All In the Family :"Oh Archie!!! We're 35!!!"

[Borderstone]

"Boy the way Glenn Miller played,songs that made the hit parade"....

It may not be easy to believe...even i can't believe it but it's true. On January 12th (3 days ago now) 1971,"All In the Family made it's debut!

Now I may have been 2 years and 7 months when it started but around '75-'76,I caught up quite well watching until it ran out of steam in '83 (as "Archie Bunker's Place" by then. Over 300 shows & didn't even have a finale!

I'm sure a lot of us here watched the show ove the years,on CBS and in re-runs. In fact most of today on TV Land is dedicated to the show.
Among the classic episodes I rememebr best are,Archie getting trapped in the cellar (and getting drunk)only to be saved by a black handyman he thinks is God. :D

There's the well remembered Sammy Davis Jr. episode where Sammy gets the better of Archie (but then..who couldn't?) Okay,now my brain has decided to nt help me at the moment for comedy so I'll talk about the flipside.

The most serious of moments that I never forgot,Edith's friend Beverly LaSalle getting killed by street thugs for being "different",which causes Edith to have crises of faith.

2/9/1971 : Archie making fun of a friend of Mike's for being queer because he's "too" nice. Only to find out a good buddy of his at Kelsey's (a tall bear of a guy)is actually gay. (Pretty shocking for only the fifth episode and... for 1971,the first time that subject was ever discussed in a sitcom.)

Archie buys Kelsey's bar but is in over his head and ends up dependent on drugs to keep going.

Gloria's (well acted and very real looking) birthing episode when she has baby Joey.

Mike realizing Arche rides him out of jealousy because Archie will never get the chances he's gotten.

When Mike & Gloria left for California. Tearful good-byes.

Edith pasess away (between seasons thankfully.)

Mostly,I'll never forget the almost too real episode where Edith "almost" gets raped in her own home by a stranger posing as a plain-clothes policeman. That actor is long gone but his performance is very scary.
I really do applaud each time though when Edith shoves the burning cake from the oven into the man's face,hits him in the gut and shoves him out of the back door! The audience legitimatly goes nuts and cheers and applauds her as she makes a mad dash for the front door to escape to Mike & Gloria's. (Jean Stapleton won an Emmy for that one,and deservedly so! )

What do you remember most about the show? I'd love to read it!

Archie:"If God had meant for whit's to dance with coloreds then....
Mike:Then he'd have given us rhythm too. LOL! :D

[ January 15, 2006, 16:04: Message edited by: Borderstone ]

[DJ in MJ]

All of the above, thank you, plus when Edith died. Help me out here, it's a bit sketchy in my old head. Archie was his usual abrasive self throughout the show till all her stuff was taken away, and then he found the slipper. I *think* that was the scene, but I will never forget the ending closeup on his face that showed the true pain and loss.

One of the best shows ever on tv.

[Auburn Annie]

"Shoe bootie" episode with Mike and Arhcie locked in the cellar which went a long way to explaining why Archie was the way he was. I found a summary elsewhere:

Maybe the most memorable episode was the one where he got accidentally locked in the bar storeroom with Meathead Mike, and they both got drunk and he began telling that poignant story about how when he was a kid he was so poor he had to go to school wearing one boot and one shoe, and the other kids called him "Shoe-bootie." And how Mike began to see the roots
of his bigotry...how he'd learned it at his father's knee...he didn't think think his father who loved him could ever be wrong, so when he
called people of other races names, Archie thought it was OK.

[Borderstone]

Don't forget Annie,he also said his father would lock him in a closet "to teach him to do good". (For some stupid reason,some people in the audience laugh at that! )

I love that episode too,because I feel it takes Mike & Archie's relationship full circle. From the time Archie met him as a long haired "hippie" (for lack of a better term),to a college graduate who (until later) is a good husband and on his way to big endeavors. Even Archie (though he may not have said it) understands Mike better.

That's what makes Mike & Gloria's departure even more dramatic. They've all gone throug so much in the last deacade (from 1968 when M. & G. dated & then married) and now they'll be 3000 miles apart. It's just my opinion but when i watch the fade out on Archie & Edith,I just think,"They should have stopped there".

David,yes,you remembered right. That's the 1st show of season 2 on "Archie Bunker's Place". In the first season Edith was rarely seen.
Then Jean quit the show because she felt there was nothing left to do with her character (she was right.) Scary as it was,the "attempted" rape episode was the pinnacle of her acting on the show.O'Conner played the loss of Edith well,for the love of Archie's life was gone. Near the end of the series though,Archie starts dating again.

Like I said above,there was no "final" episode. In fact the last show was so far from the original series,it wasn't even about Archie.
It was about his neice Billie and her on/off feelings about a man she's dating (his fewelings too. In fact the episode is called,"I'm Torn Here".

It was May of '83,almost 13 years since the show taped it's first episode. It's time was up. (Evidenced greatly by the failure of it's spin-off "Gloria" (she and Mike had divorced due to Mike going to live on a commune with his "girlfriend"..he even invites Gloria to join them! ) She worked in an upstate NY vetrenarian hospital.

[Auburn Annie]

For some reason Carroll O'Connor always reminded me physically of my father; I think it was some of the faces he made. My dad had his foibles in the bigotry department (nothing as extreme as Archie but he was a product of his times) but something in the eyes was the same; it really got weird when he played a police chief on the TV version of "In the Heat of the Night," as my dad was the police chief in our city.

[Jim Nasium]

Archie Bunker was the American version of Alf Garnett from Till Death Do Us Part A seminal 60's sitcom. Alf Garnett very quickly became an English icon. He referred to his son-in-law, Mike, as a Randy Scouse Git at around that time The Monkees where riding high in the charts, and Mickey Dolenz wrote a song which he wanted to call Randy Scouse Git the record company would not allow it. It was released as Alternate Title. Just a useless piece of trivia you may or may not find interesting.

Randy Scouse Git (Alternate Title)
The Monkees By Micky Dolenz

She's a wonderful lady
And she's mine all mine
And there doesn't seem a way
That she won't come and lose my mind.
It's too easy humming songs
To a girl in yellow dress
It's been a long time since the party
And the room is in a mess.

The four kings of E.M.I.
Are sitting stately on the floor
There are birds out on the sidewalk
And a valet at the door.
He reminds me of a penguin
With few and plastered hair,
There's talcum powder on the letter
And the birthday boy is there.

Why don't you cut your hair?
Why don't you live up there?
Why don't you do what I do,
See what I feel when I care?

Now they've darkened all the windows
And the seats are naugh-a-hyde.
I've been waiting for an hour,
I can't find a place to hide.
The being known as Wonder Girl
Is speaking I believe.
It's not easy tryin' to tell her
That I shortly have to leave.

Why don't you be like me?
Why don't you stop and see?
Why don't you hate who I hate,
Kill who I kill to be free.

Why don't you cut your hair?
Why don't you live up there?
Why don't you do what I do,
See what I feel when I care?
Why don't you be like me?
Why don't you stop and see?
Why don't you hate who I hate,
Kill who I kill to be free.

[BILLW]

Hey Jim,

I always liked that song Randy Scouse Git . What does that translate to in American English ?

Bill

[Borderstone]

Very interesting trivia! I'd also always wondered what the cast of the Brit. version looked like.

Speaking of recordings,in the past 3 years I've acquired 3 things related to the show. The "All In The Family" album (which actually was certified Gold in sales!) The Carroll O'Conner solo LP and a "very scratchy" Columbia Records 45rpm of the closing theme,"Remembering You".

That would be O'Conner doing a vocal version of it I should say. :

"It's all over now,it's all over now we're through."

"..and tomorrow I can start in..remembering you". (etc.)

Just months after I bought that 45rpm,O'Conner was gone.

[Jim Nasium]

Bill, good question,

Randy = man whose appendage starts twitching whenever he sees a female.

Scouse = a native of Liverpool, The Beatles were Scousers. Those living still are.

Git = Motherf****r, or an appropiate word, (punk, sod etc)

Just another piece of trivia, the guy in the picture in the blue shirt is an actor, Tony Booth, he is our Prime Minister's (Tony Blair's) son-in-law ie Cherie Blair's father, it is a small world.

[BILLW]

Thanks Jim. I like the song even more now and I can understand why they called it 'alternate title', LOL.

Bill

[Borderstone]

Hey,big coincidence time!

Let's all wish a Happy 73rd birthday to our very own Edith Bunker.. Jean Stapleton.

That means Jean was 47 when the show began taping in '70...wow!

Happy Birthday Jean and many more. Thank you for the humor and earthiness of Edith as well,I know a lot of women out there thank you as well.

[Borderstone]

David Dukes,that's right. Thanks Misty. Y'know he was recently a recurring character on "7th Heaven" a few seasons ago. I don't watch the show but I did know that from IMDb.

[Borderstone]

Just coming bakc to this topic to mark an anniversary for the show.

Sometime this summer,in 1970,"All In The Family" began production of its pilot show.

[timetraveler]

One episode that I remember in particular was one where Mike & Gloria raise hell with Archie because he gave little Joey a toy gun for his birthday. Another one was where Archie had no clue that one of his best friends was Jewish, until he went to the mans funeral. There were many other classic, thought provoking episodes out there.

[Shutup and Deal, I'm Losin']

They still show this show every afternoon (followed by Sanford & Son :D )

I've heard the actor that played Archie Bunker (I've forgotten his name) was a super nice guy in real life. (Unlike Red Foxx).

[timetraveler]

Yeh, I'd heard the same about Carrol O'Connor. What had me broken hearted was when his son, who was with him on In The Heat Of The Night for a while, died. I could feel & understand the rage he felt because he held a certain drug dealer responsible for his sons death. And while I'm thinking of ITHOTN, he did well in the part that Rod Steiger played in the original film.

[Borderstone]

You should also check out mr. O'Conner in "For The Love Of Ivy" (with Sidney Poitier) and in Kelly's Heroes (with Clint Eastwood).

If you want to see his full resume' , check it out at IMDB. Just google search with those letters and it takes you right to the site. The use their serch box. Just type in Caroll O'Conner or even All In The Family.

[Jesse Joe]

"Mike Meets Archie"

YouTube- ‪All In The Family - Flashback :...

[Borderstone]

It's funny,when I was younger and watching re-runs,I always thought that was the first episode.

Nothing like Archie ending the arguement with "God Bless America" . LOL!

[Borderstone]

In memory of Jean Stapleton,I'm bring this topci from 2006 back up to the top.

The series in now 42 years old. Jean passes on that many years and 4 months after.

Can any of you post some her most funny moments from the show? I'd appreciate it. As a tribute to her.

[Jim Nasium]

Very interesting trivia! I'd also always wondered what the cast of the Brit. version looked like. For you Borderstone:

Jesus was English! (according to Alf Garnett) -...

The Brit cast of "Till Death Do Us Past"