Rox: Американская телесерия и контркультура

American television program

Rox is an American independently produced television and subsequently web series, noted for its political activism as well as for its aesthetic and technical achievements. First shown on public access cable TV in Bloomington, Indiana, the series expanded to multiple cable systems before becoming the first television series distributed on the internet in April 1995. Though an underground production with virtually no budget, the show has generated significant controversy and garnered major media coverage, as well as scholarly attention, especially during its earliest years.

In the fall of 1989, Bart Everson was arrested for public indecency (streaking) and assigned to community service at Community Access Television Services (then Bloomington Community Access Television) in Bloomington, Indiana. It was here that Everson learned how to produce videos for local cablecast, which a number of writers have suggested was key to the development of the series. Rox premiered (under the title J&B on the ROX) on CATS on July 7, 1992. Originally conceived as a "mixed drink cooking show," and an example of "the real impact of the digital revolution in pop culture." Everson and Nickell ceased production in 1995, citing financial difficulties, but distribution continued to expand. The producers signed several contracts with Free Speech TV, allowing for distribution via satellite on Dish Network. In the early days of Free Speech TV, this was "the network's most popular show." Nickell moved to Montana; Everson relocated to New Orleans, but after an eight year hiatus, they resumed production with their 87th episode.

Over the course of four seasons and almost a hundred episodes, Rox has covered a wide variety of topics, from the banal task of defrosting a freezer to broader social issues such as poverty and marijuana legalization. The program never uses scripts, employing a reality based technique of capturing video on the fly, improvising performances, and assembling a narrative after the fact. One early report described the show as "an offbeat look at art, life, culture, society, and whatever else the two hosts feel like looking at. The basic premise is that of teaching the viewers how to mix a variety of drinks." However, over the long term, the true subject of the series has proven to be the lives of the producers and their community. This broad approach was reflected when the name of the show was shortened from J&B on the Rox to simply Rox. "We took J&B out of the name of the show because the show's not really about the two of us, it's about the community," Nickell said in an interview at the time. "We call it reality based because it's based on people's lives." Many have branded the show as a form of countercultural identity production, with various commentators labeling it as "a good depiction of the slacker lifestyle in Bloomington of the early '90s", "equal parts slacker diary, societal satire and improvisational theater", "transform[ing] the bleakest realities of everyday Bloomington, IN, life into 30 minutes of social satire and bohemian adventure." The show's "early ’90s, grunge aesthetic" is reflected in the "blatantly amateur" The three episodes involved coprophagia, simulated masturbation, and a close up shot of male genitalia; none were cablecast in their entirety, and were shown only in censored form. Episode 5, "Rum & Coke Special," featured a segment titled "Coprophagia Corner," in which the hosts displayed a photo, downloaded from the internet, which "depicted a woman defecating into a man's mouth." Pack found the library's review procedures to be unclear and decried the "policy void" as "unacceptable, and perhaps even unconstitutional." in part because of these disputes. Another side effect to these clashes was to galvanize the producers. When two of the episodes were held back for review, Everson and Nickell chose to run a looping message in their place, which asked viewers to write in. "Our mailbox was stuffed for the next few weeks," Everson wrote twenty years after the fact. "Suddenly we became aware that we had an audience."

In April 1994, episode 59 generated the show's biggest controversy to date, when the hosts smoked marijuana in front of the Monroe County Courthouse, as a way of dramatizing the argument for legalization. (Marijuana was illegal everywhere in the United States at the time.) The story was covered by all three network affiliates in Indianapolis (the nearest large market) with clips from Rox landing on The Howard Stern Show and, eventually, in MTV's documentary, Straight Dope: An MTV News Special Report on Drugs. "Local response was mostly positive," however not everyone was impressed. The Indiana Governor's Commission for a Drug Free Indiana attempted to shut the show down, with executive director Joseph E. Mills III accusing the producers of "the overt promotion of anarchy."

Undeterred, Rox responded with episode 64, "The Overt Promotion of Anarchy," which reveled in the designation, explored the political philosophy of anarchism, documented police brutality at a Critical Mass bicycle ride, and provided explicit instructions on how to construct a "red box" for circumventing payphone fees on long distance calls. This segment generated some attention from Indianapolis television news and newspapers.