The Only Actors Still Alive From The Cast Of All In The Family

Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin were new to sitcoms when they started working on an American version of “Till Death Us Do Part,” a British show about a grouchy racist and his long-suffering family. Carroll O’Connor was cast as mouthy patriarch Archie Bunker and Jean Stapleton got the role of his wife Edith. Sally Struthers (daughter Gloria) and Rob Reiner (son-in-law Michael) rounded out the cast and CBS was ready to go, but the press questioned whether a show about a foul-mouthed bigot was needed. “We think it would be good for television and good for the country,” Yorkin told The Marion Star in 1970. Privately, however, they were concerned about the possible reaction.

We’ve lost many “All in the Family” cast members over time, including Archie and his better half Edith, but some are thankfully still with us.

Rob Reiner (Michael Stivic)
As the son of Carl Reiner, Rob Reiner didn’t have to look far for inspiration growing up. He told CBS Sunday Morning that some of the “great comic minds of the second half of the 20th century” used to hang out at his house. “Woody Allen and Mel Brooks and Neil Simon and all these people [came to see] my dad.” He even met Norman Lear, but they didn’t work together until “All in the Family.” Reiner made the rounds on other network shows (such as “That Girl,” “Gomer Pyle: USMC,” and even “Batman”) before he portrayed Archie Bunker’s liberal son-in-law, Michael “Meathead” Stivic. While Reiner was aware that they “were doing something special,” he admitted to Boston Arts Diary that “none of us expected it to be the success that it was.”

Sally Struthers (Gloria Bunker-Stivic)
When casting the role of Archie and Edith’s daughter Gloria, Norman Lear remembered seeing Sally Struthers on “The Smothers Brothers Summer Show,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “I just loved her look, something about the way she composed herself,” he said. “So, I brought her in to read.” The competition was tough, including Rob Reiner’s partner, Penny Marshall, but in the end, Struthers was the best fit. She didn’t have much in common with the character, however, and she actually attempted to leave the series in 1975. Her contract was upheld and she returned to work for another three years before she called it quits. “The public needs a breather from me and I need a breather from myself and Gloria,” she told The Sentinel at the time. “I’m glad I’m leaving the show before Gloria goes through menopause.”

Danielle Brisebois (Stephanie Mills)
When Rob Reiner and Sally Struthers left “All in the Family,” there was a void in the Bunker household, and in Season 9 it was filled by a precocious relative of Edith’s, who was basically left on their doorstep. Carrol O’Connor loved Danielle Brisebois’ performance in the original Broadway production of “Annie,” and he got her written into the show as Stephanie Mills. In 1979, Brisebois told The Republic: “I’m not as fresh as Stephanie. I have my moments, but Mom won’t let me get away with being fresh.” When “Family” ended, she followed O’Connor on his misadventures as a barkeep in “Archie Bunker’s Place.” Brisebois soldiered on in network television for a little while longer, but watching herself on the soap opera “Days of Our Lives” opened her eyes. “If I was going to be an actress, that wasn’t the sort of actress I wanted to be,” she told The Greenville News.

Liz Torres (Teresa Betancourt)
Liz Torres studied drama at NYU and by the mid-70s she was a regular on the show “Phyllis.” Norman Lear spotted her on “The Tonight Show” and wrote her into “All in the Family” as Puerto Rican hospital clerk Teresa Betancourt, who assisted Archie before surgery and later rented a room in his home. Torres and O’Connor shared more than barbs and laughed, as she learned he once taught at the same New York high school she participated. Apparently, it was a rather rough school. “Girls will go into the washroom and disappear for three years,” Torres told the Santa Cruz Sentinel.

Estelle Parsons (Blanche Hefner / Dolores Mancheney Fencel)
Almost a decade after winning an Oscar for “Bonnie & Clyde,” Estelle Parsons joined “All in the Family” as another Blanche, and as a Dolores, too. Yes, she played two different characters: Dolores Mancheney Fencel, a former high school flame of Archie’s, in Season 7, and then, two seasons later, she appeared as Blanche Hefner, wife of Bunker’s buddy Barney. She also made an appearance in the spin-off “Archie Bunker’s Place.” Parsons recalled that “it was fun to be on that show. Norman Lear of course is a reigning genius, another reigning genius of television. It was great, great to work on that show.”