Kissing (in General) - Call it locking lips, sucking face or just smooching, the popular practice of kissing manifests itself regularly on Television. Sometimes it just a peck on the cheek, sometimes it a passionate smashing of the lips, and sometimes its a friendly encounter underneath the mistletoe, but whatever and whenever, TV script writers frequently fall back on this age old act to entertain and titillate their viewers. 

A kiss beneath the mistletoe on BONES

The topic of kissing was discussed on the NBC sitcom FRIENDS when Chandler Bing (Matthew Perry) said "Yeah. I think for us, kissing is pretty much an opening act. You know. I mean, it's like the comedian you have to sit through before Pink Floyd comes out. His friend Ross Geller (David Schwinner) interjected "And it's not that we don't like the comedian. It's just that's not why we bought the ticket." Their friend Joey Tribbiani's (Matt LeBlanc) take on kissing was "You don't kiss your friend's mom. Sisters are okay, maybe a hot looking aunt, but not a mom, never a mom!"

Although popular with most TV characters, kissing had its naysayers. On the teenage sitcom THE MANY LOVES OF DOBIE GILLIS, egghead Zelda Gilroy (Sheila James) told Beatnik Maynard G. Krebs (Bob Denver) to "kiss her" or she would "break his neck." Maynard cried "Break my neck. Break my neck!"

And, on the sitcom GILLIGAN'S ISLAND the Professor (Russell Johnson) informed fellow castaway, Ginger Grant (Tina Louise): "Kissing on the mouth is far from sanitary. It can lead to all sorts of bacterial transfer." Ginger responded "You certainly make a kiss sound romantic. Like some sort of germ warfare."

TRIVIA NOTE: In the days of stricter censorship, kissing was sometimes a no-no. On the first episode of the 1960s sci-fi series LOST IN SPACE astrophysicist John Robinson (Guy Williams) gave his wife Maureen Robinson (June Lockhart) a "father/mother kiss" as he placed her in a stasis tube before their long trip into outer space.

Unfortunately, the executives at CBS sent a message down to the program's director to eliminate all kissing between these two characters because such demonstrative show of affection embarrassed the children watching the program. So for the rest of the series, John and Maureen could only look longingly at each other. See also NICKNAMES- "The Most Kissed Man In America"