Sketch o’the Week- The Jeffersons!

We’re back to our usual “Sketch o’ the Week” insanity, and the continuation of our “classic TV sitcoms” theme. This week’s sketch is of the two main stars of “The Jeffersons”, Sherman Hemsley and Isabel Sanford! “The Jeffersons” was a spin-off of “All in the Family”, and actually ran for more seasons (11) than “All in the Family” (9). It was ground breaking for being based on a black family that was portrayed as successful and wealthy, and for being the first TV series to prominently feature a married interracial couple. Norman Lear claimed in his autobiography that he got the idea to move the Jeffersons from “All in the Family”, where they were working class neighbors of the Bunkers in Queens, NY, and make them financially successful and living in a luxury apartment in Manhattan after members of the Black Panthers who were fans of Lear’s shows met with him an complained that anytime Black people were portrayed on television they were poor and living in run-down neighborhoods. That change in their characters led to their own long running series.