Growing Pains with Kirk Cameron

If you want to start a thread to bash Kirk Cameron, do you really need to pretend it's about something else?

Never saw this but that little girl is fug.

It was about a girl with bulimia and baiting pedos and twinkhounds with a teen Leo DiCaprio.

And Matthew Perry dies in a car accident. Or was it Brad Pitt?

Hated it then, hate it now. This and that stupid greaser show that came on before it were the two worst sitcoms of the 1980s to run predominantly in the 1980s. Not one funny line or believable characterization between the two of them.

I can't believe this show had people from [italic]WKRP in Cincinnati[/italic] on the production staff. That show was SO much better. Even [italic]Silver Spoons[/italic] holds up better than this crap!

If Disney+ refuses to upload an episode of [italic]The Muppet Show[/italic] with guest star Chris Langham because of his child p*rn conviction, then this show should not be allowed to be shown again either.

I have no idea what greaser comedy you’re talking about. Head of the Class?

The weird thing is that I vaguely remember watching episodes on occasion but I see now that it was on Thursday nights, but I would only watch NBC on Thursdays, so no idea when I would have seen it.

The original premise was that the mom was returning to work after staying home with the kids (I think she was a news reporter?) and the dad moved his psychiatric practice into the house so he was the one staying home with the kids. That's probably why they paired it with Who's the Boss, since that was also about a man taking care of the house and kids and the woman working outside the home. But eventually it became the usual teenager storylines.

Was Cameron supposed to be an Alex Keaton type?

Alex P. Keaton cared about three things: money, money, and money. He didn't seem to give a shit about people's race or private lives.

[quote] The original premise was that the mom was returning to work after staying home with the kids (I think she was a news reporter?) and the dad moved his psychiatric practice into the house so he was the one staying home with the kids. That's probably why they paired it with Who's the Boss, since that was also about a man taking care of the house and kids and the woman working outside the home. But eventually it became the usual teenager storylines.

I'd rather watch [italic]Hello, Larry[/italic].

All of those family-oriented sitcoms of the 80s are unwatchable today. Roseanne really helped to kill that genre.

Growing Pains, Mr. Belvedere, Different Strokes, even the Cosby Show were just awful.

r9, No, they reversed most of the traits on the kids from Family Ties (probably to avoid comparisons). On FT, Alex was the smart, driven one; Mallory was the shallow, materialistic one. On GP, Mike was the "cool" one who didn't care about school; Carol was the smart, nerdy one. On FT, the third kid was a girl; on GP, the third kid was a boy. Each show introduced a pregnancy and fourth kid around the middle of the run; on FT, it was a boy; on GP, a girl.

R12: Either way, they enabled him to have a career in the first place, so they sowed the seeds to do even more damage in the 1990s when his stupid show premiered and was everything wrong with the worst shows of the 1980s only worse.

All I remember is when Tracey Gold, the teen daughter Carol, went from nerd to whore during sweeps month. And she remained a whore, darlin'.

Geez, I just looked at Wikipedia and had no idea the show was that popular. In 1986-87, it was the #8 show on TV (higher than the shows that aired before and after it); in 1987-88, it was #5. Definitely not would have come to mind if I thought the most popular shows were back then.

[quote][R9], No, they reversed most of the traits on the kids from Family Ties (probably to avoid comparisons). On FT, Alex was the smart, driven one; Mallory was the shallow, materialistic one. On GP, Mike was the "cool" one who didn't care about school; Carol was the smart, nerdy one. On FT, the third kid was a girl; on GP, the third kid was a boy. Each show introduced a pregnancy and fourth kid around the middle of the run; on FT, it was a boy; on GP, a girl.

They did another reversal: [italic]Family Ties[/italic] was funny. [italic]Growing Pains[/italic] was not. Don't forget they also copied [italic]Cosby Show[/italic] as well.

Likewise, [italic]Who's The Boss[/italic] ripped off the mutually exclusive parts of [italic]Gimme A Break![/italic] (which Tracey Gold was cast in originally) and [italic]Cheers[/italic]. And once again, the NBC originals held up better than the ABC knockoffs.

Growing Pains and Family Ties were similar in the fact that both shows were originally supposed to focus on the parents but then Kirk Cameron and Michael J. Fox became the breakout stars of those respective shows and the focus became all about them.

The same thing happened with the Valerie Harper sitcom. She was the star of the show but then Jason Bateman became the hot new panty creamer sensation for teen girls and the show was retooled to be centered around him. Valerie Harper was NOT happy, to say the least.

I guess the lesson to be learned is that if you're the star of a sitcom you'd better make sure the actor who's playing your teenage son is ugly AF 😂

[quote] Geez, I just looked at Wikipedia and had no idea the show was that popular. In 1986-87, it was the #8 show on TV (higher than the shows that aired before and after it); in 1987-88, it was #5. Definitely not would have come to mind if I thought the most popular shows were back then.

More proof Americans are racist if this got better ratings than [italic]Gimme A Break![/italic], [italic]227[/italic], [italic]Amen[/italic], [italic]Webster[/italic], [italic]Frank's Place[/italic] or any of the other non-Cosby Black shows still on at the time.

Cheers and Golden Girls were the only good sitcoms in the 80s. Everything else was total shit.

[italic]Too Close For Comfort[/italic] wasn't that bad. Neither were [italic]It's a Living[/italic] or [italic]9 to 5[/italic]. ABC should have stuck with those instead of canceling them for this sappy junk.

[quote] Growing Pains, Mr. Belvedere, Different Strokes, even the Cosby Show were just awful.

You can add the Hogan Family to that list. Although it seems nobody even remembers that show.

I went to college with his future wife Chelsea Noble, nee Nancy Mueller.. I wish I could say she was a bitch but she was very nice and gorgeous. Shame what happened to her.

They also passed on the reboots of both [italic]Leave it to Beaver[/italic] and [italic]What's Happening!![/italic] despite being the homes of the originals.

Actually I have to amend that. Gimme A Break could be funny, Nell Carter was very talented. And for such a large woman she could really move!

Robert Iger is part of the reason ABC had so many terrible shows in the 1980s. He was president of ABC Entertainment when the worst of them were on. He is scum.

The people who think all 1980s sitcoms were crap are projecting the flaws of this show and the even worse show that aired before it onto shows that weren't terrible.

The 1990s and beyond had many more worse shows. In fact, I'm not that convinced by all the hype around TV's so-called "Second Golden Age." More like network TV reached a theoretical nadir in the mid-to-late 1990s and had nowhere to go but up, while technology made it possible for non-hack writers to do better work elsewhere.

Whose idea was it to name his friend Boner?

[italic]Married with Children[/italic] started in the 1980s; that held up pretty well.

Even on an anonymous board, I'm ashamed to admit I thought he was cute and had a crush on him back then. No, I'm not a pedo. He and I are the same age.

I always thought Kirk Cameron was homely on the show because he had the same hairstyle as all the Golden Girls.

The show's writers tortured Tracy Gold with constant ugly and fat jokes aimed at her character. No wonder she turned anorexic.

[quote] The show's writers tortured Tracy Gold with constant ugly and fat jokes aimed at her character. No wonder she turned anorexic.

In that case, her getting fired from [italic]Gimme A Break![/italic] after the original unaired pilot was best for all parties. She never would have survived the early years of wall-to-wall fat jokes. Except that there, the people on the receiving end of them actually were morbidly obese.

Nell Carter was clearly coked out of her mind on Gimme A Break. If you know how to spot it, you can tell when she'd hoovered up a few lines in her dressing room before filming a scene.

[quote] If you want to start a thread to bash Kirk Cameron, do you really need to pretend it's about something else?

It's always about racism. Ever since I became Black, it opened my eyes, bulged my lips, and flattened my nose to that reality. Now go get a sex change since Pat Robertson says it's okay.

OP, don't you ever refer to me by my slave name again!

"Married with Children started in the 1980s; that held up pretty well."

Dad is a professional, perpetual loser, mom is a do-nothing lay about, daughter is a first class slut/tramp/trollop and junior an old perv in the making.

With stats like those, how can you go wrong?

If gay men are women and lesbians are men like Rev. Robertson says, then that means Bill Cosby raped a man. Oh Lawdy Lawd!

[quote] Whose idea was it to name his friend Boner?

Poor Boner ended up hanging himself from a tree in Canada.

Even Married With Children wasn't immune to trying out the stereotypical sitcom cliches.

Remember when they tried to bring that kid on board for one season and they got such backlash they dropped him halfway through?

[quote]Even Married With Children wasn't immune to trying out the stereotypical sitcom cliches.

At least they didn't feel a pathological need to preach to their audience. You can tell that even the other shows that fell into this trap were treating it like a network-imposed chore by this point.

[quote]Remember when they tried to bring that kid on board for one season and they got such backlash they dropped him halfway through?

That kid was only there to make up for the baby storylines they could no longer do when Katey Sagal miscarried

R40 His name was Seven on the show. He's now a voice actor.

The Seavers lived in Huntington, Long Island aka Trumpland.

Married...with Children and Roseanne are the few 80s sitcoms to age well because they were created to be anti-family comedies and portray dysfunctional white working class families. MWC was originally titled "Not the Cosbys" and the writers constantly tested the limits of what they could get away with. Despite their wackiness (especially in later seasons), MWC and Roseanne are more relatable especially with the more obvious rising income inequality in the 21st century. I think 227 also aged better than The Cosby Show because it felt more real too. A lot of the 80s family shows are just too optimistic and saccharine. Unlike The Brady Bunch which is unbelievably awful and ridiculous that it's funny, a lot of the 80s family sitcoms are just bland and boring.

I disagree the 80s had the worst sitcoms. The 70s and 90s are not really better and had just as much shit on the air but I guess the 80s seemed worse because it allowed shitty shows to last more than a season. I still think the 2000s was a step up once networks started ditching laugh tracks though The Big Bang Theory lasted way longer than it should have.

I had a HUGE crush on Mike's best friend Boner.

Growing Pains didn't have a long life in syndication unlike The Cosby Show, Full House, Step by Step, Family Matters and Who's The Boss? So it's not as known among younger people. I only remember Growing Pains mainly from the Disney Channel and Nick at Nite reruns in the 2000s. Then Kirk Cameron being a crazy homophobic Televangelist and his awful Left Behind movies that my Christian mother used to play which always kept GP into my memory. Alan Thicke dying was sad and I didn't even realize Robin Thicke was his son at first despite their heavy resemblance. I always forget Leo was in this show because he was only in the last season.

In comparison, Full House was forced down everyone's throats because it was always on the air all the time. Morning, afternoon and evening. That's the only reason twentysomethings and little kids still know it because it was overly syndicated. Same with Friends, George Lopez, Everybody Loves Raymond and Seinfeld. Cable TV always airs these shows all the time in blocks.

i dont think the writer's knew what a "Boner" was, and Mike Seaver would never have been friends with someone nicknamed Boner. I remember getting secondhand embarrassment watching the show when Alan Thicke would say Boner.

[quote]They did another reversal: Family Ties was funny. Growing Pains was not. [bold]Don't forget they also copied Cosby Show as well.[/bold]

R17 is correct. On The Cosby Show, Vanessa was the unfavorite; on Growing Pains, Ben was the unfavorite.

The original opening intro to Growing Pains was obviously inspired by Cheers. I preferred the photograph aging montage they later used.

It was about sex, basically.

....

Leo looked 12 in Growing Pains but was actually 16. He looked 14 in What's Eating Gilbert Grape but was 18. He looked 16 in Titanic but always actually 22. Now he looks like a chubby toddler with a ton of facial hair and a bad tan.

Tracey Gold's sister Missy was a regular on "Benson," which ran almost as long as "Growing Pains."

This show just always makes me remember high-waisted jeans and slacks. Everybody always was costumed in high-waisted pants!!

He had dirty feets.

Why didn’t they try to make the Seavers more believable as Lawn Guylanders? They seemed a lot more So Cal.

Whatchu talkin’ ‘bout, Willis?

[quote] Why didn’t they try to make the Seavers more believable as Lawn Guylanders? They seemed a lot more So Cal.

Same with Friends, felt more SoCal than Manhattan.

[quote]Why didn’t they try to make the Seavers more believable as Lawn Guylanders? They seemed a lot more So Cal.

If they had done an authentic Long Island family, it would've shocked and horrified the entire country.

They should have turned Tracey Gold's character into an Amy Fisher type. That would have been entertaining.

These shows were made for Middle America and can't be too regional or accurate in order to not alienate their audience. But I often wonder why they can't just set all of these shows in Wisconsin or Minnesota instead of pretending like these characters could live in NY, Chicago, Boston or California.

r61 I've thought that too. Why don't they just set these shows in Middle America, because the characters are written to pander to that demographic anyway.

Like Friends being set in NYC. Please. There was nothing NYC about that show.

Kirk had a delicious high water phat ass for a white boy. I fucked Kirk Cameron off the coast of Catalina one whole summer in his ASS.

"A lesbian FBI Agent (Kirk Cameron) poses as a teen boy to infiltrate a drug-soaked high school"

didn't they age up the little girl on this show? she started off as a baby, but the next season she was 5 or 6?

Leo Dicaprio was brought in because Kirk Cameron was aging out of teen idol territory and Jeremy Miller went from a cute kid to a homely and gross teenager - girls were not going to be interested in him at all. Leo had teen idol potential, but the show ended pretty quickly anyway.

Deep inside, Kirk is not christian.

[quote] But I often wonder why they can't just set all of these shows in Wisconsin

Because then you bitches wonder why someone from Milwaukee has a suspiciously NYish accent!

All I remember is the theme song. But I did think Kirk was cute when I was a preteen.

The E True Hollywood Story was interesting.

The cast member who was the most insightful was Jeremy Miller. When he talked about Tracey's struggle with anorexia, he was nearly in tears when he talked about how worried he had been for her when he went to lunch with her at the studio and she barely ate. He also didn't have hard feelings about Leo being brought on to replace him.

Tracey Gold loved playing a brainy nerd because in real life, she had difficulty in school due to dyslexia. The scripts included lots of "fat" jokes from Mike at Carol's (and Tracey's) expense. That didn't help with her anorexia. I remember when she appeared on Oprah to try to convince another anorexia victim to seek treatment.

Midway through the show, Kirk had some kind of religious awakening, and he withdrew from the rest of the cast; he didn't even invite them to his wedding.

Julie McCullough, who had played his girlfriend was let go from the show.

From wikipedia:

Julie McCullough landed the role of nanny Julie Costello on the television show Growing Pains in 1989. She appeared in eight episodes until she was fired in 1990 ... In his 2008 autobiography Still Growing, Cameron states that he did not call for her to be fired and the show's producers have claimed that Julie's character was never intended to be a permanent character. However, the long-told story is that Cameron called for McCullough's termination because of his anger and objections to her having posed nude in Playboy, accusing the show's producers of promoting pornography. A decade later, Cameron apologized to his TV family for some of his prior behavior due to his lack of maturity. He reportedly did not reconcile with McCullough, who claims that Cameron refused to speak to her during a later encounter.

He's a COVID denier and Trump lover. Fuck Kirk Cameron No MORE!!

It's easy to forget how popular Kirk Cameron was in the early years of Growing Pains. My sister had a huge crush on him. I never got his appeal, although now when I watch the early years, both Cameron and Mike were more fun. Then Cameron found Jesus and he became so dull.

r32 is right. The fat jokes directed at Gold are shocking to watch and hear nowadays. That would never fly today.

I think the '80s had some funny sitcoms. Family Ties could be really funny (and Michael Gross was the MVP of that show, not Michael J. Fox in my opinion). And Gimme A Break could be hilarious thanks to Nell Carter.

Some of the '90s sitcoms have not aged well. I still enjoy watching Step by Step but even though it debuted in 1991, it was still very '80s in style and humour.

The way McCullough was treated was disgusting.

Having said that, she was a HORRIBLE actress.

I thought the girl who played Cameron's girlfriend and got fired was Grace Slick's daughter. I must be thinking of a different show.

It was an erotic thriller

I enjoyed seeing Alan Thicke’s hairy forearms.

R21 I liked TCFC but it has not aged well. They had an incredibly bizarre episode where Monroe was kidnapped and raped by some women and it was played for laughs.

Fuck Kirk Cameron for lots of things, but especially what he did to Julie McCullough.

Whatever its other issues, I still say The Cosby Show has the best line in sitcom history: "No 14 year old boy should have a $95 shirt unless he is onstage with his 4 brothers."

^ And in case you think I made up the rape of Monroe episode:

R18 but again, Michael J Fox was (very) talented. Kirk Cameron was not. I agree with whoever said that all those ABC shows were knockoffs off Far superior ones.

Tracy Gold was originally cast in Gimme a Break? Which part? I guess even with her agent father he had to push and push and push until he could get her some success - never else could someone of such average looks, zero talent, and one of the most annoying voices ive ever heard on any actor of any age gotten so many shots at successful TV sitcoms.

I always thought Jeremy Miller was cute in his goofy younger brother way. When he entered his teenage years and got chubby for a little while, they followed the sitcom cliche of making the mom have another baby. The new kid was annoying as hell and looked like a toilet brush in overalls.

[quote]Tracy Gold was originally cast in Gimme a Break? Which part?

Tracey was supposed to be Samantha Kanisky, but she couldn't play a tomboy well enough so they recast her and instead of a boy they went with three girls.

[quote] Poor Boner ended up hanging himself from a tree in Canada.

It was more of a stump.

[quote] Kirk had a delicious high water phat ass for a white boy. I

"High water"?

[quote] Didn't they age up the little girl on this show? she started off as a baby, but the next season she was 5 or 6?

Prime time SORAS.

[quote] I always thought Jeremy Miller was cute in his goofy younger brother way.

He used to remind me of Simon LeBon, Duran Duran lead singer.

Tracey was anorexic before she was cast on Growing Pains. She developed it pre-puberty and had gotten treatment and seemed to have it under control. Then during the show she gained some weight and that triggered a horrific relapse, no doubt aggravated by the fat jokes. They actually made a point to include her modest weight gain in the script, because of course it just had to be.

This is "fat" Tracey, whose weight apparently could not possibly have gone unremarked on the show:

A year later she's skeletal:

Casted.

Luckily, she can still eat.

[quote]I see now that it was on Thursday nights, but I would only watch NBC on Thursdays, so no idea when I would have seen it.

I'm sure someone has already pointed this out but "Growing Pains" was on Tuesday nights, not Thursdays. IIRC, it was sandwiched between "Who's the Boss?" and "Moonlighting."

[quote]Leo looked 12 in Growing Pains but was actually 16.

I thought it was funny when they had that "Growing Pains" reunion several years ago and Alan Thicke joked that they were still waiting to find out if Leo was going to participate.

In fact, that also reminds me of how surprising I thought it was when Leo issued a statement after Thicke's passing saying what a nice man he was. Not because I didn't think Thicke was a good person, just that Leo who rarely says anything publicly felt compelled to speak about him. He obviously must have thought a lot of him even after all those years.

Why does Tracy Gold look so different in R49? Was this before her anorexia?

I always thought he was the most irritating character and never thought he was a “heartthrob.”🤮

Tracey Gold was talentless and pretty fug, it makes sense that her father was an agent.

Kirk has been nightly holding a 100-day live session on his FB page where he reads from the bible and talks all things 'Merica, socialism, etc., while perched in front of his house as an American flag waves in the background. He's marketed his nightly chat session as spiritual, but what it's really all about is that he's pissed that the Republican party no longer controls the WH and both houses of Congress. This is all, of course, AFTER he spent the winter flouting social distance, masking and public gathering mandates by holding mask-optional outdoor Christmas caroling events as a way of rebelling against the mandates set by California governor Gavin Newsom. In short, he's still an annoying turd.

Cameron apparently drove the GP cast crazy after he found Jesus and wouldn't shut up about it. Miller and Gold were both Jewish and esp. didn't care to hear about it.

Just the Ten of Us was a GP spin-off and was MUCH funnier. Unfortunately, it was cancelled after two seasons, not for low ratings but because the Powers That Be wanted the TGIF line-up to be an all Miller/Boyett affair. The JTTOU replacement, Going Places, ended up not going anywhere, only lasting one season.

Was Growing Pains a sci-fi show? How did they ever explain the baby suddenly becoming 10 years old the next season while everyone else hasn’t aged? Ben was still in high school (freshmen) when he got a baby sister and was still in high school (sophomore) when she turned 10. Was she an alien or was it time travel?

I loved the episode where Mike Seaver, (Cameron), gets his asshole rimmed by Boner.

I find it interesting how Kirk Cameron became an obnoxious Evangelical Christian and started proselytizing in an industry that has a heavy representation of Jewish, gay, bisexual and socially liberal people working. He must have been very passionate and also very stupid to kill his acting career like this. But honestly becoming a Televangelist probably made him more money than GP did. People really send their life savings to these evil snake oil salesmen who claim to be the voice of God.

We know, r100.

I still think it was a shitty move the way he treated the girl who played Julie after she was in Playboy. Sanctimonious prick.

Anyone with any knowledge of NY area sports might find this interesting. The main family were the Seavers and the next door neighbors were the Koosmans. Apparently the Executive Producer or someone else with the show was a big NY Mets fan and the names were nods to Mets pitchers Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman.

Sometimes our mind forgets things on purpose when they are truly awful to save ourselves! "Growing Pains" is such a thing

So is that rumor about Kirk being gangbanged in a leather sex club in the late 80s true or not?

R100, and despite his assholish proselytizing, he was still given a headline eponymous show.

R91 Oh, shut up!

teenage Ben looks like the Encyclopedia Britannica guy

We always referred to the show as "Groin Pains".

R91 Leo even attended (and spoke) at Alan Thicke's funeral, with the rest of the cast except for Ashley Johnson.

They were both frequent visitors at the Playboy mansion, which is probably how they maintained their close friendship.

R108, are you R45's sister?

[quote] he was still given a headline eponymous show.

Interesting. I don't remember that show at all.

Theme Song.

Final scene

R111, probably because it flopped. They gave him a second season despite it being a critic and ratings failure, because Hollywood is supposedly so anti-Christian. He also played some anti-choice nutter in that flop movie Listen to Me. Cameron only went full-on Christian programming after he was no longer a mainstream success.

[quote] I'm sure someone has already pointed this out but "Growing Pains" was on Tuesday nights, not Thursdays. IIRC, it was sandwiched between "Who's the Boss?" and "Moonlighting."

You could just as easily have watched NBC, CBS, PBS, or cable until 9 o’clock. Or, better yet, you could’ve read a book. We used to do that back in the days before the Internet. Some of us had a stop loss on how much of the bad we could take in order to take the good.

He became a fundie long before his career was in the shitter.

Family Ties also did a quick aging of the baby to some overly-cute boy with the dreaded bowl cut that meant he would be giving "witty" digs at the adults in the room.

Both shows had a fair amount of focus on the brother-sister rivalry with a bit of sparring, but I guess that is an old sitcom staple going back to Betty and Bud and Laurie and Keith.

Alex also fell in love with the baby's nanny, although I doubt Geena Davis was meant to stay around long or end up with Alex ,

Family Ties could be funny, but they had a fair amount of very special episodes that were big then -- drunk Uncle Tom Hanks - Alex taking speed to study even before Jessie and her caffeine pills). Why do I think there might have been a homeless episode as well - that was a pretty common one.

I was the target age for the show and the girls at school were crushing on him. I noticed him a bit later once he got rid of the mullet and got a little beefier and switched the high waisted kakhis for 501s - which I hate to admit, did show off a nice ass. I think I had some sort of after-school activity the night it was on, because I did not watch it much when it was online and saw it more later when it was in syndication.

[quote] Family Ties also did a quick aging of the baby to some overly-cute boy with the dreaded bowl cut

Brian Bonsall. He's had run ins with the law. He also played Wor's Klingon son, Alexander Rozhenko, in Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Awe, that was a touching series finale moment. I gave up on the show before it went off the air.

Don't forget the VSE where Alex's friend is killed in a car accident and he has a nervous breakdown. It was advertised as this big solo acting tour-de-force for Fox, as nearly the entire episode was him monologuing to a therapist. I'm sure the rest of the class just loved that.

*rest of the cast

I will say while Family Ties was a better show in general, the Growing Pains finale might have been less annoying (and that scene above a r113 is actually kind of touching).

I saw the Family Ties finale on AntennaTV a couple of years ago and they tried to make this huge drama between Alex and Elyse and her anger about him going away. He was a college graduate going away to grad school -she should have been concerned if he was not leaving home. Plus, it was always a bit contrived Alex did not leave the house after his high school graduation (as it is for most college aged kids on sitcoms, but esp. for Alex). The Keatons always seemed like parents who would want their kids to follow their dreams, so it seemed off that Elyse was so hurt and needy. It was just an excuse to have a lot of dramatic moments between the actors during the episodes forgetting it was a sitcom and supposed to be funny.

I do think Alex's dropping and leaving Courtney Cox from his future plans was pretty in character. Plus not sure they ever really clicked as a couple on the show.

R113 neither Tracey nor Joanna Kerns turns the light out when they’re the last to leave! What kind of sitcom ending is that?

Wow, R109. I did not know that. That was very classy of Leo. Thanks for the info.

r43, Huntington was also the hometown of Neal Marlens, the show's creator, which is probably why it was set there. He and his wife also created The Wonder Years, and were two of the creators of These Friends of Mine (which changed its title to Ellen in the second season).

Looking at his Wikipedia page, Marlens' father was a psychologist and his mother was a newspaper editor, so he really didn't have to stretch too far in coming up with this show, eh?

That final scene at R113 was dull, sad, and anti-climactic.

So many sitcoms have this weird arc where for years no one leaves home, and then just in time for the finale suddenly everyone is leaving.

Fresh Prince had that type of finale. Everyone decided to pack up and leave and go their own ways. That '70s Show had a weird finale as well. At least they got an ending. Married...with Children didn't have a finale because Fox cancelled it without telling anyone. While My Wife and Kids, Full House and Family Matters ended on cliffhangers because the writers didn't know if the show would be renewed. I think Malcolm in the Middle had one of the best finales for a sitcom.

I'm too young to have appreciated it in real time, but best sitcom finale has to be Newhart. If you read up on the context, it's fucking brilliant.

Since sitcoms were made to run in endless loops in syndication, it would make more sense if they didn't have a real finale. Just the family stuck forever in that big house with their endless petty problems, never moving on or moving out.

I’ve always found Married with Children totally unwatchable. Even if something was funny they had the most obnoxious studio audience ever that just made me change the channel.

The Simpsons did a great parody of the MWC's studio audience of horny construction workers.

Unhappily Ever After, a MWC rip-off had an even worse studio audience and it lasted 5 years since The WB actively tries to avoid cancelling shows.

[quote] The original premise was that the mom was returning to work after staying home with the kids (I think she was a news reporter?) and the dad moved his psychiatric practice into the house so he was the one staying home with the kids.

So it started as a rip off of The Cosby Show, then morphed into a rip off of Family Ties as Kirk Cameron became famous with the Teen Beat crowd?

The Newhart finale was indeed brilliant.

Wow - Unhappily Ever After lasted five years?

I vaguely remember they killed off the wife and had her haunt her husband as a ghost. Of course, this was also the show with Bob Golthwait as a rabbit. Nicki Cox post-breast implants --- pre-cutting up her face.

It's a shame that Just the Ten Of Us got canceled. It was much funnier than this show. That show's cast got screwed. Apparently the show had been doing well.

R136

Yes and despite having 100 episodes which is the standard for syndication. UEA was only syndicated for two years and fell off the face of the earth. No DVD release either or streaming. I guess people really hated it that much. The co-creator of MWC, Ron Leavitt created UEA and didn't intend for it to be a MWC rip-off at first. It was supposed to be about a married couple splitting up and living in separate houses while co-parenting their kids. Mr. Floppy the talking stuffed bunny was only supposed to be a once-an-episode gag and the kids were just for the background. But Nikki Cox and Kevin Connelly stole the show and it became about their characters and their high school/college hijinks. Unlike MWC which gave all of their characters focus, UEA became the Nikki Cox show featuring her crazy father, idiot brother, Mr. Floppy, her cute little brother and her annoying mother who was killed and resurrected only to be written off for good.

Given Nikki had success on Las Vegas, Kevin was in Entourage and the young Justin Berfield ended up as Reese in Malcolm in the Middle (and the first child actor to have 100 episodes in two sitcoms). That nobody still acknowledges this show. I find it actually quite funny, un-PC and they tried very hard to push the limits and ended up even more wackier and cartoonish than its predecessor.

I've never even heard of Unhappily Ever After, and I pay attention to pop culture. Amazing that it went on for that long flying under the radar.

[quote] I've never even heard of Unhappily Ever After

Same here.

R113 Tracey Gold is also holding herself in a really weird way the entire episode (I remember I actually watched it). Either she was shivering on set or just felt very uncomfortable /self conscious to be there (or both). Also possibly the worst fake eating of food ever (which she laughs at now).

Over 100 posts and none of you gay bitches even touched on the real reason behind the show. It was a vehicle/showcase for me and my mad acting skills.

Wow.

Alan Thicke and Joanna Kerns really had great chemistry together, you could totally believe they were a married couple and liked to fuck.

WEHT Joanna Kerns?

Yes, the chemistry between Thicke and Kerns was strong. It was also strong between Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Somers in Step by Step. Not great shows, but the shows benefitted from that chemistry.

R143 this is true. I’ve always liked both of them - it was the kids (and writing and pretty much everything else) that sucked.

R145 well it wasn’t hard for Suzanne to act “chemistry” given her faaabulously sexual relationship with her real life hottie of a hubs. Do you know they still do it 20x a day?

Suzanne Somers has a broken neck. But that doesn't stop Alan from enjoying her from behind! She is a glory.

[quote]Either she was shivering on set or just felt very uncomfortable /self conscious to be there (or both).

Didn't she come back from the finale or last couple of episodes after having to take a leave of absence earlier in the season to deal with her anorexia which was now public knowledge?

r144, she did a little acting afterward, but she mostly transitioned into directing. She directed an episode of GP, and has pretty much been directing ever since. She did episodes of several shows last year.

TV director is a great second career for an actress.

Remember when she guest stared on Less Than Perfect? She and Valerie Harper played a lesbian couple, who were the parents of Andy Dick.

Valerie Harper doesn't work much anymore. Is she directing as well?

Is that a good job - TV director? You get to travel around and stuff? I mean better places than this.

TV director pays well:

[quote]Directors of hourlong dramas make about $42,000 an episode; sitcom directors earn $35,000. But direct a pilot and you'll get paid for every future episode, even if you never set foot on set again.

I didn't know about the pilot payout thing. That's a sweet deal.

Geoff Pierson who played the father on Unhappily Ever After was also doing Grace Under Fire at the same time playing Grace's ex husband.

Poor Stephanie Hodge had two shows in the 90's that were supposed to revolve around her, and she wound up getting written off both of them.

How did she die? And how was she written off a second time? Did she die again?

She was only dead for a couple episodes. She fell asleep in a tanning bed and burnt to a crisp, then hung around as a ghost for the rest of that episode and most of the next. At the end of the next episode, Jordan Levin, an actual WB executive (he was the head of the network at one point), showed up, said it wasn't working and she had to be alive again. The video is cued up here:

(The next season it was said she ran off with another woman.)

(If the timing didn't work, start it around 19:30.)

I tried to watch five minutes of UEA and now I know why I didn't watch or why I don't remember it. Painfully unfunny.

I tried to watch five minutes of UEA and now I know why I didn't watch or why I don't remember it. Painfully unfunny.

Yep, it was a terrible show.

Those early WB shows were awful.

I remember at some point they adopted a young Leonardo Dicaprio and he was a troubled youth. I was around 10 and that’s the only time in my life I found him hot. I also remember an episode where the ugly sister wore fake tits to impress a guy.

Leonardo Dicaprio never did TV. Eldergays are so drunk on Saturdays.

R164, surely you're trolling. Here's Leo in the Growing Pains theme song credits.

R165. But that was not the movie star Leo Dicaprio. Funny how they used the same name. I don't think that's allowed? Weird looking kid. I wasn't born when this show was on. But I've seen it in some reruns. Dumb shit. So I know it was not Leo DiCaprio. I am soon to be 38. Leo never did TV.

I think I saw every episode of this series, and I don’t remember a single thing. Same goes for Who’s The Boss?, which I seem to recall was the better series.

Fun Fact. Who's The Boss had a young Julia Roberts playing "Sherry" - the next door neighbor & friend of Melissa Alyano. Meghan Ryan twice played the babysitter. Which was kind of against the concept of the show, right?

I liked Who's the Boss. Tony Danza had charisma, and though Judith Light was a bit awkward, they had a lot of chemistry.

Delta Burke appeared on an episode too. And let's not forget Betty White's appearance as a bitchy TV reporter.

I liked Who’s The Boss too I found it funny as a kid and I loved Mona

r91 I wouldn't look that far into the psychology of it. Leo has a PR team. He pays them on a monthly rate. They may have just written up the comment and texted him for approval. But he may have had a good time on the show and liked Thicke also.

Leo was pretty close to Thicke after the show ended. When magazines wrote articles about Leo, they would go to Thicke for quotes. In one article, Thicke talked about the Christmas card he received from Leo around the time Titanic opened.

If Thicke was such a nice guy how did his son turn into such a creep?

Thicke was nice, but we was a bit of a creep himself. At the height of his GP fame in 1987, when he was 40, he started dating Kristy Swanson, who was 17. When he was 47, he married a 24-year-old Miss World winner. In 1999, he started dating his third wife, who was 29 years his junior (and younger than his oldest son).

[quote] he started dating Kristy Swanson, who was 17.

Looks like Thicke was the one who dodged a bullet with that one.

r150 Damn right.

[quote] Thicke was nice, but we was a bit of a creep himself.

Probably served as a role model to Leo. Still, better to grow up to emulate Alan Thicke versus growing up to emulate Kirk Cameron?

My God, I'd forgotten how awful sitcoms were in the 80s. The Miller/Boyett shows were the worst. The first few seasons of Cosby and Family Ties were OK, but they ran on too long.

M/B used the same scratchy voiced male crooner for all of their sitcoms. Full House, Family Matters and Step by Step were pretty much the same damn show.

Lol at Family Matters having a white guy sing about the good old days in a show about a black family in Chicago

Right, this was the show where Leo got to know Alan's thick reeeeaall well, I remember now.

R175 Well, maybe Swanson wasn't a right wing nutcase back then.

I respect the hell out of Alan Thicke for mocking Kirk's homophobia on Twitter. Tracey also bashed Kirk on Twitter too.

[quote] Thicke, who played Kirk Cameron's father on the family friendly sitcom Growing Pains, tweeted in response to Cameron calling homosexuality "unnatural" and "destructive" on Piers Morgan Tonight, writing "I'm getting him some new books. The Old Testament simply can't be expected to explain everything." That tweet followed a softer comment on Sunday night, in which Thicke tweeted, "I'll address kirk's comments as soon as I recover from rush limbaugh's."

[quote] Later in the day, Thicke added another joke, tweeting, "I love Kirk but I may have to spank him...'tho not in a gay way!"

[quote] Tracy Gold, who played Cameron's Growing Pains sister, tweeted a rebuke of his comments on Sunday night, writing, "I am a strong supporter of the #LGBT Community, and I believe in equal rights for all. #NOH8 #LOVE"

[quote] A large number of celebrities have come out against Cameron's anti-gay interview, with Jesse Tyler Ferguson writing, "The only unnatural thing about me being gay is that I had a crush on Kirk Cameron until about 24 hours ago" and Roseanne Barr adding "kirk or kurt or whatever cameron is an accomplice to murder with his hate speech. so is rick warren. their peers r killing gays in uganda."

This is why Kirk never got any more work in Hollywood and had to do conservative Evangelical media for work opportunities. He can't keep his mouth shut and stop proselytizing. His sister Candace is also a right-wing Evangelical but she is smart enough to keep her views to herself mostly. Hallmark actually makes sure its actors represent their brand and they don't mess around.

Correcting someone up thread Meg Ryan did not play a maid twice on "Who's the Boss." She was on "Charles in Charge' as a live-in babysitter.

The funniest thing is Jordan Knight of New Kids on the Block roasting Kirk on Twitter. His brother Jonathan is gay, so it makes sense this would piss Jordan off.

[quote] His statements angered another heartthrob of the 1980s, New Kid On The Block Jordan Knight, who only had this to say on Twitter in response: "Seriously Kirk?"

[quote] Jordan, whose fellow New Kid and brother Jonathan Knight came out publicly last year, later added, "Get right with yourself on the inside... Ya won't have to take the fight to the world.. #justsayin."

Jonathan basically implies that Kirk is a self-hating gay man and his homophobia is a defense mechanism.

He wasn't gay when I fucked him.

If Cameron is gay, it would explain why he flipped out as a teenager and turned into a hard-right fundie. Internalized homophobia is a destructive thing. He'll never be happy or contented while he lies to himself, and he'll go to his deathbed pretending to be straight. Tragic.

Kirk Cameron obviously wasn’t raised right. His sister turned into a Fundie mess too.

R182 shit those Thicke tweets are funny. Sad he’s gone.

[quote] Correcting someone up thread Meg Ryan did not play a maid twice on "Who's the Boss." She was on "Charles in Charge' as a live-in babysitter.

I can see why someone would make that assumption when she was on ATWT the same time Danny Pintauro was dragging the ratings down to the bottom.

[quote] And let's not forget Betty White's appearance as a bitchy TV reporter.

I'd like to. I'd like to forget that just like I'd like to forget that Katherine Helmond went from a groundbreaking TV classic such as [italic]Soap[/italic] to that piece of shit. If only they could have let that run until at least 1985. I didn't even know that until you brought it up. I think (read: hope) even Betty White put it out of her mind as soon as she cashed the check. What the hell was she thinking anyway? She loses any right to throw shade at [italic]Mama's Family[/italic] after that.

And that's not the only thing they have in common with [italic]Gimme A Break![/italic] Rue McClanahan was on it twice while they had the [italic]Designing Women[/italic] cast covered when Alice Ghostley played Nell's next-door neighbor. Rue was the lucky one even if she acts otherwise in her biography.

I dpnt know about you, I thought Jeremy Miller was a hot blonde when ge was a teenager

[quote]What the hell was this show about again?

How to stay out of that particular place, and it looks like you failed miserably, OP!

"Valerie Harper doesn't work much anymore. Is she directing as well?"

Well, she doesn't do too much of anything these days since she died in August of 2019.

"[R165]. But that was not the movie star Leo Dicaprio. Funny how they used the same name. I don't think that's allowed? I wasn't born when this show was on. But I've seen it in some reruns. Dumb shit. So I know it was not Leo DiCaprio. Leo never did TV."

Is anyone going to tell this pathetic fucking idiot how wrong he is?? Yes, DUMB SHIT, that was "future movie star" Leonardo Di Caprio on Growing Pains.

Christ, you're a tiresome old fool. And also, learn how to properly compose a sentence.

Why would anyone need to respond to an obvious troll doing a "humorous" post? DiCaprio's in the picture at the very top of the thread. Obvious troll is obvious. (Besides, r165 did respond to the first troll job at r164. There was no point responding to r166 continuing the schtick.)

Kirk wasn't raised in any particular faith; he became Crazy for Christ later on. However, he was married at a Catholic Church (Our Lady Help of Christians, Cheektowaga NY) but at least one party has to be Catholic in order to get married in the Church. Assuming his wife was Catholic at the time, she would have to sign a document promising to raise their kids Catholic. They don't raise their kids in the Catholic faith, so she broke that promise. Kind of weakens her promise to be faithful to Jesus, right?

I always thought Kirk was either gay or gay-curious.

I laugh when actors are criticized about being COVID deniers. If someone is so pathetic that they look to lame ass Hollywood for guidance then they are too stupid to live.

They're not looking for guidance, dear, they're looking for compliance.

[quote]Leonardo Dicaprio never did TV. Eldergays are so drunk on Saturdays.

And Mondays too, obviously. R93 is a tiresome old fool. 🥂

I compose beautiful sentences btw. But not for the proletariat.

R193 is even more tiresome. He's always say Christ or for Chrissakes! Like your great grandpa who shits into a bag. Does he have a pain problem? Opioids or just booze? God Bless you, R193. I'll pray for you.

Leonardo DiCaprio never did TV and for sure not some sitcom from the 1970s with Robin Thicke!!

I would have liked to have seen Joanna Kerns on Family Ties instead of Meredith Baxter (Birney) - she’s a lot more warm and likable and would have had better material to work with. I guess she might have been too young.

I read that charisma free frau Joanna kerns is a Mexican

Joanna Kerns was perfect as the murder victim Maria Marshall in "Blind Faith," starring Robert Urich as

....the husband Robert.

And then Kerns introduced Tracey Gold to Robert Marshall's real-life son Roby, and they've been married for 26 years.

R205 so he’s the son of a murderer? Nice.

[quote]Alan Thicke and Joanna Kerns really had great chemistry together, you could totally believe they were a married couple and liked to fuck.

That's because they did. Alan date Joanna briefly at the start of the show.

"Leonardo DiCaprio never did TV and for sure not some sitcom from the 1970s with Robin Thicke!!"

It was the 1980s and yes, he did.

And it was with Alan Thicke. Robin is his son.

Leo Di Cap wasn't even alive in the 1980s. You are so wrong R208! Google is your friend.

Umm...he was born in 1974...

YOU are so wrong...

Robin Thicke was born in 1977. He could hardly play the father of Leonardo who was born in 1984!! Use your head.

Ummm...it was ALAN Thicke who was the father on Growing Pains...

Keep it coming...

Someone who used to post interesting gossip here back in the 90s, said that Cameron gave a blow job to Ricky Schroder when they were both teens. I think both they were filming on the same lot on the day, but their respective sitcoms were filmed on different lots.

In any event, Schroder considered it "fooling around"/ experimentation. Cameron wanted it to be an ongoing thing. This was before Cameron went full fundie.

The poster also said Cameron was pissed at how much attention DiCaprio got when he joined the cast. He said DiCaprio's contract was not extended because of Cameron.

I bet DiCaprio won't be going to Kirkles' funeral.

r208, r209, r211, r213, seriously, it's a dumb troll doing schtick. Stop feeding it. It's not worth responding to.

Kirk Cameron also had Matthew perry fired and his character killed off because he believed he was an agent of Satan

R214 it wasn’t extended because the show was canceled.

DiCaprio had star power even as a kid on Growing Pains. He was pretty much brought in to be a mini-Kirk since Jeremy wasn't funny or charming. Growing Pains was lucky to even last 7 seasons honestly. DiCaprio not too shortly after got cast in What's Eating Gilbert Grape and This Boy's Life. When River Phoenix died, it reduced his competition for roles.

Used to watch Growing Pains when it was on television. While many girls - and some boys - were fawning over Kirk Cameron, I always looked forward to seeing Alan Thicke in his dad jeans.

[quote]Kirk Cameron also had Matthew perry fired and his character killed off because he believed he was an agent of Satan

He should know since he's the Beelzebub to Tony Danza's Devil of TV Hell.

Alan Thicke may have mocked Kirk Cameron on twitter, but I also remember him low-key defending him on a TV nostalgia podcast around the same time. Maybe it's one of those deals where a celebrity is pandering to different audiences? It's pretty common.

It was a show about a boy and his best friend, Boner.