Biography
Norman Lear was an American TV writer, producer, film director and political activist who was best known for producing some of the most popular television shows of the 1970s, including "Sanford and Son" (NBC, 1972-77), "The Jeffersons" (CBS, 1975-1985), "Good Times" (CBS, 1974-79) and most notably, "All in the Family" (CBS, 1971-79). Born and raised in New Haven, Connecticut, Lear never planned on having a career in Hollywood. He attended Emerson College in Boston, but left to join the United States Air Force at the outbreak of World War II. Lear was a radio operator/gunner during the war, and flew 52 combat missions. When the war ended, Lear returned to the states and began a career in public relations. He later found himself in Los Angeles, where he met a young aspiring comedy writer named Ed Simmons. Excited by the idea of writing comedy for the new medium of television, Lear teamed up with Simmons and together the two wrote television comedy sketches and jokes for some of the most notable comedians of the 1950s, including Rowan and Martin and Martin and Lewis, as well as a variety of other 50s comedy shows. By the 1960s Lear had decided to branch out on his own to try his hand at film writing and directing. He wrote the screenplay to the 1967 comedy, "Divorce American Style," which earned him an Oscar nomination, and followed that up by directing the films "Justice for All" (1968) and "Cold Turkey" (1971). Then in 1971 Lear produced a show about a working class family in Queens, New York called "All in the Family." Although not an immediate hit, "All in the Family," which was groundbreaking for its time for boldly tackling such hotbed cultural and political topics as racism, abortion and the Vietnam War, eventually found its audience, and quickly became one of the most popular shows on television. With the success of "All in the Family," several other Lear-produced shows followed, including "The Jeffersons," "Sanford and Son," "Good Times," and "Maude" (CBS, 1972-78). By the 1980s Lear had turned his attention to the liberal advocacy group People for the American Way, which he also founded. He attempted to return to TV producing in the 1990s with the shows "Sunday Dinner" (CBS, 1991) and "704 Hauser" (CBS, 1994), but both shows failed to catch on with the public. In the ensuing years Lear's immense contributions to television began earning him a multitude of honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Woody Guthrie Prize, and the Kennedy Center Honors. In 2017, when he was well into his 90s, Lear had somewhat of a late-career comeback when Netflix rebooted his series "One Day at a Time" (Netflix, 2017- ). The reboot, which starred an ensemble cast that included Justin Machado and Rita Moreno, premiered on the streaming service in January of 2017. After three seasons, Netflix canceled the series in March of 2019. Norman Lear died on December 5, 2023 in Los Angeles, CA at the age of 101.
