I still enjoy Amos and Andy, All in the Family, Sanford and Son, Beverly Hillbillies, etc. they were all fun and very comical. Youtube has many of them. The Amos and Andy TV show was one of the best. Comedy done right.
Amos played the straight man who tried to warn Andy about falling for one of Kingfish's schemes to con him out of his money. Amos wasn't even in all the episodes and he had a very small part. The show came on in reruns in the afternoon about the time I got home from school in junior high. I had just enough time to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a glass of chocolate milk before sitting down to watch it. The show might have perpetuated racial stereotypes but it was an important breakthrough at a time when roles for black actors were virtually nonexistent. It gave work to some talented black actors. I heard a story one time about a woman who always played the part of the maid in movies in the 30s and 40s and into the early days of television in the 50s. I don't remember who she was but she might have been the one who played the maid in Gone With The Wind. An interviewer asked her how she could always take roles that were demeaning to her race. Her answer: "I'd rather play a maid for $700 a week than be one for $7 a week."
Thanks. Among her other quotes: "When I was little my mother taught me how to use a knife and a fork. The trouble is that Mother forgot to teach me how to stop using them." And "As for those grapefruit and buttermilk diets, I'll take roast chicken and dumplings."
I didn't think anything he said was out of line by even today's standards. ONE THING I did notice though. If James were that age today the lyrics would be " I feelS good" instead of "feel".
