Movie Review: Norman Lear: Just Another Version Of You
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- No, he's not Shakespeare's Lear and, no, he's not known for tragedy.
But he too is – or, at least, was – a king.
Of comedy.
He's Norman Lear and he's the focus of the nostalgic biographical documentary, Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You. This revealing look at the life, work, and political activism of one of the most successful producers in the history of television concentrates on his creativity, his longevity, and his employment of levity.
In essentially chronological fashion, documentarians Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (Jesus Camp) paint their portrait of this nonagenarian's life from the trauma of his abandonment by his parents at a young age up through his current delight with geriatric fatherhood.
It's an up-close-and-personal visit with a master of topical humor who became the personification of prime-time television comedy in the 1970s. If there is one TV accomplishment that Lear is best known for or associated with, it's the masterful situation comedy, All in the Family, which dominated the ratings in its day and ran from 1971 to 1979.
It was an adaptation of the British sitcom, Till Death Us Do Part, it was urgently topical, and it offered us an iconic protagonist, Archie Bunker, indelibly played by Carroll O'Connor, a bigoted husband, father, and father-in-law who shared a few important characteristics with Lear's real-life father.
Lear was, at one point, simultaneously responsible for an astounding six of the ten highest-rated network programs on the air. He also gave us Maude; The Jeffersons; Good Times; Sanford and Son; One Day at a Time; Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman; and Fernwood 2-Night.
And we get a fascinating glimpse into the kind of creative conflict that drove these demanding, timely, and sometimes timeless projects – although it might be said that the film is on the timid side in this regard and thus falls a bit short of a warts-and-all portrait, as if the makers were afraid to besmirch his unassailable record of accomplishment.
Lear was a trailblazing producer with immense cultural impact – at a time, remember, when virtually everybody watched his shows -- who today would be described as a showrunner. And in his day, he and his shows tackled important issues, made folks laugh, and got high ratings: the trifecta. Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You includes plenty of telling clips from Lear's shows and allows several talking heads – including O'Connor, Rob Reiner, Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks, George Clooney, Amy Poehler, and Jon Stewart – to share memories of and insights into Lear.
What is probably a lot less familiar to viewers are the doc's focus in the latter stages, during which the film reveals and addresses Lear's second career as an aggressive social activist who helped found "People for the American Way," a liberal advocacy group that was a response to the religious right's Moral Majority Movement in the 1980s.
Some might come into the film wondering why the subject deserves all this attention, but the film makes its case: what's being celebrated here is somebody who absolutely pushed the boundaries of television and changed our culture for the better.
So we'll broadcast 2-1/2 stars out of 4. By the time Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You wraps up, even if you started off finding the praise effusive, you'll no longer feel, well, leery.
