#archie-bunker — Public Fediverse posts

From Seinfeld to Shawshank, Rob Reiner changed Hollywood for ever – Movies – The Guardian

From Seinfeld to Shawshank, Rob Reiner changed Hollywood for ever

Reiner’s own films reshaped modern comedy and drama with their intelligence, empathy and range. But through his company, Castle Rock, he paved the way for Seinfeld, Sorkin and many more…

• News: Rob Reiner found dead in apparent homicide
• Gallery: Rob Reiner – a life in pictures
• Meeting Reiner was like a visit from Santa

By Andrew Pulver, Mon 15 Dec 2025 08.29 EST

As a film-maker, Rob Reiner championed humour, civility and intelligence – qualities you suppose would be out of step with the Hollywood of the 1980s where he made his name, and in the 1990s where he scored a series of extraordinary, far-reaching successes. Reiner had a family interest in the workings of on-screen comedy: his father Carl had played a key role on Sid Caesar’s TV shows, which themselves were revolutionary, and helped birth a new generation of screen comics by directing Steve Martin’s film debut The Jerk. Rob had become a household name as Meathead, the liberal foil to Carroll O’Connor’s bigoted Archie Bunker in 70s sitcom All in the Family (the equivalent to Mike Rawlins v Warren Mitchell in the British original, Till Death Us Do Part). But it was as a director and producer that he really made his impact felt.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ul-FKLl_K7s

In 1984, Reiner released This Is Spinal Tap, a “mockumentary” about a fictitious heavy metal band from the UK that rewrote the rules on what comedy could do. It sent up rock’n’roll behaviour and codified its cliches (with Reiner himself doing a hilarious parody of Martin Scorsese’s hosting role in The Last Waltz) and gave us zingers that haven’t lost their comedy power more than 30 years on: “The numbers all go to 11”, “it’s such a fine line between stupid, and er … clever.” Its deployment of improvised comedy was revolutionary for a Hollywood feature, and while Reiner wasn’t the first to use the fake-documentary techniques for comedic purposes (that goes back at least to Woody Allen’s Take the Money and Run), it hugely popularised the mockumentary style; subsequent efforts include Bob Roberts, Fear of a Black Hat, Drop Dead Gorgeous and Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. All these owe Tap a huge debt – as well as the microgenre of star Christopher Guest’s improv-mockumentaries: Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show and A Mighty Wind. Almost incidentally, Spinal Tap became a sort-of-real band, with tours, record releases and a follow-up feature (Spinal Tap II: The End Continues), in which the presence of music industry titans Paul McCartney and Elton John demonstrated the high regard in which the original was held.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_lEs4FYkhs

Continue/Read Original Article: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/rob-reiner-director-this-is-spinal-tap-when-harry-met-sally

#RobReiner initially rose to fame playing Meathead, #ArchieBunker’s son-in-law, on the sitcom “All in the Family” in the 1970s. He then went on to become a remarkably versatile director and a force in California and national Democratic politics.

Reiner was the son of a pioneering television comedian who became a popular sitcom actor himself before directing a slate of beloved films including “This Is Spinal Tap,” “When Harry Met Sally …” and “The Princess Bride.”

Racists and bigots are generally angry, broken and insecure people which is why they're so miserable.

Often they're only happy when they're expressing their own familiar brand of hate. It's the only thing that gives them satisfaction.

Ask Carol O'Connor who played the famous racist and bigot, Archie Bunker, in the 70s sitcom All in the Family.

#allinthefamily #ArchieBunker #racists #bigotry

"East is East and West is West, but none of us is gonna meet Mark Twain." — Archie Bunker — — — #ArchieBunker #quote #quotes #east #west #quip #twain #meet #meet #humor #funny #joke #malaprop #misspeak #misquotation

Archie Bunker: Too woke for today's Republican Party.

https://buff.ly/4d4SfCb

Via Xitter/ @ThorntonMcEnery

#HalfHeartedFanatic #KamalaHarris #Harris2024 #KHive #Election #Democrats #Democrat #GOP #Trump #TrumpLost #TrumpIsAFelon #TrumpForPrison #Republican #PutinsPuppet #NoTrump #NeverTrump #LockHimUp #AntiTrump #AntiGOP #Republicans #TrumpVance2024 #JDVance #MAGA #MAGAts #Racism #Racist #ArchieBunker #AllInTheFamily

What are you watching?
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1982 Archie Bunkers Place Commercial
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#ArchieBunker #TVshow #Television #Commercial #TVCommercial #CarrollOConnor #SallyStruthers #Reto #Vintage

|| Didn't need no welfare state,
Everybody pulled his weight.
Gee our old LaSalle ran great.
Those were the days. ||

Archie Bunker in the early 1970s sung about how great the 1940s were for Americans and how terrible the 1970s were. Curiously, it's become fashionable in the last couple decades to claim North America was at some kind of cultural and economic peak in the 1970s.
____________
#ArchieBunker
#AllInTheFamily
#TheSeventies

Would Archie Bunker Be Welcome On TV Today? Bill Maher Says, “No”
#News #ArchieBunker #BillMaher #RealTimeWithBillMaher

https://deadline.com/2023/12/bill-maher-archie-bunker-tv-today-1235670037/

Norman Lear has died (at 101!) and his 70's sitcoms were definitely mainstays of TV in my formative years.

"All in the Family," "The Jeffersons," "Maude" - I loved them all.

I distinctly remember telling my folks 'round about '73 that Archie and Edith reminded me of them.

Looking back, I don't think that went over very well.

#NormanLear #ArchieBunker #TV #70s #oldpeopleofmastodon

#FictionalCharactersInRetirement

Archie Bunker: Psychoanalyst

#HashTagGames #ArchieBunker #CarolOConnor #Meathead

You know, as a child of the 1970s, I watched the TV show "All In The Family" (and cheered for Mike "Meathead"). It just blows my mind that someone who is pretty much a salacious #ArchieBunker on steroids got elected, and somehow is still popular, even after showing his true colors? I just don't get it...

Gnarly Crunker

#FlipABadCharacterGood #HashtagGames #ArchieBunker #Crunk

Whenever I think of Trump, a few different BUNKERS come to mind.
#DonaldTrump #Trump #MAGA #ArchieBunker #DeadFish #HitlersBunker #racism #bigotry #hate #scapegoating