ABC to recreate “All in the Family” and “The Jeffersons” eps for special

Aww, ******.
Despite being a Woody Harrelson and Marisa Tomei fan, I forgot about this until it was over.

Lucky for me I don't have much of a life outside of work, so I'll be home to watch the Saturday night replay.

 

Or, it was a real project that fell apart.

 

What if John Goodman had been cast as Archie, and Melissa McCarthy as Edith?

 

I think Paul Giamatti could have done a decent Archie. Woody acted like a crack addict who had some physical disabilities as well. And the dreadful accent....

Didnt work for me.

 

Mel Gibson could've pulled it off

 

Hm, you might be onto something even if you were trying to be funny. He might could have.

 

My ex wife.

 

I'm having "Flintstones" flashbacks here.

 

Holy cow, was Woody Harrelson miscast on this. I could only watch for about five minutes...

 

Skip ahead to the Jeffersons part...much more enjoyable

 

Not sure primetime is ready to hear Archie call Edith "Sugar T*ts".

 

I dont know....don't see Hugh Jackman signing up as meathead for a sitcom

 

He is definitely miscast, but the biggest problem is that his and Tomei's performances are so over-the-top and cartoony. They do not come across as real human beings. If you compare the original episode to the remake, the subtlety of O'Connor's work is really apparent. Harrelson seems like he is trying really hard to be funny, rather than just playing the scene and letting the humor come from the situations. Only Wanda Sykes seems to get that. If this was a new script being produced for the first time, the director would have told Woody and Tomei to dial it back because they are chewing up scenery all across the stage. It would have been interesting if they'd played it straight instead of making it a cartoon re-creation.

 

I’ll try to catch it tonight.

 

Comes on in 5 minutes! I won't miss it this time!

 

I have to say, Wanda Sykes came across as the most "real" of anybody in the two shows (to me), and she wasn't trying to do an impression of Isobel Sandford -- it was just a version of her own voice, doing the same character. It's an interesting question as to how the shows would have done if they had just let the actors act in the parts and not try to look/sound like the original characters.

But I did enjoy the shows a lot more than I thought I would, and it was fairly entertaining. Ratings were very good, too.

 

Wanda's latest standup special on Netflix is excellent!

 

...Hearing the AITFamily theme on this rerun I noted:
That W. and M., just as Carroll and Jean did on the later episodes of AITF:TOS, they really carefully e-nun-ci-at-ed the " Gee, our old LaSalle ran great " line! On TOS, for the earlier esp, C. and J. (who could sing - Jean was in the 50s B'way musical " Bells Are Ringing " which my folks had the cast LP of and Carroll actually had a post-AITF CBS special production of the Gershwin musical " Of Thee I Sing " as the star that I've been meaning to look for on YT) rather sang the "...LaSalle..." line in a slurred manner.??then, someone brought to their attention and the later seasons had a new recording where C/J rather slow down and drop the accent and sang it more clearly.
The Jefferson's bit about the Tom and Louise singing old songs was just on - Would a sitcom today quote " The Best Things In Life Are Free " or a Porgy and Bess song - or quote George Bernard Shaw?

 

Thought both were wonderful. Things missing: George never called her Weezy. Archie never told Edith to stifle.
I also have trouble living in a world where I am hot for Edith over Gloria.

 

Gee, I dunno. Could we believe Gibson was a racist, a bigot, and an anti-semite? That might be a stretch.

They did the scripts as written, and didn't change anything. I think those things were in other shows, but not these specific episodes.

 

George breaking character was in the script? And what about the hotness transfer?

 

A stumble is just a stumble. That happened all the time in the original shows, too: I saw a live taping of Maude in the summer of 1975, and it took them more than 2 hours to get through it because of screw-ups and technical issues. Hotness is relative. (And I still say I would've liked both shows to be about 25% brighter overall.)

 

no mel is meathead and alan alda is archie, we get weird with it

 

Alan Alda was so good in Horace and Pete!

 

loved him in Seems Like Old Times