One of the most popular and critically acclaimed television (see entry under 1940s—TV and Radio in volume 3) dramas of the 1990s was ER. The show depicted the medical traumas faced by the doctors and nurses of an inner-city Chicago, Illinois, hospital emergency room. The series, created by author Michael Crichton (1942–), debuted in 1994 and was more quickly paced and realistic than previous medical programs. Author Steven Stark, in Glued to the Set, discusses ER's mass appeal: "It brilliantly took a number of trends in programming—the push to realism, the focus on dysfunction, and the emphasis on shorter segments—and combined them to create a synthesis of an early-evening 'reality' show, a daytime talk fest, and Hill Street Blues." The program dominated the ratings. In 1998, it became the most highly compensated show in TV history when NBC agreed to pay $13 million per episode.

Before he was the...