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Ebony Magazine : July 1972 : Article by Louie Robinson
It certainly is not Julia. Nor, on the other hand, is it Amos and Andy. And in the current vernacular applied to some motion picture and television shows making rounds, it definitely is not Superspade. What it is, actually, is something all its own: Sanford and Son, one of the brightest half-hours to grace the TV tube, one which brings a high point to the career of one of the nation's veteran but underrated entertainers, Redd Foxx.
Bowing in at the middle of the television season, Sanford and Son climbed immediately into the Top 20 ratings with its first six shows, three of which were among the top 10 in audience size. When the show debuted on NBC's Friday night schedule in January, some portions of the opening episode seemed a little weak, and many of Foxx's longtime fans looked in vain for the old stand-up, knock-'em-dead, razor-tongued comedian they had grown accustomed to. In his stead was a creaking old man: selfish, prejudiced, bumbling and almost never delivering a laugh-line in the sophisticated Foxx style. As that show and others have rolled on, however, it has become increasingly apparent that Fred Sanford of Sanford and Son is not the old Redd Foxx, and that Foxx is innately a shrewd enough actor to have made the distinction. "He's basically a very good actor," producer Aaron Ruben says of Foxx. "He came up with that old man character. Nobody told him to walk like that."
Before the first episode, too, some industry people wondered how well the little-known Demond Wilson would do as the son in Sanford and Son. It did not take long into the first show to find out. He is excellent.
The series based on an English TV series, Steptoe and Son, is the continuing story of two junkmen who are father and son. Theirs is a loving but constantly feuding relationship. The son has his life before him and would like to get away from the junkyard that is both place of employment (and where, incidentally, he seems to be doing all the work) and his home. His father is a grasping old faker, quick to grab a buck without questioning its honesty and quick to feign a heart attack if things are not going his way. ("You hear that Elizabeth? I'll be coming to join you honey," is the lament he throws heavenward to his long dead wife as he clasps a hand to his chest.) The old man does not want to leave the junkyard, and most of all, he does not want his son to leave.
Although the Sanfords complain and nag each other and the son treats the father with irreverence, there is nevertheless the understanding of a deep and abiding love between the two.
The plots that evolve from this very special kind of father-son relationship are slight. In one, the son brings home an expensive heirloom to take to an auction, only to have his father get involved in the bidding and spoil a fantastic profit. In another episode, both men go for chest X-rays and first one, then the other, comes to believe he is incurably ill. In yet another, the father refuses to sleep in the house when his son brings home two coffins for resale, and soon the old man's fears and superstitions become those of the braggadocious son. But such is the stuff situation comedies are made of, and one can hardly fault Sanford and Son for having no more depth than that other his of the current season, All in the Family. Indeed, Sanford and Son ranks next to All in the Family among young adult viewers. Both shows are the brainchildren of Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin, and are based on British shows.
So far, Sanford and Son has been using doctored scripts from London, but Ruben says he would "like to eventually get our own style from here."
Foxx was sought out for the title role because he was remembered for his performance in the movie Cotton Comes to Harlem, in which he played a junk dealer. Young Wilson has been a performer in an All in the Family episode and the producers had liked him. Yet, there were reservations about both men. Despite his film role and his great comedy acts, could Foxx, it was wondered, do the kind of sustained acting called for a television series? Redd settled that question on the first script when he went through twelve straight minutes during one scene. For the role of the junior Sanford, it was thought another comedian might be a good bet. Wilson was not a comic, but he has proven to be an actor with a fine sense of comedy; his facial expressions and timing play beautifully to Foxx.
Four days after the two gave the script its first reading in Las Vegas, where Foxx was appearing, they were in Hollywood doing it before the All in the Family cast. It went so well that visiting NBC vice president from New York was summoned from lunch to see their performance. He ordered that a pilot film be made.
When Foxx happened to mention that his real name was John Sanford, Steptoe and Son became Sanford and Son. On the show, however, Foxx uses the first name Fred in honor of a deceased brother. For the role of the son, Foxx chose the first name Lamont, after an old St. Louis buddy. About half-way into the shows first season, Foxx declared: "I think I'm still trying to find Fred Sanford. I have a lot of him already, but I'm still searching. Eight weeks ain't long to create a human, not being the Lord. Time will tell what his full character is."
Wilson likewise is working on the Lamont Sanford characterization. "I've done enough of the character at this point so I can call upon him to do the things that are required of him," Wilson says, "but I haven't realized his full potential yet." For a sustained role such as this, he says "I begin to explore the character, to deal with him in the way I deal with myself. I've got a lot of things he does down, but not to the point of a Gomer Pyle or Andy Griffith. Every week Redd and I find new stuff to do in terms of the characters, not funny stuff, but things about two men."
Wilson and Foxx had never met before they were called in on the TV idea, and getting to know each other has helped their subsequent performances. "When we did the pilot, we had never worked together, so Redd didn't know my timing and I didn't know his," Wilson explains. To this, Foxx adds: "Now we do know each other, and when you dig a cat, it's real. You can see the warmth in our later shows." As a matter of fact, there was a feeling among viewers that the son was too harsh with the father of the first show or two. Wilson has now rounded off the sharp edges.
Georgia-born Demond Wilson started his acting career at the age of four when he appeared in a Broadway production of Green Pastures with William Marshall. Three years later he made his television debut on The Children's Hour. At 12 he was tap dancing on the stage of Harlem's Apollo Theater and later studied acting at the American Community Theater and at Hunter College. Drafted by the Army, he saw service in Vietnam and was wounded, but today declines to discuss his war experiences. His stage work since then includes the national company of The Boys in the Band and Ceremonies in Dark Old Men. He has done television soap operas and Mission : Impossible as well as two movies, Dealing and The Organization.
Wilson is not quick to rattle off his list of credits but nevertheless declares: "I'm proud of all the things I've done." He was between engagements when the Sanford and Son proposal came. As he told Foxx while waiting to get the word on whether the show was to be aired or not: "I'm tired of eating those baloney sandwiches now. Apparently he is not eating baloney sandwiches now. His weight has increased from 149 to 156 pounds. Now, with a slice of his own television show, Wilson says: "For me, its like graduating from school. It's hard knocking around, especially if you think you're talented and not getting the breaks."
Redd Foxx has had almost all the breaks, good and bad. The bad ones were when he was working the streets of New York with a washboard band as a kid, and later when he was sleeping on rooftops and in doorways and riding in the back of trucks as he tried to find a living in show business. But he has sold over 10 million comedy records, done his vaudeville and night club stints and had spend the last year and a half in a well-paying spot at the International Hotel in Las Vegas. (Success has given Foxx his own weight problem: Unlike Wilson, he is trying to carve his way down to 175 pounds from a high of 202.)
Despite all the memories of gin mills and multiple-shows-a-day in theaters, Foxx says of the eight-hours-a-day, five-days-a-week filming of Sanford and Son: "I ain't worked eight hours a day in my life. The last time I tried it was at Rose's Dresses in New York. I worked sixteen hours and quit. They still owe me money."
Foxx made the latter comment over a spartan lunch of soup and beef patty in the Hungry Peacock restaurant and NBC's Burbank studios between rehearsals. A few minutes later, he was back to his grind, playing a bed-ridden hospital patient. While the cameras were getting set up, the hard-working Foxx closed his eyes and lay very quiet. After a while, somebody woke him up for his lines.
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