55 Years After Its Premiere, One of TV’s Most Controversial Sitcoms Lands on Netflix
One of the most beloved — and most divisive — sitcoms of the 20th century is about to meet new generations of audiences, thanks to Netflix.
All in the Family, the Norman Lear-produced family comedy series, ran on CBS for nine seasons and 205 episodes, from January 1971 to April 1979. The sitcom follows the lives of the Bunker family: patriarch Archie Bunker (Carroll O'Connor) and his wife Edith Bunker (Jean Stapleton), as well as their daughter Gloria Stivic (Sally Struthers) and her husband, Michael, aka Meathead (Rob Reiner).
The clash of "lovable bigot" Archie with his feminist daughter and her Polish-American hippie husband makes for most of the show's hijinks, using hot-button issues in the '70s cultural discourse as comedic vehicles for the sitcom. Topics such as abortion, homosexuality, women's liberation, and the Vietnam War were just some of the subjects covered in the series as a source of conflict between characters.
While audiences are now more used to sitcoms taking on serious subjects, thanks to classic shows such as The Golden Girls, Roseanne, and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, All in the Family was one of the first to take on these topics and prove that tragedy and comedy could work alongside one another. While not every joke would be acceptable to a modern audience, the way the sitcom challenged social norms and provoked discussions in a manner that was actually very progressive for its time.
All in the Family's arrival on Netflix just months following the tragic death of Rob Reiner in December last year, and the show serves as a perfect example of Reiner's early work, as well as his influence from his father and fellow comic actor, Carl Reiner. His performance as Meathead could easily be seen as an early example of Reiner's blending of humor into unusual circumstances in his work as a director, such as his Stephen King adaptation, Stand by Me, the fantasy film The Princess Bride, or the early music mockumentary, This is Spinal Tap.
All in the Family arrives on Netflix U.S. on March 25.