Line #15 Trivia/AllInTheFamily


1	* FakeNationality:
2	** Creator/CarrollOConnor, an Irish American, is portraying Archie Bunker, of Anglo-Saxon/English heritage.
3	** Polish-American Mike is played by Creator/RobReiner, a man of Austrian- and Romanian-Jewish descent.
4	* FollowTheLeader: American television spent most of TheSeventies making sitcoms dealing with controversial subjects, and adapting landmark British sitcoms to an American setting, and this series kicked off both trends (with creator Creator/NormanLear producing many of the follow-ups as well).
5	* IAmNotSpock:
6	** Try to imagine Creator/JeanStapleton as anybody other than Edith Bunker. Just try it. (She could have avoided this fate if she had accepted the lead role on ''Series/MurderSheWrote'' - she was the producers' first choice - but she bizarrely declined and forced them to go with Creator/AngelaLansbury instead).
7	** Oddly enough, the only one out of the core foursome to fully escape this was Creator/SallyStruthers, who put on quite a bit of weight, and then became widely known and ridiculed for those commercials shilling correspondence diplomas ([[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RKQRVn4NAs you know the ones]]) and later, {{narm}}-laden appeals for children-oriented charities.
8	** Even Creator/RobReiner, who became a successful director, has often said that if he were to win the Nobel Prize, all the headlines would read "MEATHEAD WINS NOBEL PRIZE". It was a double trumping as he was first known mostly as Creator/CarlReiner's son.
9	** Somewhat averted with Creator/CarrollOConnor, thanks to the TV version of ''Series/InTheHeatOfTheNight''. That said, Gillespie is essentially a more intelligent Archie with a different accent - his basic character arc (bigot who gradually becomes more accepting of others) is identical to Archie's.
10	* IronyAsSheIsCast: Unlike the highly conservative Archie Bunker, Creator/CarrollOConnor was an outspoken liberal.
11	* MissingEpisode: Several, though none were "episodes" in the traditional sense of the word.
12	** Both the first and second pilot never aired, as the roles were re-cast and the sets rebuilt. All three pilots, including the aired "Meet the Bunkers", use largely the same script.
13	** In 1975, in response to the FCC instituting the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Viewing_Hour Family Viewing Hour]] (similar to the {{Watershed}} in most other countries), the cast performed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oypjEhAdzsA a sketch]] showing what ''All in the Family'' would be like (as the show aired at 8:00 - it was moved to 9:00 in the following season specifically to avoid having to lighten its tone or content). The sketch is notable as the first example of the many "''All in the Family'' could never work today" parody sketches that have been made over the years - but as performed by ''the actual cast''. This was followed by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvrIltxWnS0 a reworking of the iconic theme tune]] called "These ''Are'' The Days". This sketch was never aired, though it was performed before the live studio audience (presumably as a warmup for a taping of a real episode).
14	* PostScriptSeason: The show wrapped up its eighth season with Mike, Gloria, and Joey moving to California. Creator/RobReiner and Sally Struthers had announced they were leaving the show, and producer Creator/NormanLear couldn't imagine continuing it without them, so having the Stivics say goodbye to Archie and Edith was conceived as a perfect TearJerker ending to the show... until CBS executives offered Carroll O'Connor [[MoneyDearBoy $100,000 an episode]] to come back as Archie, and he agreed. Not only did the show continue for a ninth season (without Reiner, Struthers, or Lear), it got an AfterShow in ''Series/ArchieBunkersPlace''.
15	* RealitySubtext: Years after the series ended, Creator/SallyStruthers revealed that Creator/CarrollOConnor became something of a father figure to her (Struthers' own father had passed away several years before), mirroring how their respective characters were a young woman and her father.
16	* RealLifeWritesTheHairstyle: Creator/RobReiner actually wore a wig for most of his run as Mike due to his baldness advancing quickly.
17	* SeparatedAtBirthCasting: By all reports, what sealed the casting of Sally Struthers for the role of Gloria (over stronger, more assertive actresses like Penny Marshall) was her resemblance to Carroll O'Connor.
18	* TechnologyMarchesOn: While it would certainly still be sad, Mike and Gloria's move to California would have been a lot easier on the Bunkers in today's age of free long-distance calling, text messaging, social networking, and video calling services like Skype and Zoom. Could also work as a bit of Fridge Sadness for young viewers when they stop and think how hard it really must have been on the Bunkers for the kids to move across the country without all of today's technology to help them stay in touch more easily.
19	* WagTheDirector: From the very first, Creator/NormanLear and Creator/CarrollOConnor were at loggerheads about the show's content, themes, and its depiction of Archie Bunker. O'Connor became known for throwing tantrums and demanding script rewrites, often doing them himself on his own initiative, going all the way back to the ''pilot''. In general, Lear, who was a "limousine liberal" (and who based Archie, in part, on his own father, along with the ''far'' less sympathetic [[Series/TillDeathUsDoPart Alf Garnett]]) saw Archie as a malignant, malevolent reactionary force that was holding America back from embracing the modern, progressive ideals supported by the younger generation. O'Connor, on the other hand, was an old-school socialist who saw the American working class as victims of the moneyed elites and the political establishment. Accordingly, he depicted Archie's backwardness and ignorance as the product of a deprived upbringing, and played him as more complex and sympathetic (while still clearly in the wrong) far more than Lear would have liked. (Lear eventually saw an opening in skewering his own side's hypocrisies in ''Series/{{Maude}}'', whose main character was based on his then-wife.)
20	* WhatCouldHaveBeen:
21	** The pilot episode, "Meet the Bunkers", was actually the ''third'' pilot produced (becoming the first show with three separate pilots - a few years earlier, ''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Star Trek]]'' had been the first with two). In both pilots prior to the one that was greenlit (both starring O'Connor and Stapleton), Michael was an Irish-American named Dickie and the Bunkers' last name was Justice. The first pilot, produced in 1968 for Creator/{{ABC}}, not CBS, was entitled "[[PunBasedTitle Justice for All]]" and was actually filmed in New York; the second pilot, filmed in Hollywood in 1969, was called "Those Were the Days". ABC turned the project down out of fear over what happened regarding the infamous sketch comedy ''Series/TurnOn''. "Dickie" and Gloria were recast twice; the same actor (Creator/DUrvilleMartin) played Lionel in both original pilots but was replaced for the final 1970 pilot.
22	** Creator/HarlanEllison wrote that he saw the filming of the pilot for the show then called ''Those Were The Days'' and planned for ABC, and it included the famous scene where Archie explains that "God damn it" isn't really swearing.[[note]]That did get used in the show, in "We're Having A Heatwave", after Michael's beautiful "WATERGATEWATERGATEWATERGATE" moment.[[/note]] Ellison said the show had "rare good humor and extraordinarily good taste.", was "adult, funny and presumptuous", and "would have made a dynamite series." When Lear asked the audience for comments, Ellison asked him if, given what happened with ABC's ''Turn-On'', Lear really thought ABC would go for it. Lear was sure they would, and of course they didn't, and Ellison wrote his ''Glass Teat'' column for that week shaking his head regretfully over Lear's "belief in Santa Claus".
23	** Two famous casting tidbits: Creator/MickeyRooney was the first choice to play Archie, and Creator/HarrisonFord was actually cast as "Dickie", but both backed out because they found the playing of Archie's bigotry for humor to be too offensive.
24	** Before Creator/NormanLear secured the rights to a TransatlanticEquivalent of ''Till Death Us Do Part'', Creator/{{CBS}} also made a bid for them, thinking it would be a great vehicle for Creator/JackieGleason, who the network had under contract. Carroll O'Connor was a fan of Gleason, and by his own admission incorporated a lot of [[Series/TheHoneymooners Ralph Kramden]] into Archie Bunker.
25	** Creator/JackWarden was also considered for Archie.
26	** Long before she became [[Series/LaverneAndShirley Laverne]], Creator/PennyMarshall was up for the role of Gloria. Had she gotten it, she could have worked alongside [[RealLifeRelative then-husband]] Creator/RobReiner.
27	** Carroll O'Connor was absent from several episodes during the show's fifth season as a result of protracted contract disputes with the producers. This was explained within the show as Archie having gone missing while attending a convention. If O'Connor and the producers had failed to renew his contract, he would have been gunned down at the convention and his best friend "Stretch" Cunningham would have moved in to help look after the family. (Cunningham, played by Creator/JamesCromwell at the very beginning of his career, made his first onscreen appearance after years as TheGhost earlier that same season, to anticipate the possibility of his becoming the new lead.) After his contract was successfully renewed, O'Connor, understandably not fond of Cromwell's continued presence on the show, put his foot down and demanded that Cromwell be fired, which eventually resulted in the famous "death of Stretch Cunningham" episode. According to Cromwell, other members of the cast liked him and pushed for him to stay on, but to no avail.
28	* YouLookFamiliar:
29	** Allan Melvin appeared as a cop in one episode (season 1's "Archie in the Lock-Up") before taking on the recurring role of Barney Hefner.
30	** Vincent Gardenia played Jim Bowman in "Lionel Moves into the Neighbourhoood" (season 1) and as Curtis Rempley in "The Bunkers and the Swingers (season 3). before becoming a semi-regular as Frank Lorenzo in season 4.
31	** Roscoe Lee Brown appeared twice as two different people. As Archie's French hospital roommate Jean Duval in "Archie In The Hospital" and as Hugh Victor Thompson III in "The Elevator Story".
32	----
33	Miscellaneous trivia:

Context Trivia / AllInTheFamily