{"id":157197,"date":"2021-01-18T18:32:40","date_gmt":"2021-01-18T15:32:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/norman-lear-sally-struthers-look-back\/"},"modified":"2021-01-18T18:32:40","modified_gmt":"2021-01-18T15:32:40","slug":"norman-lear-sally-struthers-look-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/norman-lear-sally-struthers-look-back\/","title":{"rendered":"#Norman Lear & Sally Struthers look back"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Norman Lear & Sally Struthers look back<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n

In January 1971, \u201cAll in the Family\u201d stormed onto America\u2019s TV screens \u2014 blowing a collective raspberry at network complacency and lobbing\u00a0a grenade into prime time.<\/p>\n

The show\u2019s blustery lead character, Archie Bunker, soon became a rallying point for a politically polarized country turning a mirror on itself through laughter, anger and outrage.<\/p>\n

Television would never be the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t know Archie Bunker, but we felt we did,\u201d series<\/a> creator Norman Lear, 98, told The Post on the show\u2019s 50th anniversary. \u201cHe was so American, but a specific type of American\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.There was an Archie Bunker that lived next door to me, and my father had a little bit of Archie in him \u2014 he would say \u2018Jeanette, stifle!\u2019 to my mother. If you didn\u2019t live with Archie, he was up the street, down the street or across the street.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that he was on television was a surprise \u2014 but it wasn\u2019t like we didn\u2019t know him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CBS sitcom, based on the British TV hit \u201cTill Death Us Do Part,\u201d was originally intended for ABC. Several people, including Jackie Gleason and Mickey Rooney, were considered for the lead role. (Rooney turned it down, saying it was was \u201cun-American.\u201d) Archie Bunker (Carroll O\u2019Connor), dubbed \u201cthe lovable bigot,\u201d was a loading-dock foreman living in a Queens row house with his quavery-voiced \u201cdingbat\u201d wife Edith (Jean Stapleton), adored \u201clittle girl\u201d daughter Gloria (Sally Struthers) and her liberal, hippy-ish husband, college student Mike Stivic (Rob Reiner) \u2014 who Archie referred to as \u201cMeathead.\u201d <\/p>\n

That was tame compared to the shocking ethnic and racial slurs that flew from Archie\u2019s mouth. But the public lapp<\/a>ed it up, and CBS had a huge hit on its hands. \u201cAll in the Family\u201d was TV\u2019s top-rated show for five consecutive seasons, at its height reaching more than 30 million viewers a week in those pre-streaming, three-network days. <\/p>\n

\""All
\u201cAll in The Family\u201d ran for nine seasons from 1971 to 1979.<\/figcaption>
\u00a9CBS\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIt shows you that very little has changed,\u201d Struthers, 73, told The Post. \u201cIf you took a recording of an [\u2018All in the Family\u2019] episode\u2009.\u2009.\u2009. and just heard the audio, especially where there\u2019s a discussion or argument about politics, if the names being shouted by Mike and Archie were removed \u2014 and you inserted the names of politicians today \u2014 all of the arguments still hold up.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sounds silly now, in this day and age of \u2018everything goes\u2019 .\u2009.\u2009. but at that time, a married couple had never slept in the same bed before, a toilet had never been audibly flushed before,\u201d she said, alluding to a particularly memorable scene with Archie. \u201cPeople had never sat at the table in anything but their best clothes and their perfect manners. We broke all the taboos \u2014 they lived like real people and hadn\u2019t been portrayed like that on any television series.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were lower socioeconomic real people living their lives and loving each other and arguing \u2014 and reaching over one another at the table for food.\u201d<\/p>\n

Native New Yorkers O\u2019Connor and Stapleton were 46 and 48 when the series premiered; Reiner and Struthers were both 23. None of them knew how much \u201cAll in the Family\u201d would forever change their lives.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was very young and certainly had no crystal ball \u2014 I had just been let go from \u2018The Tim Conway Comedy Hour\u2019.\u2009.\u2009. when I went to read for [the role of Gloria] for this man named Norman Lear,\u201d said Struthers, who won two Emmys<\/a> for her portrayal. \u201cI had laryngitis, and they handed me a yelling scene to do. I\u2019m sure that\u2019s why he remembered me\u2009.\u2009.\u2009. It was just another job. There was no way to know what it was to become.\u201d<\/p>\n

\""We
\u201cWe didn\u2019t know Archie Bunker, but we felt we did,\u201d series creator Norman Lear, 98, told The Post on the show\u2019s 50th anniversary. <\/figcaption>
\u00a9CBS\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Struthers recalled how John Rich, who directed that first episode, told the cast, as they left rehearsals to head home and watch the premiere, that CBS had staffed its affiliates nationwide with extra operators to take angry phone calls. \u201cHe said, \u2018So please show up tomorrow morning but be prepared for all of us to be out of a job.\u2019 When we came in the next morning, he told us that, yes, the affiliates received more phone calls than they\u2019d ever received before \u2014 but that the majority of [the calls] were gleeful and exciting, with people asking, \u2018What was that?\u2019 \u2018Is it coming back?\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n

America approved. Lear, who had been arguing with CBS about a particular line of dialogue in the premiere, felt vindicated.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe storyline in that first episode was very easy and straightforward because I wanted to show 360 degrees of Archie,\u201d said Lear. \u201cThe Bunkers were returning from church earlier than expected on a Sunday morning. Mike and Gloria weren\u2019t expecting them and were about to make love upstairs. They heard the door open and close, and they came running down, with Mike buttoning his shirt.<\/p>\n

\u201cArchie\u2019s very first line is, \u201911:30 on a Sunday morning?\u2019 The network wanted that line out,\u201d he said. \u201cWhy? Because he\u2019s talking about 11:30 on a Sunday morning and it implants a picture in the audience\u2019s mind. I remember thinking, if the line comes out, I\u2019m going to be in trouble from then on with the silliest things. So that was our first disagreement. I said, \u2018If you don\u2019t play that line, I won\u2019t be in tomorrow.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t until the show went on the air in New York, three hours earlier [than California] and someone from my family called and said that it was [kept] in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Lear and Struthers attributed a big chunk of the show\u2019s on-air magic to O\u2019Connor and Stapleton.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was so in love with Carroll and Jean,\u201d Struthers said. \u201cMy own father died two years before I got \u2018All in the Family\u2019 and Carroll became my dad, off-screen as well as on-screen. He and his wife, Nancy, took me everywhere with them and even introduced me to my husband. Carroll protected me, loved me, social<\/a>ized with me, joked with me. He was a dad to me. And I loved Jean with all my being. She was such an angel.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEdith was somebody we fell in love with immediately. Jean [Stapleton] saw to that,\u201d Lear said. \u201cI must have auditioned 30 guys [to play Archie], and it wasn\u2019t until Carroll O\u2019Connor, who was maybe the 40th audition, sat down with me and read three pages. He wasn\u2019t off the second page before I knew I had Archie, who didn\u2019t become that character until Carroll O\u2019Connor said those words.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine anyone else in that role.\u201d\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Norman Lear & Sally Struthers look back” In January 1971, \u201cAll in the Family\u201d stormed onto America\u2019s TV screens \u2014 blowing a collective raspberry at network complacency and lobbing\u00a0a grenade into prime time. The show\u2019s blustery lead character, Archie Bunker, soon became a rallying point for a politically polarized country turning a mirror on itself…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":157198,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/01\/all-in-the-family-norman-lear.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[89901,89969,2443,71364,89970,69366,74120,89971],"class_list":["post-157197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-1-18-21","tag-carroll-oconnor","tag-cbs","tag-classic-television","tag-jean-stapleton","tag-norman-lear","tag-rob-reiner","tag-sally-struthers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}