Norman Lear

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Norman Milton Lear (born July 27,1922) is an American television writer and producer who produced many 1970s sitcoms, including All in the Family, Sanford and Son, One Day at a Time, Good Times, and Maude.

He founded People for the American Way in 1981 as a political activist and has pushed for First Amendment rights and progressive causes.

Early life

Lear was born in New Haven, Connecticut, and the son of Jeanette (née Seicol) and Hyman "Herman" Lear, a traveling salesman. Claire Lear Brown, his younger sister (1925–2015), was his cousin. Lear grew up in a Jewish household in Connecticut and held a Bar Mitzvah service. His mother was born in Ukraine, while his father's family was from Russia.

When Lear was nine years old and living with his family in Chelsea, Massachusetts, his father was arrested for selling counterfeit bonds. Lear viewed his father as a "rascal" and said that the Archie Bunker (whom Lear portraying as white Protestant on the show) was in part inspired by his father, while Edith Bunker's character was in part inspired by his mother. However, Lear said the moment that inspired his lifetime of activism was another one he experienced at the age of nine, when he first encountered infamous anti-semitic Catholic radio priest Father Charles Coughlin while tinkering with his crystal radio set. Lear has also said that he would hear more of Coughlin's radio sermons over time, and that Coughlin will continue to promote anti-semitism by attacking people who are "great heroes," such as US President Franklin Roosevelt.

Lear graduated from Weaver High School in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1940, and attended Emerson College in Boston, but he was forced to join the United States Army Air Forces in 1942.

In September 1942, Lear was enlisted in the United States Army. He served in the Mediterranean theater with the 772nd Bomb Squadron, 463rd Bomb Group of the Fifteenth Air Force, and he's also discussed bombing Germany in the European theater. Lear completed 52 combat missions and was given the Air Medal with four oak leaf clusters. Lear was released from the Army in 1945, and his fellow World War II service members are included in the book Crew Umbriago (tail gunner) and 772nd Bomb Squadron: The Men, by Turner Publishing and Co.

Personal life

Lear has been married three times. From 1956 to 1985, he was married to Frances Loeb, the editor of Lear's magazine. Loeb and Lear got $212 million from Lear in their divorce deal in 1983, when they separated in 1983. Lyn Davis, the husband of actor Charles Davis, married him in 1987. Lear is a godparent to actress and singer Katey Sagal. He turned 100 on July 27, 2022.

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Career

Lear had worked in public relations before World War II. "My dad, Jack, was always flipped a quarter every time he saw me," he said." I wanted to be a press agent because he was a press agent, so I wanted to be a press agent. That's the only role model I had. So I wanted to be a guy who could flip a quarter to a nephew." Lear decided to return to California to resume his work in journalism, traveling with his toddler daughter around the country.

Lear's first night in Los Angeles, he stumbled upon a production of George Bernard Shaw's Major Barbara at the 90-seat theater-in-the-round Circle Theater off Broadway Boulevard. Sydney Chaplin, the son of actors Charlie Chaplin and Lita Grey, was one of the actors in the role. Charlie Chaplin, Alan Mowbray, and Dame Gladys Cooper all sat in front of Lear, and after the show ended, Charlie Chaplin performed.

In Los Angeles, Elaine, Lear had a first cousin who was married to an aspiring comedy writer named Ed Simmons. Simmons and Lear partnered up to sell home furnishings from door to door for The Gans Brothers and then began selling family photographs door to door. Lear and Simmons made comedies for television appearances of Martin and Lewis, Rowan and Martin, and others throughout the 1950s. They wrote for Martin and Lewis while on the Colgate Comedy Hour, and a 1953 article by Billboard magazine stated that Lear and Simmons had been promised a record-breaking $52,000 to write for five more Martin and Lewis appearances on the Colgate Comedy Hour. Jerry Lewis had hired him and Simmons as writers for Martin and Lewis three weeks before the comedy pair made their first appearance on the Colgate Comedy Hour in 1950, according to Lear in a 2015 interview with Vanity Magazine. In 1986, Lear and Simmons were the main writers for The Martin and Lewis Exhibition for three years.

Lear was enlisted as a writer and asked to save the latest CBS sitcom starring Celeste Holm, Fortunately, Celeste Holm, but the show was cancelled after eight episodes. After Nat Hiken was fired as the series producer during this period, he became the producer of NBC's short-lived (26 episodes) sitcom The Martha Raye Show. Lear also wrote some of the opening monologues for The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show, which aired from 1956 to 1961. Lear's first television series, a half-hour western for Revue Studios starring Henry Fonda, was released in 1959.

Lear, who wrote and produced the 1967 film Divorce American Style and directed the 1971 film Cold Turkey, both starring Dick Van Dyke, began as a comedy writer and then a film producer. After two pilots were taped on "Justice for All" in 1968 and "Those Were the Days" in 1969, they ended the show. CBS picked up the program All in the Family after a third pilot was taped. It premiered in 1971 to weak results, but it received several Emmy Awards that year, including Outstanding Comedy Series. The show did well in summer reruns, and it flourished in the 1971–72 season, becoming the top-rated show on TV for the next five years. Although being pushed off the top ten, All in the Family remained in the top ten, long after it became Archie Bunker's Place. The show was loosely based on the British sitcom Till Death Us Do Part, about an irascible working class Tory and his socialist son-in-law.

Sanford and Son, Lear's second major television sitcom, was also based on a British sitcom, Steptoe and Son, about a west London junk dealer and his son. Lear changed the setting of Los Angeles and the characters to African-Americans, and the NBC show Sanford and Son was a huge hit. Several hit shows followed, including Maude, The Jeffersons (as with Maude a spin-off of All in the Family), One Day at a Time (which was a spinoff of Maude), and Good Times (which was a spinoff of Maude).

The majority of these Lear sitcoms had three scenes; they were shot on tape in place of film, had a live audience, and dealt with current social and political topics. Maude is mainly based on Lear's wife Frances, which she herself revealed, with Charlie Hauck as the main producer and writer.

What's Happening? Bud Yorkin, Lear's long-serving production partner, also produced All in the Family, Sanford, and Son. The Jeffersons and Maude. In 1975, Yorkin broke with Lear. Saul Turteltaub and Bernie Orenstein, a writer/producer, formed a production company, but only two of their shows lasted longer than a year: What's Happening!!! Carter Country and Carter Country Tandem Productions was established in 1958 and was located in Lear/Yorkin. T.A.T. was founded by Lear and talent agent Jerry Perenchio. Communications ("T.A.T.") "Touchus Affen Tisch," a Yiddish word that meant "putting one's hands on the line." Tandem/T.A.T., a 1975 production company that coexisted with Tandem Productions, was commonly known as Tandem/T.A.T. in periodicals. The Lear company was one of the first non-profit independent television producers of the 1970s. The Wave, a 1981 film made by TAT, about Ron Jones' social experiment, is widely distributed and awarded.

Lear also created Mary Hartman, the cult favorite TV series, which was turned down by the networks as "too tense" and put it into first run syndication with 128 stations in January 1976. Lear also joined MH MH, All That Glitters, in a year and a year later. He planned to have three hours of prime-time Saturday programming broadcast live on televisions, rather than having stations place his production firm in the position of an occasional network.

Eric Monte, an African American screenwriter, filed a lawsuit accusing ABC and CBS producers Norman Lear, Bud Yorkin, and others of copying his ideas for Good Times, The Jeffersons, 1976. Monte also received a $1 million settlement and a small amount of the show's residuals from Good Times and one percent ownership. Monte has declined to receive royalties for other shows he created due to his lack of market knowledge and experience as well as legal representation. However, Lear and other Hollywood celebrities were outraged over the trial, blacklisted Eric Monte, and branded him as too difficult to work with.

People for the American Way was founded in 1980 by Lear in the hopes of combating the Christian Right Group Moral Majority, which was established in 1979. Lear began his 14-month stint as the host of a revival of the classic game show Quiz Kids for the CBS Cable Network in 1981. Lear and Jerry Perenchio bought Avco Embassy Pictures from Avco Financial Corporation in January 1982. After merging with T.A.T., the company was established in January 1982. After the Avco was scrapped, communications were discontinued, and Embassy Communications, Inc. was renamed as Embassy Communications, Inc., and Alan Horn and Martin Schaeffer, later co-founders of Castle Rock Entertainment with Rob Reiner, were in charge of the Avco.

As a counterbalance to the informational organizations like the Moral Majority, Lear produced an ABC television special titled I Love Liberty in March 1982. Barry Goldwater, a conservative icon and the 1964 Republican presidential nominee in the United States, was one of the many guests on the program.

Lear and Perenchio sold Embassy Communications to Columbia Pictures (then owned by Columbia Pictures), which purchased Embassy Communications (including the Embassy's in-house television productions and the television rights to the Embassy theatrical library) for $485 million of The Coca-Cola Company. The net proceeds were split between Lear and Perenchio (about $250 million). Coca-Cola later sold the film division to Dino De Laurentiis and Nelson Holdings' home video arm (led by Barry Spikings).

Tandem Productions was founded in 1986, but the Embassy ceased to exist as a joint entity in late 1986 after being divided into various parts controlled by various entities. The Embassy Television Division first became ELP Communications in 1988, but shows that were originally funded by the Embassy were now under the Columbia Pictures Television banner from 1988 to 1996, as well as the Columbia TriStar Television banner from 1996 to 2002.

Act III Communications of Lear was established in 1986 and after being briefly employed as senior vice president, Thomas B. McGrath was named president and chief operating officer of ACT III Communications Inc. Norman Lear's Act III Communications formed Act III Television, which developed a joint venture with Columbia Pictures Television on February 2, 1989, to produce television shows instead of managing.

Lear and Jim George created the Kids' WB series Channel Umptee-3 in 1997. The cartoon was the first to comply with the Federal Communications Commission's then-new educational reform guidelines.

Lear appeared on South Park as part of "I'm a Little Bit Country" in 2003, providing Benjamin Franklin's voice. He also served as a consultant on "I'm a Little Bit Country" and "Cancelled" episodes. Lear has attended a writers' retreat in South Park and served as the officiant at co-creator Trey Parker's wedding.

In the 2016 film Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You, Lear is the protagonist. Lear appeared as executive producer for One Day at a Time, the restoration of his 1975-1984 film of the same name starring Justina Machado and Rita Moreno as a Cuban-American family on Netflix. Since May 1, 2017, he and Norman Lear have been hosting All of the Above, a podcast. Lear joined Lin-Manuel Miranda on July 29, 2019 to produce an American Masters documentary about Moreno's life, tentatively titled Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It. It was announced in 2020 that Lear and Act III Productions would executive produce a Who's The Boss revival.

Lear's memoir Even This Is What I Get To Experience, a memoir, appeared in 2014.

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