The Jeffersons
 1 9 7 5 - 1 9 8 5 (USA)
This popular US sitcom was a spin-off from All In The Family
and starred a nouveau riche black family making it to the top in
New York City with a dry-cleaning business.
George Jefferson and his wife Louise (who he called Weezy)
started out with nothing, living with George's mother. Louise was
working as a maid, and George worked off and on, whenever he
could.
George eventually opened his own business, Jefferson Cleaners
and they moved to a house in Queens and became neighbours to
Archie Bunker and family.
As George's business became more successful, the family moved
into a "dee-luxe apartment in the sky" and hired a maid,
Florence.
The Jeffersons' best friends were Helen and Tom Willis, an
interracial couple from apartment 14F. Their daughter, Jenny,
married Lionel later in the show, and had a child, Jessica.
Support characters that appeared from time to time included
Ralph the Doorman, eccentric English neighbour Harry Bentley,
Charlie from Charlie's Bar, Jessica Jefferson (George and Louise's
grand daughter), and Marcus Garvey, one of George's employees.
A number of two-part episodes were produced, including a story
where George is mugged and stabbed, an episode where Lionel and
Jenny almost divorce, and one where Louise witnesses a murder on
Halloween and is then cornered by the murderer.
Other memorable
episodes were the Martin Luther King assassination episode from
1980, the Mystery Cruise Ship episode from 1982, and all of the
Christmas episodes.
Ironically, as the show continued into the conservatism of the
Reagan years the tone of the program shifted. Louise Jefferson's
afro disappeared and so did her poor English. There was no mention
of her former life as a housekeeper.
The last episode of The Jeffersons aired on 21 July
1985.
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