Set in Westport, Connecticut, Bewitched chronicles the difficulties Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) has negotiating between her supernatural powers and her role as the suburban housewife of advertising executive Darrin Stevens (Dick York, replaced by Dick Sargent after the fifth season). Other major characters include Samantha’s mother, Endora (Agnes Moorehead), who enjoys employing meddling witchcraft to complicate her daughter’s marriage; a suspicious neighbor named Gladys Kravitz (Alice Pearce, later replaced by Sandra Gould); and Darrin’s neurotic boss, Larry Tate (David White). Sporadically, Elizabeth Montgomery would appear as her cousin, Serena, embodied as a “teeny-bopper,” counterculture type, with a knack for free-spirited and manipulative sorcery. Eventually, Samantha and Darrin have a daughter, Tabitha, and a son, Adam, both of whom display witchly powers. (In 1977 ABC attempted a spin-off called Tabitha, in which the now grown witch [Lisa Hartman] worked as assistant producer for a California news program, with Robert Urich as the anchorman. The spin-off failed before season’s end.)

Bewitched’s formula typically involves a disruption created by either Samantha’s or Darrin’s family, or by Darrin’s boss, Larry. Samantha’s responsibility for maintaining family harmony comes into conflict with her vow not to exercise witchcraft. Usually, the resolution does come about through witchcraft, but Samantha’s role as a “good” wife undergoes re-inscription because she has performed her spells for the sake of her family.

Samantha generally exercises her witchcraft by twitching her nose and mouth (known at the time of the show as the “witch twitch”), or by casting verbal spells. Either method may result in making objects and people disappear or appear; or Samantha may grant unearthly powers to herself or others, or turn herself or others into various kinds of animals. Samantha constantly subordinates her supernatural powers at the request of her husband—he is particularly adamant that she not cheat her domestic duties. Samantha could easily have the entire house cleaned and dinner on the table with a single “witch twitch” but, for Darrin’s sake, she chooses to perform the labor of housework herself.

At the same time, Samantha takes a keen interest in Darrin’s job and gets him out of many a campaign jam with her “imagination” and “intuition”—sometimes attributed to her witchcraft, sometimes not. She often saves Darrin’s job by producing sales concepts on the spot for his clients, sometimes even going to the extent of turning his clients into animals to prove a point or buy him time. Her mastery in this area includes shoring up Darrin’s ego and making him feel that it is his ideas that saves the day. In this way, Bewitched addressed a host of pressing concerns for mid-1960s middle-class American culture, such as anxieties about women’s place in the public and private spheres and general mistrust between the sexes: What is the appropriate woman’s role? How should a woman exercise her own agency to the best of her abilities? What do we do with female power, since it has been relegated to a place outside of culture for so long? Toward the end of the run of Bewitched, Samantha often traveled to far away places and times or interacted with historical figures, somewhat displacing the centrality of the home and middle-class suburban life.

Notably, Elizabeth Montgomery’s real-life husband was William Asher, the director of the series (who also directed I Love Lucy, The Danny Thomas Show, and The Patty Duke Show). Asher and Montgomery owned a percentage of profits of Bewitched as well as a percentage of the merchandising rights, which involved the conception of a Samantha doll, jewelry, cosmetics, and a Bewitched ice cream flavor. The couple’s first child was born three weeks before the production of the first episode, leading much of the popular press at the time to refer to the initiation of the show as a “birthing process.”

That series premier remains one of Bewitched’s most memorable episodes in many ways. When Samantha reveals to Darrin that she is a witch, he seeks the advice of others (best friend, doctor, bartender), each of whom refuses to take him seriously. So he returns home, resolving, “So my wife’s a witch. Every married man has to make some adjustments.” His conclusion rings true and continues to define much of the series—marriage may not be what it appears on the surface, and the commitment to marriage and family, certainly for late 20th-century Americans, meant confronting male fears about women’s sexuality and otherness, women’s power, and the changing social and cultural significance of domestic institutions.