The Raunchiest ’90s Sitcom Is Being Rebooted
Well, that will be an interesting reboot.
Adult-oriented animated shows used to seem relatively novel, but these days they’re practically the norm. New cartoons in the vein of South Park, Family Guy, BoJack Horseman, Rick and Morty, Archer, and Robot Chicken seem to premiere just about every day. So how does a new series stand out among the rest? Well, how about rather than bothering with a brand new concept, you take an older hit with the same kind of content, and replace the live-action with animation? That’s what’s about to happen with the hit sitcom Married… with Children.
According to Deadline, the new Married… with Children will have the same leading cast of Ed O’Neill, Katey Sagal, Christina Applegate, and David Faustino voicing the respective members of the epically dysfunctional Bundy family. Family Guy executive producer Alex Carter will be the showrunner. The series is currently being pitched and Deadline says it’s receiving tons of interest from networks and streaming services. The site reports that the most likely future homes for the revival are Fox, Hulu and Peacock.
The original Married… with Children was an early hit for the young Fox network and one of its first scripted series. The sitcom lampooned the usual happy suburbanite families found in sitcoms. O’Neill played the unsuccessful woman’s shoe salesman Al Bundy married to Sagal’s Peggy — a lazy compulsive shopper whose out of control spending keeps Al securely in debt. Applegate played the pea-brained Kelly, Al and Peggy’s daughter who changed boyfriends just about every episode. Faustino played Bud, Kelly’s perpetually randy younger brother.
On the surface, the characters of Married… with Children seem to not care for one another very much. Peggy and Al constantly mock each other, as do Kelly and Bud. But whenever one of them was in real trouble, the rest of the family showed their true colors. While Peggy often seems to enjoy her male strip clubs over Al and Al can’t get enough of Big Uns magazine, they always find a way to share sweet and tender moments with one another.
There’s no word on whether or not some of the other recurring actors from the live-action original will be joining the Bundy actors. Amanda Bearse (Fright Night) played Peggy’s best friend — and Al’s nemesis — Marcy on the series. Then there was David Garrison (The Practice) who played Marcy’s stuffy first husband Steve Rhoades, and Ted McGinley (Revenge of the Nerds) who played her second husband; con-man Jefferson D’Arcy.
In most cases, the leading cast of Married… with Children went on to equally memorable roles. Ed O’Neill made yet another signature sitcom role for himself as family patriarch Jay Pritchett in Modern Family. Katey Sagal lent her utterly recognizable voice to the cyclopean Leela of Futurama and she’ll be returning to the role soon. She also played one of the most manipulative and worst mothers in the universe in the crime drama series Sons of Anarchy. Applegate became the eponymous newsman’s main squeeze in the Anchorman films, and more recently starred in the acclaimed Netflix black comedy series Dead to Me opposite Linda Cardellini (Avengers: Age of Ultron).
