The brilliant Carroll O’Connor as Archie Bunker
Not just O’Conner, but Stapleton too. And the script. All brilliant, I think.
People remember Archie as a buffoon, and the show as a comedy. But it was much more than that, and the acting was superb:
The New Neo
A blog about political change, among other things
It was always one of my favorite shows. The proof of the pudding is how well it still holds up almost 40 years later.
Dare we ask what prompted this post?
Well, that sure made me cry. At work. (Had to get up and close the door to my office)
Yes, consistently great acting and great writing.
Meathead learned nothing from Archie’s working class wisdom.
I agree that it was creative and timely, then. But, it was the creation of generally liberal minds. I think that overall, it made the Left look better than the Right. It contributed to the Gramscian march that began in the 1960s.
WWAVF (Who Would Archie Vote For)?
The acting may have been superb, but it was in the service of some pretty awful ideology. All in the Family was the first pebble in the landslide of liberal contempt for “common people” which is about to bury the country today.
There was a rather ironic backfire. Archie was a caricature of a working class white guy, but people identified with him, celebrated him. When he sneaked little Joey out to the church on a week day and baptized him, millions were cheering him on. His sensitivity to real people with real problems, even if these were poster children as victims of bigotry, Archie saw them as people, not members of groups. That is the Conservative way.
Michael Adams:
I agree. Archie was revealed as a guy who usually meant well, and the way O’Connor played him he usually ended up a very sympathetic character. This scene is an excellent example, I think.