And the center Brady box goes blank -- RIP Ann B. Davis

I'll bet the story was teased on A1 of quite a few papers. The people over 60 who still get the paper will eat it up.

Deaths like this, people who were on beloved shows who haven't been seen since, get a ton of clicks.

 

Great wikipedia section on Bob Cummings, actor, Emmy winner, meth addict:

Cummings married five times and fathered seven children. He was a staunch advocate of natural foods and a healthy diet and in 1960 authored a book, Stay Young and Vital, which focused upon health foods and exercise.[20]

Despite his interest in health, Cummings was also a methamphetamine addict from the mid-1950s until the end of his life.[21] In the 2013 book Dr. Feelgood: The Shocking Story of the Doctor Who May Have Changed History by Treating and Drugging JFK, Marilyn, Elvis, and Other Prominent Figures,[21] authors Richard Lertzman and William Birnes describe how Cummings began receiving injections from Max Jacobson, the notorious 'Dr. Feelgood', in 1954 during a trip to New York to star in the TV production of Reginald Rose's 12 Angry Men.

Rose and Cummings' friends Rosemary Clooney and José Ferrer recommended the doctor to Cummings, who was complaining of a lack of energy. While Jacobsen insisted that his injections contained only 'vitamins, sheep sperm and monkey gonads', they actually contained a substantial dose of methamphetamine.

Cummings continued to use a mixture provided by Jacobson, eventually becoming a patient of Jacobson's son Thomas, who was based in Los Angeles, and later injecting himself. The changes in Cummings' personality caused by the euphoria of the drug and subsequent depression damaged his career and led to an intervention by his friend, television host Art Linkletter.

The intervention was not successful, and Cummings' drug abuse and subsequent career collapse was a factor in his divorce from his third wife Mary, as well as his divorce from his next wife, Gina Fong.

After Jacobson was forced out of business in the 1970s, Cummings developed his own drug connections based in the Bahamas. Suffering from Parkinson's Disease, he was forced to move into homes for indigent older actors in Hollywood.

 

More Wikipedia fun -- there's a direct line from Ann B. Davis to Gwyneth Paltrow:

Ann B. Davis' character, Schultzy, was the inspiration for the comic book character Pepper Potts, a supporting character in the Iron Man comics, who was modeled after her. Potts first appeared in Tales of Suspense #45 (September 1963), and was depicted with brown hair and a hairdo resembling Schultzy's. Eventually, it was decided by the editorial team that the resemblance was too great, and in Tales of Suspense #50, her appearance was altered to give her red hair and a different hairstyle.[1]

 

Why is this show so popular?
I know syndication had a lot to do with it, but it wasn't a very good show.
Badly acted, bad jokes, canned laughter - everything about it was corny.
And this was a fairly cynical time in Amer. history. Maybe it was responding to that.
But all in all a goofy fucking show whose popularity is perplexing.

 

Largely the success was its layer of escapism during a very turbulent time in this country.

 

Sit-Coms weren't funny until much later. Try watching Who's the Boss or Growing Pains or Kate & Allie etc.

 

The number of sitcoms without canned laughter you could count on one hand, and some people who protested to get rid of the canned laughter (The Monkees, Bill Cosby) found their shows canceled instead.

 

I liked it as a kid, but I saw it a few years ago and thought it was dreadful.

 

The Peanuts specials made a conscious decision to shitcan the laugh track.
As such they are timeless.
Humor does not need to be telegraphed.
Give your audience more credit than that.

 

I feel the same way about The A-Team.

 

There are quite a few shows from the 70s and 80s that don't hold up on any level.

 

We got older. The shows are locked into their times.
That The Brady Bunch was cornball fare was shown in how easily spoofable it was in those feature films in the 90s.
I can watch Fat Albert today and still laugh. I didn't even think Brady Bunch was funny as a kid.