First watched : Uncertain
I can't remember exactly when we started watching this though I recall episodes with Grandma ( Ellen Corby) before her stroke which occurred in November 1976 so it must have been around 76 or 77 . It's the first BBC Two show I'm sure of watching since Play Away.
I do remember that we started watching this as an act of rebellion against my Gran who declared it to be "sickening" with a particular contempt for Richard Thomas's character "John- Boy" the eldest son and narrator ( although the actual voiceover was done by Earl Hamner Junior on whose autobiographical Spencer's Mountain the series was based). The show concentrated on the lives of a large poor Baptist family in Virginia in the thirties and forties.
The show is a by-word for "Mom and apple pie" values and the oft-parodied "goodnight" sequence at the end remains toecurling but, like most people I suspect, I enjoyed it more than I let on. I mean come on who wouldn't want Ralph Waite and Olivia Learned for their mum and dad ? There was a tangible sense that the cast were a real family unit exemplified by Corby's return to the show despite severe speech and mobility problems and the pain expressed on the passing of Will Geer who played Grandpa. With the exception of Thomas who didn't want to return as a regular character in the last two series , no one had to be replaced and they would re-group for six TV movie sequels up to 1997 despite being left to fend for themselves in the intervening years
My favourite of the kids was Ben ( Eric Scott ) who seemed to have a bit more spunk than the others. In one of the last episodes I saw he sprung a considerable surprise on the family by bringing a wife home with him ; I'm not sure it was ever really explained why he'd got married in secret. That wasn't broadcast here until November 1980 so maybe I am including this too early.
Anyhow I did see one or two epiodes after that when it was repeated on Channel 4 on Saturday mornings some time in the nineties. One had Jennifer Jason Leigh in it as a young foxtress conning Jim-Bob into thinking he's made her pregnant which surprised me; I hadn't realised the series lasted long enough for her to appear. The other was set in the war years and had Ben supposedly in a Japanese prisoner of war camp but it was set in a clearing in the wood with a couple of extras , like Ben dressed in jeans and lumberjack shirt, no fences and a single comedy Jap guard who lets them humiliate him without chopping their heads off. Absolutely ludicrous.
The maturity of the kids necessarily meant the fragmentation of the storylines and from 1978 onwards the show started slipping in the ratings. In 1981 the show was finally cancelled, the cast reading about it in the papers before they were officially informed. None of them would ever be quite so famous again . Thomas , the only one who had a reputation before the series remained stuck in TV movies and serials. Judy Norton Taylor ( Mary Ellen ) caused a stir in 1985 by doing a spread for Playboy but after the fuss subsided she settled into an average TV acting career. Mary Beth McDonough ( Erin ) also shed her clothes briefly in the film Mortuary ( the only reason to watch it ) but had a long period of ill health from lupus erythematousis after having breast implants. She now divides her time between TV acting and charitable fundraising for lupus sufferers. Jon Walmsley ( Jason ) has a low-key career as a session musician. Eric Scott became a courier, and one day had to deliver a package to the company that made The Waltons but eventually got to buy the company. Kami Cottler ( Elizabeth ) is a high school teacher while David Harper ( Jim- Bob ) had the odd minor film part in the eighties but since the last sequel has become a bit of a drifter though he does normally turn up for reunion shows ( not looking terribly good to be honest ) . Amazingly Ellen Corby survived to appear in five of the sequels ( including the last in 1997 ) before her death in 1999.
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