In order to impress a girl, Danny Partridge lies and tells her he is Jewish. He arrives at a Purim festival, where he meets her father, who is the local rabbi.
Can you imagine this story EVER happening on The Brady Bunch? They would never use the word Jewish, let alone a Brady Boy wear a yarmulke. The Bradys lived in an odd, vague, generic world. Real life seldom entered their orbit. While they occasionally ventured out, it was a family comedy, where everything was handled in the family, and usually indoors. Even their backyard was indoors. When The Bradys went to square dance at a hoedown, we only saw them coming home from it. We saw the Purim Festival that Danny attended. This kept the family inside the confines of their home set (and was also cheaper to film). They truly were the last of the old style 50s sitcoms. While The Partridges lived in San Pueblo, Ca., My Three Sons was set in Bryant Park, and Family Affair was set in New York City. The Bradys lived in an unnamed, non specified American town, that was clearly southern California. Everyone knew it but them. The Andersons on Father Knows Best, lived in a place called Springfield. Beaver lived in Mayfield. Those locations were vague, and unclear, but they had a name. The Bradys town had no name. I don't know why this was their style, or who dictated it. It's style matches Sherwood Schwartz earlier TV work. Perhaps this lack of specificity created an inoffensiveness that kept so many people loyal for all these decades.
There was also an episode of the Partridge Family where Keith was flunking Sex Education class. Danny tried to help Keith by bringing him an issue of "Playpen" magazine. That would definitely NOT be "very Brady!" It was season 3, episode 20.
ReplyDeleteOh man, thats a good one, forgot that episode.
DeleteAnd the irony is that Sherwood Schwartz was Jewish. In the Season 3 episode "Jan's Aunt Jenny" though, Imogene Coca blows a shofar and talks about Rosh Hashanah, so there were references to other religions and cultures on the show at times.
ReplyDeleteThat's a great reference point, but, there were so few. Even the Christmas episode came very early (episode 12), and in the 4.5 subsequent years, no one mentioned it, or church service again.
DeleteThe Bradys said grace during Jesse James episode (Bobby's cap gun went off).
ReplyDeleteI remember a website actually said that Christopher Knight who played Peter is Jewish, I don't know if this is actually true though
ReplyDeleteIn the Sam/Alice elopement episode, Marcia and Greg talk to a "reverend" at the butcher shop who knows both of them (this implies that the Brady family attends church services).
ReplyDeleteNICKBONADUCE
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