 · Work · other · 1991–1994

PROVISIONAL evidence grade of this record

Roc, created by Stan Daniels and produced by HBO Independent Productions, aired on Fox from August 25, 1991, to May 10, 1994 — three seasons, seventy-two episodes starring Charles S. Dutton as Roc Emerson, a Baltimore sanitation worker whose household absorbed his brother, his father, and the economics of a working-class Black family rendered without sentimentality. Its place in television history is a production feat: the series' entire second season was broadcast live, making it the first prime-time scripted American series since the late 1950s to air a full season live — a feat not repeated until Undateable in 2015. The live format let the writers build same-week events into scripts, including an episode staged around the 1992 presidential election. The pedigree explains the nerve: Roc's four principals were veterans of August Wilson's stage plays, most fresh from The Piano Lesson, and the series carried a theater company's discipline into a sitcom's schedule. The graph files Roc as the Fox bloc's dramatic conscience — the live-wire entry in a decade of taped ones.

The record

• Also known as: Roc

Notes

Statistics: Fox, 1991–1994; 72 episodes; season 2 broadcast entirely live (Wikipedia). Named with the '(TV series)' disambiguator; the graph's text hits for 'Roc' were unrelated. Filed as Work/other: schema v0.2.6 carries no television subtype, and none was invented inside this merge (schema changes are a separate, reviewed step). · Curator's Judgment: DRAFT — for founder review: A whole season performed live, by a cast trained in August Wilson, about a garbageman's household economics: Roc is the shelf's reminder that formal daring and working-class subjects were never opposites. It did the hardest thing on television and made it look like Tuesday. · Photo slot: HELD — poster/key art and production stills for this title are copyrighted studio material and were NOT pulled (per CTL-PHOTO-001 and the wave brief: never force non-free key art); no cleared Commons image was verified for this title in this run. Slot honestly HELD pending a cleared visual.

Sources

• Wikipedia, 'Roc (TV series)' — supports: creator, Fox run (August 25, 1991 – May 10, 1994), 3 seasons / 72 episodes, the fully live second season and its first-since-the-1950s distinction, the August Wilson cast pedigree, and the election episode — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roc_(TV_series)

Record CTL-E-5460 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · evidence grade: PROVISIONAL · 1 source · CTL research: MEDIA-001.
Directory: all entity records · the knowledge graph

Cite this record

Citation guidance for teachers, journalists, and funders: How to Cite Us.

From the Archive

The archive in pictures

The people, places, and institutions this work documents. Photographs from the CultureTechLens research record — rights-cleared, credited, and cited like everything else here.