Archie Bunker's Place Homepage Q&A

[Dan Asnis]

I have added an e-mail Q&A with Archie Bunker's Place Writer/Producer Fred Rubin to my web site.

http://hometown.aol.com/archiesplacetv/myhomepage/tv.html

Dan Asnishttp://hometown.aol.com/archiesplacetv/myhomepage/tv.html

[ThomasE]

I liked the Q & A. It was cool that Fred Rubin was able to answer your questions. I wonder why Jean Stapleton wasn't available to do a final final appearance.

[Dan Asnis]

I think Jean had said she was done playing Edith and she wanted to move on and play other types of roles.

[TV Guy]

It's funny -- for years, I've read in several sources that Jean Stapleton was no longer interested in playing Edith at all, and that's why she was written out. But recently, I read that Stapleton was willing to continue to do a few appearances a year on "ABP", and that it was the producers (and Carroll O'Connor's) idea to kill off Edith. Their feeling was that it was getting difficult to continue to write stories around an off-camera Edith, and that as long as there was the possibility that she would appear, the audience would be disappointed in the episodes that she wasn't in (I always felt that way during the first season). They were starting to have to reach for storylines, and a widowed Archie would allow for more episodes to take place at the house rather than the bar, and for them to explore things like Archie dating again. Stapleton was willing to continue out of loyalty to the show and was a little surprised when the Carroll told her, but was ultimately OK with it because it would free her up to do other things full-time.

Either way, I understand that Jean Stapleton didn't want to have Edith die on-camera because she felt it would be "ghoulish".

[cp]

Yup! Thats the true story.