Every generation has an iconic TV mum of its own. The OG is Leave It to Beaver’s June Cleaver, an archetypal 1950s housewife who was never not wearing pearls. The Brady Bunch’s Carol was a groovy sitcom mum and stepmum – a Seventies update that acknowledged the changing shape of families. Her women-can-have-it-all 1980s successor was Clair Huxtable from The Cosby Show, who juggled five kids and a legal career.
There have been prickly but loving mums (Sophia in The Golden Girls), bad but good mums (Married… With Children’s Peg Bundy), and high-strung but devoted mums (Claire Dunphy from Modern Family). They weren’t idealised but they got the job done with panache. Lorelai Gilmore from Gilmore Girls, which ran from 2000 to 2007, has long been considered a high watermark in the annals of TV mums. She’s so good at being a mum, she’s hardly a mum at all, but a friend. Now, I’d like to formally induct Nikki Newman, from the Apple TV+ sitcom Trying, to the exclusive club of TV mums worth rushing home to.
