This is in response to THISARTICLE, which is about the possibility of remaking in some limited series,
various classic episodes of popular old sitcoms. Especially those that had a measure of
cultural relevance.
Some people are calling this an
awful idea. They list the usual reasons
of, “I want new things, not remakes” which is demonstrably untrue when you look
at box office numbers. The strawmen also
mention how, “It’s a classic, don’t mess with it”, which is also stupid,
reinterpreting things that are considered classics with fresh perspectives is a
key concept in creativity. Alan Moore’s
entire career is about popular reinterpretations of characters from other eras.
All of that aside I thought of 3
ways they could do an “All in the Family” reboot/remake/sequel that would be
somewhat relevant to today’s world. You
might be asking yourself, “What makes a 31-year-old qualified to comment on a show that had run its course before he was even born?” I watched it in syndication, because we did
not have cable when I was growing up and “All in the Family” was what was on.
You may feel free to sing the theme if you know it. |
First Option: Straight up remake
This
appears to be what they are going for.
Using modern production methods, conventions, and actors to create a
crisp and fine looking set of episodes that would serve as a “best of” tribute
to the old series and maybe a gateway for people wondering whether they should
try out older programs when looking for something to watch.
This is a
boring method. It adds nothing and the
only editorial commentary you can glean from it is by looking at which episodes
that were chosen for a remake and asking, “Why did they think this was worth
the treatment?”
This sort
of thing does happen from time to time for a good reason. “Doctor Who” has several episodes remade inanimation, the reason for this has to do with archiving techniques, the BBC did
not keep recordings of dozens of old episodes and as such lots of episodes are
lost in time (you can follow the link to a short documentary that will explain
what happened in that instance, and here are the other entries in that documentary explaining new efforts in recovering lost TV shows).
If you don't know anything about "Doctor Who" this must look very strange. |
Second Option: The Farce
Anybody
remember “The Brady Bunch” movie they made in the 90’s? When they took the Brady family as their
1970’s selves and just plopped them right into (then) modern 90’s Los
Angeles? It was funny. Really funny.
It did a great job of illustrating how much the show’s conventions were
different from modern entertainment and how far removed from reality the whole
thing was.
Have you ever seen that Mad TV
Sketch about the “Andy Griffith Show” in which Andy is actually a violent king
pin in Mayberry? About how they take
what you expect and know about a character and completely turn it on its head
to unnerve you?
They could
do something like the above examples with “All in the Family”. Having the exact same Archie appear in modern
New York, or conversely set it all in the same time period but make fun of it
but having Archie be 100x’s more politically incorrect. I mean, you don’t have to Calvin Candie the
whole production by having Archie use the N-word 100+ times, but making the
character worse and less sympathetic would be a good way to make fun of how the
show often attracted the wrong kind of praise—as people would often like the
show because they were the same sort of blue collar bigot that Archie was, not
realizing the show was making fun of him for his bigotry.
Third Option: The Sequel/The Remake
This wouldn't be too hard to make,
at least not as hard as you would think it would be. The show has been off for 40 years and what
actors from the show that haven’t passed on are now either too old to return to
their roles or you just wouldn’t want them to try. So you would need a fresh cast.
Now you get to choose if you want
this to be a modern Archie or if you want it to be a sequel. The sequel would carry its own issues, they
would have to play with the timeline a bit, make Meat Head and Gloria a little
younger, maybe set the whole thing in the early 2000’s that is not really that difficult. The hard part, whether you are doing a remake
or a sequel set in modern times is picking out what modern bigotry you want to
make fun of. And how far you want to
take the characters.
Let’s do some for instances. Just assume this is a straight up remake.
Instead of black neighbors they have
Middle Eastern Muslim neighbors. Instead
of a preachy son-in-law marrying their daughter, they instead have a preachy
daughter-in-law marrying their daughter.
Anxiety against Muslims and Gays are the two big fish right now.
Maybe make Archie layered in that
he remembers protesting Nixon or something, and he looks back on those times in
his life as "the necessary changes" and how he thinks changing things
now is a step too far. That he thinks he
fought, "For those people to be treated fairly, but not so that they could
live in my guest room." Which,
let’s face it, a lot of older people who would have been “liberal” (whatever
that word means anymore) in the 70’s think now.
Many old liberals are pretty conservative by today’s standards.
See, it might not be on a chart, but if you search for the term "liberals" it is now just a slur. |
Or have him be a blue collar guy
who laments that all the jobs he and his dad had worked, all of those jobs are
going away and he resents the rest of the world and the rich for causing
it. My grandfather was a fan of Bernie Sanders
during the election for just these kinds of reasons. You could even have him be really liberal on
economic issues but socially conservative.
You don't have to make it straight
up a repeat, there are plenty of things in the modern world that need looked
at, and giving them a leering look while still making them a sympathetic voice
and doing their best to learn and be fair.
If you remember the show Archie wasn't all bad, hence why so many people
didn’t get that he was supposed to be laughed at.
No comments:
Post a Comment