This month we continue with our “Kinda Creepy” blog series. Last week we talked about a show that debuted in fall of 1964 and was canceled in the spring of 1966, The Munsters. You can use the exact dates for our show today, The Addams Family.
ABC aired The Addams Family for two years, ending up with 64 episodes. Like The Munsters, this show was filmed in black and white. The Munsters was based on the typical suburban family while this series was created by David Levy and was based on Charles Addams’ New Yorker cartoons.
The first Addams Family cartoon was published in The New Yorker in 1938. The first illustration was titled “Vacuum Cleaner,” and it shows a salesman convincing “Morticia” to buy an appliance. The joke was that this was a house full of dirt and cobwebs, probably haunted. Addams was paid $85 for it. Addams did not intend for it to be a series, but New Yorker editor Harold Ross asked for more of them. Later, Gomez and the children were added. During the forties and fifties, 58 cartoons appeared in the publication.
In an interview before the show’s debut, Levy said that Addams was “a social commentator and a great wit.” It was produced by head writer Nat Perrin for Filmways, Inc. Perrin was a friend of Groucho Marx and had written for the Marx Brothers movies.
Like the Munsters family members, everyone in the Addams family is a bit off in some way. Wealthy former attorney Gomez Addams (John Astin) still is in love with his wife Morticia (Carolyn Jones) whom he often speaks to in French and refers to her as Cara Mia at times. Originally Carolyn turned down the offer to play Morticia because she was focusing on her movie career. She was persuaded to accept the role by her then-husband Aaron Spelling; the couple divorced not long after. Carolyn Jones had to endure sitting in the makeup chair for two hours every day. She worked with Nolan Miller to create a unique costume. Miller said that Morticia’s outfit was the most difficult one he had ever designed. The dress was very tight, especially around her feet. Gomez’s hobby is crashing model railroad trains. The prop department had to line Gomez’s pockets with asbestos because he put his lit cigars into his pockets.
The couple has two children: daughter Wednesday (Lisa Loring) and son Pugsley (Ken Weatherwax). They are polite children but Wednesday has a pet black widow spider and a headless doll named Marie Antoinette while Pugsley has a pet Octopus named Aristotle. Wednesday is named for the poem, which included “Wednesday’s child is full of woe.”
In addition, Uncles Fester (Jackie Coogan), Grandmama (Blossom Rock), and the butler Lurch (Ted Cassidy) all live in the house. Fester enjoys playing with dynamite, Grandmama is always experimenting with potions and has a crystal ball, and Lurch always replies to his summons with “You rang?” Coogan was rejected for Uncle Fester. He went back home, shaved his head, and did his own makeup and costuming. Then he went back and got the part. Ted Cassidy got a lot of fan mail from teenage girls who thought he was so cute.
Their house décor is rather dark including a Venus flytrap, an art piece where a human leg protrudes from a swordfish’s mouth, and a taxidermied two-headed tortoise. The interior of the house was inspired by the apartment in Manhattan where Charles Addams lived. It contained suits of armor, an antique crossbow collection, and other oddities.
Thing is a gloved hand which shows up in places around the house. Cousin Itt (Felix Silla), who is all hair except for a hat and sunglasses, visits from time to time as does Ophelia, Morticia’s sister. Gomez was supposed to marry Ophelia in an arranged marriage but when he saw Morticia, he could not go through with it. Ophelia is an expert in judo.
The family considers itself quite sophisticated and cultured and they don’t understand the general public’s reaction to their home and actions.
The theme was composed and sung by Vic Mizzy. He also snaps his fingers through the song. You could hear Ted Cassidy say “neat,” “sweet,” and “petite” during the lyrics. Mizzy would also write the memorable theme for Green Acres.
In the early seventies, there was a Saturday morning cartoon with the actors voicing their characters. In 1977, a reunion made-for-television film, Halloween with the New Addams Family, was filmed with all the original actors except Rock who was quite ill at the time.
Like so many shows of the sixties, a lot of memorabilia was released for this series. You can choose from trading cards, comic books, board games, lunch boxes, and a ton of action figures.
A major film, The Addams Family, was released in 1991 starring Raul Julia as Gomez, Angelica Huston as Morticia, and Christopher Lloyd as Uncle Fester. A sequel aired in 1993, Addams Family Values. In 1998 a reboot, The New Addams Family debuted on Fox and ran for two years just like the original. I honestly never saw either of the big-screen movies or any of the television reboots, so I cannot speak to whether they did the original show justice or not. The movie also spawned a popular pinball machine, which became the biggest-selling pinball machine of all time with more than 20,000 units sold since 1992.
Considering that both The Munsters and The Addams Family were only on the air for two years, and did not even rack up the typical number of shows needed for syndication, it is truly amazing that more than fifty years after the original shows aired, they are still very popular. I think like the Bewitched vs Jeannie debate, there are arguments for which family was more fun; my vote would have to go to The Addams Family, but if you have never watched either of the series, you should at least check a couple of episodes out. They probably would not work out so well to binge watch, because I think they would get boring quickly, but that is only one humble opinion.
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