Posted on 01/12/2006 1:22:30 PM PST by lunarbicep
SHAFTSBURY— Norman Lear says "All in the Family" remains alive and well - at least in his spirit - after all these years. It was 35 years ago today that Lear's show first aired on CBS. The comedy series featured a character named Archie Bunker, a bigoted, working-class, family man from Queens, N.Y. Bunker constantly squabbled with his family about the important issues of the day.
"It took three years to get it on the air," Lear said of the show in a phone interview Wednesday from his Los Angeles home. "I think about that journey and it was a great journey."
Lear, who also has a house in Shaftsbury, wrote comedy in the 1950s and later teamed up with producer Alan "Bud" Yorkin to create Tandem Productions. That firm produced a pilot for the show. ABC was interested in the idea but ultimately rejected it, so Lear brought "All in the Family" to CBS.
After the series first aired on Jan. 12, 1971, it drew its share of criticism for the themes it explored and the language its characters used. But "All in the Family" won Lear four consecutive Emmy Awards and a Peabody Award in 1977. The show went off the air in 1979.
To commemorate the 35th anniversary, the channel TV Land is running classic episodes from Saturday morning to early Sunday.
Lear, 83, said there are probably only a handful of shows today that come close to the social commentary of the world he created for Bunker, Stivic and the Jeffersons.
And they're all cartoons.
"There's 'South Park' and 'Family Guy' and, oh yes, 'The Simpsons,'" he said with a chuckle. "I wouldn't miss an episode of 'South Park.'"
Lear, who spent Thanksgiving and Columbus Day in Shaftsbury, said he is regularly reminded of his show, usually from his children.
"They're getting to know me better through the show," he said. "I think about it all the time. It's wonderful hearing about it after 35 years,"
While not a big fan of reality television, Lear said that he is convinced society is in the "golden age" of television. He was referring to the plethora of options available at the click of a remote, including the History Channel, the Discovery Channel and the SciFi Channel.
"There are some great shows, of course you have to flip through the channels sometimes," he said.
Lear's television credits include "Maude," "Good Times" and "The Jeffersons." His motion picture credits include "Cold Turkey," "Fried Green Tomatoes," "Stand By Me" and "The Princess Bride."
He is a political and social activist and philanthropist who founded several nonprofit organizations including People for the American Way and the Norman Lear Center.
These days, Lear said he is putting most of his energy into one of his companies, Concord Music Group, Inc., a record label focused on jazz, traditional pop and adult contemporary formats.
In other words,it's one show that I don't watch on TV Land and it's one show that I won't be buying on DVD.
I remember, very early on, being aware that this was a painfully self-conscious show. They tried SO HARD to be earnest and "right" and they would PAUSE so that the audience could laugh and applaud and appreciate just how "correct" they were in their humor.
God I hated that show.
It was the first of a new type of program to demean conservatives and Christians. Archie was always a fool for trying to honor America's past. Edith, as liberal as Archie would allow her to be, was pure of heart. Meathead, and the liberal daughter were always, always, right just as Archie was always wrong.
It was a terrible program and an intergral part of our long cultural slide.
This show gave birth to an era of pretentious, self-important, insufferable trash.
I'm glad we're taking the time here to remember that.
Some family sitcom when Edith got raped.
Don't they mean celebrate the 8 years they had 27 years ago?
Norman Lear's only big successes were weak derivatives of better work done by British writers.
The best episode to illustrate this would have been the one that guest starred Ron Glass as the repairman's helper. Told in a Rashamoon style fashion, first you see Archies version of a militant black man with a switch blade threatening the overly meek and polite Archie. Michaels version is of a beaten down black man at least 50 years out of date who's terrorized by the domineering Archie. Finally, through Edith's eyes you see the real story, which had very little in common with either Archie or Michael's version.
Sucked then; sucks now.
Oddly, I never heard my dad use racist language until All In The Family. Archie Bunker made it fashionable to be a bigot. The son-in-law, hero to liberals everywhere, came off as a raving worthless do-gooder who sponged off his bigot in-laws. A naive bloodsucker that every veteran saw when he looked at the hippies. My dad rather identified with the "every man" in Bunker who fought in WW2 to win the right to rail against the new world.
Wow, thats a long time ago; although most of the comments here appear to not like the show I was only 10, was not into politics, just thought Archie was funny.
The best sitcoms can be transplanted into any time period. That's why Cheers will live forever in reruns. And why Murphy Brown won't.
I can't decide which I hate more . . . "All in the Family" or "Hogan's Heroes."
Archie Bunker was a good man. Carol O'Connor may have been a pinko freak, but Archie Bunker was a good man.
I have always refused to watch that show.
We diagreee, that's baseball. I saw this show as an out and out attack on conservatives, especially the Nixon administration. It made it somehow OK to attack conservatives and Nixon/Agnew (remember him) personally.
Keep in mind that Lear founded People For The American Way.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.