jerry: where'd you get those? kramer: the machine. you want one? jerry: no. henry winkler: you come home, turn on that television. kramer: take one. jerry: i don't want one! kramer: no there good... jerry: i don't want it. henry winkler: what do you want? you want comedy. kramer: take one! jerry: no! kramer stop it! jason alexander: and boom, there you go, a situation comedy. sheldon: bazinga! tim allen: this twenty -three minutes of magic. lucy: it's so tasty, too! tracy morgan: you fell in love with these characters. arnold: what chu' talkin' about willis? geri jewell: we need to laugh at ourselves. joey: you hide my clothes, i'm wearing everything you own. constance wu: laughter opens you up. haley: okay ready? surprise! [screaming and chaos] mara brock akil: the things that we might be afraid to talk about. bow: some people that were supposed to protect us didn't do the right thing. tim reid: like racism. son: so the cops are the bad guys? dre: yes. bow: no. kim fields: class wars ralph: money! i'm a millionaire. dan levy: and gender diversity... sarah: dad? maura: hi girls. ted danson: you can reach in and really touch people's hearts. dianne: i hate you sam: are you as turned on as i am? dianne: more! rainn wilson: whether it's a family living under the same roof... jj: dyno-mite! james: now that's the kind of talk i like to hear. rainn wilson: ...or gathered together in a workplace. jack: jenna, that's a glue stick. jenna: mmm? rainn wilson: all the great sitcoms are about family. debra: so wonderful! kelsey grammar: it's one of the great, great accomplishments of the modern age. [opening] michael: what have we always said was the most important thing? george: breakfast...? michael: family. george: family, right... dan levy: family is key to the sitcom. dre: mama!! randall park: it's something that we all can relate to. dre and mom: shake shake shake! tracy morgan: you're in these people's homes for years. you're a part of the family. eddie: one good thing about moving here is i have no friends, and no distractions. that's why i got a... grandma, what does fonzi say? grandma: ayyy! jesse tyler ferguson: the family sitcom brings people together in a really unexpected way jane leeves: there's so many different dynamics at work in families. frasier: i want you here, it will give us a chance to get re -acquainted! martin: that implies we were acquainted at one point. jane leeves: there's a lot of pain, there's a lot of laughter; you sort of recognize your dynamic in there. and you go, well, their family is just as crazy as mine. claire: i don't really care who kissed who and who's got a pimple on their head, and who's wearing an outrageously inappropriate dress... we are going to get together and act like a normal family for one tenth of a freaking second, and we're going to do it right now! come on lets go! dan levy: it's amazing to sort of track the history of the family sitcom because you can see so much about culture throughout the years, now looking back. ♪ jason alexander: and you know, it was really i love lucy that kind of kicked it all off. lucy: first operating this evening... stop that now and go back and sit down!! linda lavin: it was a show about a ditzy woman who wanted to be in show business... man: have you ever considered acting? everyone: has she ever considered acting? linda lavin: ...and her husband, who is latin and a musician... desi: honey, you know how i feel about this. i don't want my wife in show business. lucy: why not? marisa guthrie: lucille ball was always trying to emancipate herself from the wife and the homemaker role. bob saget: and every time she gets the opportunity, something goes awry. jaleel white: lucille ball was fearless in her physical comedy. you know, women were supposed to be demure and dainty and in their place. tim allen: lucille ball was one of my favorites for timing her bits. desi: what do you think you're doing? well? jennifer armstrong: i love lucy became a phenomenon instantly. lorraine ali: when you think about the era that lucille ball came up in, and what she was able to achieve it's astounding. desi: hey! i'm a father, i'm a father! tom gilbert: when lucy and ricky had a baby, it was like huge. it was the highest-rated show of the series. it changed the dynamic because all of a sudden it became centered around the family unit. i think i love lucy was the big bang of the family sitcom. marisa guthrie: then the family moved to the suburbs... lucy: gee isn't this exciting. we are in our very own home. marisa guthrie: and that mirrored what was happening in america at the time. patrick gomez: advertisers wanted to cater towards that new suburban family that needed to buy that kitchen appliance or needed to buy that vacuum. jacqueline coley: and after i love lucy, there was a formula for what the american family should look like. cybill shepherd: ozzie and harriet... announcer: the adventures of ozzie and harriet. cybill shepherd: i just loved everybody in it, actually. david: hurry up, bring it in... i'm starved! candice bergen: it was a happy, gentle american family of the 1950s. ozzie: how much do you need? david: never mind pop, that's okay. ozzie: no don't worry about it, you can pay me back. david: honest pop, i don't want it. ricky: what's the matter with you david, you got rocks in your head? linda lavin: the kids were very polite. everybody was very nice to each other. those were not real people, but they entertained and delighted us. jim: alright kids, dinner is on, we're sitting down. jennifer armstrong: when you get to father knows best, it's very patriarchal, dealing with tiny little problems. jim: ah... a quiet evening at home. i could use it. [slam] billy gray: and i played bud. bud usually had a problem with the truth telling, on some level. jim: what was all that racket upstairs? bud: i didn't hear anything. billy gray: father knows best represented the good life; the american dream. jim: i'll read you one story, then off to bed you go. bob: and then leave it to beaver enters the sitcom realm in 1957. wally: what's that? beaver: a haircut i think. tony dow: the real key to leave it to beaver is that it's written from a child's point of view. wally: why didn't you let stanley cut your hair? beaver: i losted my money. jerry mathers: you have the character of beaver and you have wally his older brother who usually does things right, beaver's always the one that gets in trouble. june: [gasps] marisa guthrie: and there were the parents to teach them, to show them the right path. ward: we want you to feel that you can come to me or to your mother with any problem and we'll understand. patrick gomez: in the 1950s, sitcoms were really giving us an idealistic version of america. jacqueline coley: but as we get into the 60s, we'll see different types of family sitcoms. steven: i'm sure i'll be able to handle a little washing and to cook an occasional meal. ♪ sam: i'm a bad mommy. max: no, you're a disaster mom. sam: you're a big f------ c--- your sister's an a------, and your other sister's great. (off camera): aww, thanks mom! pamela adlon: better things is about a single mom who is raising her three daughters on her own. max: you're my mom, i want you to know if i have sex or i want to get high. pamela adlon: it's dirty, it's funny. sam: no! hide things from me please! emily vanderwerff: better things is a fascinating example of the ways that the family sitcom has adapted to the 21st century. frankie: mom, where's the broom? sam: what are you being, a witch? frankie: no, i'm going to be a useless housewife from the 50s. sam: i love that! dan levy: throughout the years, the boundaries have been pushed back and the walls have come down. if you look back to the 50s, there was a lot of confines on what family looked like and what was acceptable and what wasn't. steven: hi chipper. robbie: hi squirt. chip: hi cats. barry livingston: my three sons was the first show that deviated from the perfect pleasantville nuclear family. ernie: you gonna blow up the stove again mr. douglas? steve: no ernie, i don't think i'll make that same mistake again. [laughs] [small expolsion] barry livingston: it was a show about a single dad. he was a widower with three boys, trying to raise them in an all-male household. chip: you dry. barry livingston: everyone had to do something. everyone had to pitch in. we did dishes, you know, we were darning socks. these are things that you never saw in the ozzie and harriet show or donna reid or leave it to beaver. [phone rings] mike: hey that's mine, i've got it! bob saget: when you watch a show that's based on losing someone... steven: come on, look out... you're going to tear it. bob saget: that adds a deep-rooted truth to the hardness of life. and then it gives comedy even more of a reason to go as crazy as you want to go. uncle charlie: i think that shirt's done. robbie: oh my gosh my shirt! steven: well, robbie you'll just have to wear your pants higher. patrick gomez: in the 60s, you see the sitcom move away from telling stories that are solely focussed on the nuclear, suburban family. jim colucci: divorce had become more prevalent in the 60s, it had become more part of normal american life, but it took a while for it to be reflected in sitcoms. ♪ the brady brunch. the brady brunch. ♪ ♪ that's the way we all became ... ♪ christopher knight: the brady bunch is the story of two separate families being glued together. lloyd schwartz: a man with three boys, a woman with three girls. the man was going to be a widower. the woman, divorced, but divorce was a taboo topic on television. so they said, let's just leave it so you don't know. [yelling] mike: what's all the yelling about, huh? bobby: she stole our ball. marcia: i'm just trying to find out what they did with my school awards. lloyd schwartz: the brady bunch was an evolution from like leave it to beaver, it was shown from the kid's point of view. cindy: will you lend me your skate key? bobby: i'm not lending you anything to a snitcher. eve plumb: it was all about what children are having problems with. their appearance, or their schoolwork or their friends. peter brady: pete brady intercepts and goes for the shot... eve plumb: oh you broke the vase, it was those kinds of everyday problems. cindy: marcia. i'm proud to be your sister no matter how terrible you look. marcia: thanks a lot! andy greene: this is airing in the nixon era, when vietnam is raging and people are losing faith in government. lloyd schwartz: all these things were happening and the brady bunch was kind of a refuge. malcom jamal warner: watching the brady bunch and having all these brothers and sisters, it was a great getaway for me. michael schneider: the brady bunch was a huge success for abc that led to the partridge family which really attracted a young, hungry audience. shirley: hey kids, hollywood boulevard! danny bonaduce: we were a musical family that would travel around doing shows... keith: (singing) oh girl, you make my day. helen hunt: i was for sure going to marry david cassidy. that was definitely going to happen. patrick gomez: the partridge family is trying to embrace this like hippie cool culture. danny: what did you hit mom? shirley: i think it was a studebaker. man: you crazy hippies, it's not enough you don't trust anyone over 30. now you're trying to wipe us out! laura morowitz: but it takes this phenomenon of the counterculture and makes it very safe. danny: now relax mum.... but just remember our whole future depends on these next few minutes. shirley: ahhh. barry livingston: it was an escape from the real world for a lot of people. news anchor: in new york, a student protest is met by construction workers and at kent state in ohio, 4 students are killed. ethan alter: but some people didn't want to hide from what was happening. drew carey: people were like, no, we want to hear about all this stuff and how it's affecting our families. that's when shows like all in the family came on. ethan alter: norman lear was at the beginning of his career and was looking to find a show that he could really make his own and he was turned on to a british series called 'til death do us part'. norman lear: it was about a bigoted father and i was said holy moly. that was the way i grew up, and i knew i had a show. crew: air pilot. take one. ethan alter: they shot the pilot at abc. it featured carroll o'connor and jean stapleton as archie and edith bunker. actor 1: we just don't see any evidence, of god... alright? actress 1: that's right daddy. archie: i know we had a couple of pinkos in the house but i didn't know we had a pair of atheists. ethan alter: it was not well received by abc. they watched it and felt the chemistry wasn't there between the parents and the kids. norman lear: and then asked me to make it again with two different young people. actor 2: we just don't see any evidence, of god, that's all. actress 2: that's right daddy. archie: i know we had a couple of pinkos in this house but i didn't know we had a pair of atheists. emily vanderwerff: the network freaks out about whether people will be able to watch this show that has like real issues. norman lear: everybody is nervous and there are people saying they're gonna kill you. they're going to shoot you dead in the streets. ♪ herbie j pilato: in 1970, cbs is trying to change their landscape. they had all these rural family sitcoms; they were looking for more sophisticated sitcoms. patrick gomez: after abc declined to move forward with the all in the family pilot, norman lear made the decision to move the show over to cbs. sally struthers: they said yes but you need a new set of kids. so rob reiner and i were the third set of children for archie and edith bunker. norman lear: so, i made the pilot for the third time. same script. i wouldn't change a word. archie: so let's hear it again, huh? what did you mean by what god? michael: we just don't see any evidence of god, that's all. gloria: that's right daddy. archie: that's right daddy? well i knew we had a couple of pinkos in this house... but i didn't know we had atheists! john lithgow: i do remember seeing the opening episode and realizing, my god, the ground is shaking under me. michael: now, i'm going to tell you something. gloria: michael... michael: no no, wait a second... sally struthers: and we reach over each other at the table and we have arguments.... michael: because guys like you are unwilling to give the black man, the mexican american and all the other minorities their just and rightful hard earned share of the american dream. sally struthers: that didn't happen before. we got real. bambi haggins: political strife. interpersonal issues. generation gaps. and they're dealing with it all in the family. michael: now i suppose you're going to tell me that the black man has had the same opportunity in this country as you? archie: more. he's had more. i didn't have no million people out there marching and protesting to get me my job. edith: no, his uncle got it for him. john lithgow: archie bunker was saying things that you just don't say on television. michael: just because a guy is sensitive and he's an intellectual and he wears glasses, you make him out a queer. archie: i never said a guy who wears glasses is a queer... a guy who wears glasses is a four eyes, a guy who's a fag is a queer. tim allen: you'll watch that show and even end up looking around like you're gonna be arrested. john lithgow: it was jaw dropping. it was funny, but it was very challenging, and you realized norman lear is taking us into a whole new realm of comedy. norman lear: the blowback from the public was buried by the excitement and the applause. bob leszczak: the show was number one for a long time. ethan alter: it changed cbs and their brand as a network. as a result of all in the family, they turned to norman lear to create more shows in that image. archie: there's a person at the door. maude! adrienne barbeau: bea arthur played maude as edith's cousin on all in the family. maude: maudie is here. jim colucci: and she could take on archie head to head. maude: now you can either come to the table and eat, or you can lie there and feed off your own fat. jim colucci: the story goes that by the time that episode had aired, fred silverman, who was in charge of cbs at the time, had called norman lear and said, get that woman her own show. ♪ and then there's maude... ♪ ♪ and then there's maude! ♪ ♪ that uncompromisin', enterprisin', ♪ ♪ anything but tranquilizin', ♪ ♪ right on maude! ♪ adrienne barbeau: it was not your all-american family. carol: you're getting senile in your old age. maude: thank you darling. i only hope i live long enough to become a burden to you. adrienne barbeau: maude is an independent strong woman who speaks her mind. she was married to her fourth husband, walter, played by bill macy. maude: i don't have time to fix you your breakfast! here, have some cold knackwurst. eric mccormick: i loved their combative relationship. i still to this day if somebody pisses me off i'll say, "god'll get you for that walter." maude: god'll get you for that walter. patrick gomez: maude was really the first time that we saw such a fiercely independent woman who wasn't afraid to speak her mind at the center of a family sitcom. norman lear: maude had a maid florida who was a great character. henry: i'm henry evans ... norman lear: her husband made an appearance. henry: i am proud of you florida ...its just i don't want you to be a maid no more. florida: your mother was a maid. that's how your brothers got through school and you got to be a fireman. norman lear: when john amos and esther rolle finished their scene, we thought, let's fill out that family. ♪ good times! ♪ ♪ good times! jay moriarty: that's the first time you ever saw a black family on television. jj: look who finally got back from her honeymoon in the bathroom mirror. thelma: knock it off jj. your mouth is always ahead of your think piece. lorida: let's face it james, this family ain't ozzie and harriet. jimmie walker: we were very different than other sitcom families from the point that we were urban. trying to survive on the south side of chicago with a dad that has spotty job situations. james: it's a cold world out there, and we can't change it. florida: well maybe we can't change it, james... but we sure can't let it change us. jimmie walker: good times was not only to show the problems, it was to show the love of a minority family. jj: we're standing in a used car lot of love. james: and in 20 years we only turned out one clunker. jacqueline coley: the idea of white families seeing things on an episode of good times that they could relate to their own experience. that is a power that cannot be duplicated with hours of conversation. patrick gomez: it showed how sitcoms weren't afraid to discuss social issues that had formerly been taboo. ♪ this is it. this is it! ♪ ♪ this is life, the one you get.... ♪ caryn james: when you get to something like 'one day at a time', the single mother in that show is divorced. that was unusual for television. julie: i haven't had a happy minute since we moved to indianapolis. sure was different before the divorce, when daddy was around. ann: yeah yeah, i know. you used to wrap him around your little finger... caryn james: all of the single parents before had been widowed. and so television begins to catch up with who we are. barbara: whatchu doing, mom? ann: i am circling the jobs for which it would appear i am qualified. barbara: i don't see any circles. ann: exactly. valerie bertinelli: i mean it was the 70's. women were feeling empowered to have lives of their own and to still have a family. ann: darling. would like to tell me what's going on between you and chuck? barbara: you're going to die! you had no business telling her. valerie