ARCHIE'S PLACE
Biography
BORN:
August 3, 1924
The Bronx, New York
SPOUSE:
Nancy
CHILDREN:
One son, Hugh
BIOGRAPHY:
After twenty years as a character actor on stage, screen and television, Carroll O'Connor became a star with his portrayal of the cantankerous and self-righteous working-class bigot Archie Bunker in the legendary television comedy series "All in the Family." He played the role in thirteen prime time seasons; the name of the series beginning with the tenth season was "Archie Bunker's Place."
When first aired on CBS-TV in January, 1971, "All in the Family" was attacked by liberals for its matter-of-fact treatment of bigotry, but O'Connor maintained that it was no help to bigotry to satirize it. By portraying Archie Bunker as a loser, held back by his own stubborn refusal to face up to present-day realities, O'Connor felt he was showing the futility of Bunker's attitudes. The series was also attacked by conservatives who thought it was making fun of them.
Of Irish Roman Catholic background on both sides of his family (his mother's family was also O'Connors), Carroll O'Connor was born in New York City on August 2, 1924. He had two younger brothers (one of them now deceased), both of whom became physicians. Growing up in Forest Hills, Long Island, O'Connor lived in prosperous circumstances even during the Depression. The social attitudes he encountered in childhood were not generally those of Archie Bunker. "I never heard Archie's kind of talk in my own home, " he told Cynthia Lowry of The New York Post (August 11, 1971). "Mine was a family of teachers, -- my mother, two aunts and an uncle. My father was a lawyer and was in partnership with two Jews who, with their families, were close to us. There were black families in our circle of friends. my father disliked talk like Archie's -- he called it low brow."
ABC Television had the first rights to "All In The Family" and financed two pilot episode (then titled "Those Were the Days") in 1968 and 1969. But ABC executives could not bring themselves to air the series because they decided that the public was not ready for such strong fare. O'Connor too had his doubts: "I thought the American public was too dour to laugh at itself," he later recalled. After ABC rejected it, producer Norman Lear sold CBS President Bob Wood on the project and "All In The Family" was shown on CBS-TV for the first time on January 12, 1971 with O'Connor as Archie Bunker.
In its frank exposition of bigotry, including Archie's unsparing use of ethnic epithets and the treatment of topics formerly taboo, "All In The Family," marked a sharp departure form the bland situation comedies to which the American viewing public had been exposed
On May 14, 1972, O'Connor received the Emmy Award for "Outstanding continued performance by an actor in a comedy series." "All In The Family" was again rated best comedy series. An LP recording of excerpts from "All In The Family, " issued by Atlantic Records racked up sales of more than $1,000,000 by January, 1972 (and spawned a second sound track album) and the paperbacks "The Wit and Wisdom of Archie Bunker" and "Edith Bunker's 'All In The Family' Cookbook" also met with considerable success. O'Connor has personally been honored over and over for his contributions to the series. He has received three additional Emmys -- four in all for the role -- and the Peabody Award.
Since the conclusion of his famous series in 1983, O'Connor has starred in two Broadway plays and three movies for television. He has written articles for The Los Angeles Time, TV Guide and Parade Magazine, and has narrated two documentary films for television.
In January, 1990, Carroll was elected to the Television Hall of Fame for his contributions to the television industry. He was the recipient of the 1990 and 1991 NAACP Image Award as producer of "In The Heat of The Night" for "Best Dramatic Television Series" for "Contributing positive portrayal s of African Americans in a prime time television series." The series received another "Image" nomination in 1992 and Carroll was the subject of a career retrospective by The Museum of Television and Radio in New York City in December, 1992.
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