Eight Is Enough


Eight Is Enough is an American comedy-drama/sitcom television series that aired on ABC from March 15, 1977, to May 23, 1981. The show was modeled on the life of syndicated newspaper columnist Tom Braden, a real-life parent with eight children, who wrote a book by the same title.

Synopsis

The show centers on a Sacramento, California, family with eight children. The father, Tom Bradford, is a newspaper columnist for the fictional Sacramento Register. His wife Joan, based on Joan Braden, was a homemaker and took care of the children.
Joan was played by actress Diana Hyland and in early 1977, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. While performing a mastectomy, doctors discovered her cancer had metastasized. During filming her health suddenly deteriorated, and Hyland died on March 27, 1977, having filmed only four episodes. As a result, her character's death was written into the second season of the series.
The second season begins in the fall of 1977 with Tom as a widower. He eventually meets and falls in love with Sandra Sue "Abby" Abbott, a widowed schoolteacher who comes to the house to tutor Tommy after he breaks his leg in a football game. Abby and Tom marry in one of the series' TV movie broadcasts on November 9, 1977. The role went to Buckley after being approved by network chief Brandon Tartikoff, who felt that the character of Miss Collins, the sympathetic high school gym teacher she had played in the 1976 film Carrie, would translate seamlessly to the series.
In the fourth season, in another of the series' TV movie broadcasts in September 1979, both David and Susan get married in a double wedding. As the series progresses, Abby receives her Ph.D. in education and starts a job counseling students at the local high school; oldest son David starts his own construction company; second-eldest daughter Joanie works as a TV producer; eldest daughter Mary becomes a medical doctor; third daughter Susan marries a baseball player, Merle "The Pearl" Stockwell, and has a baby; second-youngest son Tommy becomes a musician in a rock-and-roll band. Ralph Macchio also joins the cast as Jeremy Andretti, Abby's orphaned nephew.

Cast and characters

Main

  • Dick Van Patten as Thomas "Tom" Bradford Sr.
  • Diana Hyland as Joan Wells Bradford
  • Betty Buckley as Sandra Sue "Abby" Mitchell Abbott Bradford
  • Grant Goodeve as David Bradford
  • Lani O'Grady as Mary Bradford
  • Laurie Walters as Joan "Joanie" Bradford
  • Susan Richardson as Susan Bradford Stockwell
  • Dianne Kay as Nancy Bradford
  • Connie Newton/Needham as Elizabeth Bradford
  • Willie Aames as Thomas "Tommy" Bradford Jr.
  • Adam Rich as Nicholas Bradford
In the pilot, the role of David was played by Mark Hamill, Nancy was played by Kimberly Beck, and Tommy was played by Chris English. When ABC screened the pilot, they were reportedly unhappy with the performances of Beck and English, who were let go and replaced by Dianne Kay and Willie Aames. After the pilot initially failed to sell, Beck wanted to play a prominent role on the ABC miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man Book II, so the network granted her a release from her Eight Is Enough contract. Hamill sought to get out of his five-year contract on Eight Is Enough to take the film opportunities that followed his starring role as Luke Skywalker in George Lucas's Star Wars. After Hamill injured his face in a car crash, Lorimar Productions granted his request and the role was re-cast with Grant Goodeve.
Image:Eight is Enough.gif|thumb|The cast of Eight Is Enough
Top row :
Kay, Van Patten, Goodeve, and Walters
Middle row: Richardson, Newton, and Buckley
Bottom row: Rich, O'Grady, and Aames|220px|right

Recurring

  • Jennifer Darling as Donna
  • Michael Thoma as Dr. Greg Maxwell
  • Virginia Vincent as Daisy Maxwell
  • Janis Paige as Vivian "Auntie V" Bradford
  • Joan Prather as Janet McArthur Bradford
  • Brian Patrick Clarke as Merle "The Pearl" Stockwell
  • Ralph Macchio as Jeremy Andretti
  • Micheal Goodrow as Ernie Fields
  • James Karen as Eliot Randolph
  • Michele Greene as Jill
  • Nicholas Pryor as Jeffrey Trout
  • Jack Elam as Joe Simon

    Production

The show was developed by writer William Blinn and was a Lorimar Production. It was originally distributed by Worldvision Enterprises. For the first three years the show filmed interior scenes at The Burbank Studios now known as the Warner Bros. Ranch. From the fourth season the show filmed interiors at MGM Studios in Culver City.
The home featured in the exterior shots was on Chiquita Street near Lankershim Boulevard in Studio City, Los Angeles. The house has since been demolished and replaced. The interiors for seasons one through three were filmed on Soundstage 9 The Burbank Studio. Seasons four and five were shot on two stages at MGM in Culver City.
The show's team of producers included Robert L. Jacks, Gary Adelson, Greg Strangis, and Phil Fehrle. Executive producers were Lee Rich and Philip Capice.
As a production of the Lorimar stable, who were concurrently producing CBS's The Waltons, writers were often contracted by the producers and were shared between both programs. Regular writers included Peter Lefcourt, the writing teams of Gwen Bagni and Paul Dubov, Rod Peterson and Claire Whittaker, Bill Nuss and Dusty Kay, Nick Thiel and David Braff, J. Miyoko Hensley and Steven Hensley, Bruce Shelly, Sandra Kay Siegel, Gil Grant, Karen I. Hall, and Hindi Brooks, who soon became the show's long-time story editor. In-house directors included Philip Leacock, Harry Harris, and Irving J. Moore. As an in-joke, the character name of one of Nicholas Bradford's best friends was Irving Julius Moore, a nod to the director of the same name whose middle name was, in fact, Joseph.

Music

Theme

For the show's first two seasons, an upbeat instrumental piece written by Fred Werner was used as the show's opening theme. Beginning with the show's third season, this was replaced by a slowed-down vocal theme titled "Eight Is Enough," which was sung by series co-star Grant Goodeve. The song had music by Lee Holdridge and lyrics by Molly-Ann Leikin, and was first heard in a longer arrangement on the last episode of the second season titled "Who's on First?", which was also performed by Goodeve.

Score

Early episodes had instrumental music by Fred Werner and Alexander Courage, but the show's real musical stamp came from composer Earle Hagen, who had a knack of composing memorable cues as he had previously been the in-house composer on The Andy Griffith Show. He composed a love theme for Tom and Abby, a theme that permeated the show in various incarnations throughout the remainder of the series. Some later episodes were scored by John Beal and Miles Goodman.
Back-to-back industry strikes in the show's last seasons affected the show's score, with both the 1980 SAG actors' strike and 1981 writers' strike forcing cost-cutting measures. Some of the later episodes were tracked with a combination of uncredited library music and original music by Hagen, Beal, and Goodman.

Reception and cancellation

The series jump-started acting careers for several of its young stars. It cemented teen idol status for Grant Goodeve, Willie Aames, and Ralph Macchio, who played Abby's orphaned nephew Jeremy later in the show's last season. Aames went on to star with Scott Baio in Charles in Charge. Goodeve started a minor singing career, following his rendition of the show's theme song and initially hosted HGTV's If Walls Could Talk. Macchio gained the most fame in feature films, such as The Karate Kid and its sequels as well as My Cousin Vinny.
After the end of the show's fifth season, production costs and declining ratings caused the show to be cancelled with seven other shows that season. Variety's headline on the cancellation stated "Eight Shows In, Eight Shows Out". In a 2000 episode of E! True Hollywood Story, Dick Van Patten stated that no one contacted him to inform him of the cancellation. Instead, he read about it in a newspaper.
The series had two reunion movies on NBC. In Eight Is Enough: A Family Reunion on October 18, 1987, Mary Frann replaced Betty Buckley as Abby; Buckley had been filming Frantic during its production. Then came An Eight Is Enough Wedding on October 15, 1989, this time with Sandy Faison as Abby. Both movies aired opposite Game 2 of the World Series on ABC.

Nielsen Ratings

  • 1976–1977 — #23
  • 1977–1978 — #12
  • 1978–1979 — #11
  • 1979–1980 — #12
  • 1980–1981 — Not in Top 30

    Series overview

Episodes

Season 1 (1977)

Season 2 (1977–78)

Season 3 (1978–79)

Season 4 (1979–80)

Season 5 (1980–81)

Post-series movies

Syndication

Reruns of all 112 episodes of Eight Is Enough have aired sporadically since the show's syndication debut in September 1982. The show aired on FX from 1994 to 1997, on PAX in 1998, and as part of a marathon celebrating the 50th anniversary of Warner Bros. Television on TV Land in 2005. Eight Is Enough also aired on the Chicago-based MeTV and MeToo, a sister station of MeTV, from 2008 to 2010 before MeTV spread to other markets around the U.S.
During its network run, the show was distributed by Worldvision Enterprises, and later by Lorimar-Telepictures. All syndication rights are now held by Lorimar's successor, Warner Bros. Television.
From 2006 until 2009, the series was formerly available for streaming online on AOL's In2TV service.
The series is also available for purchase online on Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV.
Beginning in 2023, the series is available for streaming online on Tubi via the WBTV All Together Now FAST channel.
As of 2024, the complete series is also available on The Roku Channel, a free service and includes limited commercials.