And then there’s more…
Yesterday, TVOne was airing a daylong Good Times marathon (counting down the viewer-voted top episodes and whatnot). Good Times was, of course, a spinoff of Arthur’s Maude, and the sparring scenes between Arthur and the late Esther Rolle dug right into the uncomfortable, and often unacknowledged, racial tensions boiling beneath the Friedan-Steinem feminist movement. Sadly, Rolle scenes have been uniformly omitted from Arthur’s memorial clip packages, though they contain some of both actresses’ finest (and most subversive) work. (I do love hearing the Maude theme song though, my pick for the all-time greatest TV theme: a Donny Hathaway vocal and a cheeky line about Joan of Arc’s death.)
Speaking of Maude, let us not forget that I’m banking on another of Arthur’s Maude co-stars dying this year. No, not Bill Macy (who was born a mere five days after Arthur). But Conrad Bain, number six on my deathlist. Here’s to hoping Maude stars become as hot a Reaper target as Golden Girls seem to be!
