Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

At 94, taboo-breaking American TV writer-producer Norman Lear is still in good health and has a sharp mind. Filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's PBS-aired American Experience documentary serves up a career/life retrospective that finds Lear dictating his autobiography and reflecting on the past, often accompanied by vintage clips and archival interviews from upstart Lear's prolific period of creating groundbreaking American TV comedies during the Vietnam era. Lear took the medium from comfortable and sophomoric domestic pabulum to the edginess of All in the Family and Maude, ultimately landing on Nixon's notorious Enemies List. The film revisits the controversy over Good Times, Lear's attempt at a fair, honest depiction of black American family life, which was accused of promoting buffoon stereotypes (exclusively, it seems, over the unexpected breakout popularity of actor Jimmie “JJ” Walker); Lear's subsequent The Jeffersons allegedly atoned. Seemingly at the top of his game, Lear mostly walked away from showbiz (here, we learn, during the crisis of his doomed marriage to first wife, Frances). Subsequently, Lear championed free speech and progressive-liberal values via foundations and events that opposed the Reagan-era rise of the Christian right as a political force. Although the implication that Lear saved the U.S. from turning into a theocracy is a bit overstated, it would be nearly impossible to imagine American TV achieving sophistication without him. Featuring appearances by Mel Brooks, George Clooney, Jon Stewart, and father-son entertainers Carl and Rob Reiner, this is a fine biographical profile. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)