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Shows like The Twilight Zone and Star Trek routinely explored contemporary issues, including racism, corporate greed, and the military action in Vietnam, through the lens of fantasy and science fiction. Social commentary wasn’t new on television.

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The first working family on TV competing in the new job market was the Bunkers, and they had something to say about the new competition. It wasn’t even on the docket in Nancy, a 1970 sitcom about a first daughter. The charitable and likable Flying Nun didn’t have the answer hidden under her cornette. They’d only paid frightened lip service to the fights for civil rights and the women’s liberation movements, and when the postwar economy had to be divided to meet with more equalized opportunities there was no one to break it down in easy terms. American TV had little use for the working class until the 1970s.

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The Honeymooners was a standout because Jackie Gleason’s Ralph Kramden was a bus driver from Bensonhurst (the actual address on that show, 328 Chauncey Street, is in the Bedford–Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn). I Love Lucy’s Ricky Ricardo, played by Cuban-American Desi Arnaz, ran a successful nightclub. “I think they invented good weather around 1940.”Īmerican sitcoms began shortly after World War II, and primarily focused on the upper-middle class white families of Father Knows Best, Leave It to Beaver, and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. The Astoria, Queens, row house living room was supposed to look comfortable but worn, old-fashioned and retrograde, mirroring Archie’s attitudes: A displaced white hourly wage earner left behind by the social upheavals of the 1960s and 1970s. He settled for keeping the soundstage neutral, implying the sepia tones of an old family photograph album.

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Lear wanted to shoot the series in black and white, the same as the British series, Till Death Us Do Part, it was based on. Mary Tyler Moore shot live on film, but videotape helped give All in the Family the look of early live television, like the original live broadcasts of The Honeymooners.

Up to this time, sitcoms were taped without audiences in single-camera format and the laugh track was added later. There was never a canned laugh added, even in the last season when reactions were captured by an audience viewing pre-taped episodes. All in the Family was the first major American series to be videotaped in front of a live audience.

They were as respected as the authenticity of the series characters’ parodies.Įven the laughs were genuine. The audience cared deeply, and laughed loudly, because they were never pandered to. The middle-aged bigot chomping on the cigar was played by an outspoken liberal who took the art of acting very seriously. The divide goes beyond party, and is not delineated by age, wealth, or even class. It was grounded in the most serious of realities, more than the generation gap which it openly showcased, but in the schism between progressive and conservative thinking. To celebrate All in the Family’s 50th anniversary, we look back at its journey from conception to broadcast, and how it continues to influence and inform entertainment and society today.Īctor Carroll O’Connor, who was a large part of the creative process of the series, consistently maintains he took the now-iconic role of Archie Bunker because All in the Family was a satire, not a sitcom. The premiere episode contained a considerable list of “television firsts.” One of these rarities continues to remain scarce on network TV: creator Norman Lear trusted the intelligence of the viewing audience. What came was a deluge of support from people hoping this mid-season replacement was a permanent addition to the network’s lineup. CBS put an army of operators at phone lines expecting a barrage of complaints from offended middle Americans demanding its cancellation. All in the Family is roundly considered a touchstone for television achievement now, but when it debuted 50 years ago, even the network carrying it hoped it would fizzle quickly and unnoticed.