All In The Family Guy

But this time it's a different family! Now it's Peter and Lois who are doing the lamenting.

The opening sequence of Family Guy, with Peter and Lois at the piano, obviously parodies the opening of All in the Family with Archie and Edith belting out "Those Were The Days."

SIDEBAR: According to TVParty.com, "The theme song for All in the Family was re-recorded every year by Carroll O'Connor and Jean Stapleton, shown here with Rob Reiner and Sally Struthers after one of those tapings."

There are other similarities as well, despite the fact that Family Guy is a cartoon and AITF was (originally) acted and taped "live before a studio audience."

Lois Griffin has a squeaky voice (maybe squelchy is a better term), similar to Edith Bunker's.

Peter and Archie are both sarcastic, irreverent and caustic.

Both families are of the blue-collar variety.

But the biggest connection of all, it seems to us, is in the THEME SONGS. They are both highly nostalgic and yearn for lost innocence.

"But where are those good old-fashioned values...?," bemoans Peter.

"Freaks were in a circus tent...Those were the days," complains the intolerant Archie.

Check it out, we think you'll agree: Every generation misses "the way it used to be." (Or claim they do!)

Those Were The Days Lyrics (Theme Song from All in the Family)
(Words and Music by Lee Adams and Charles Strouse)

Boy, the way Glen Miller played
Songs that made the hit parade
Guys like us, we had it made
Those were the days

Didn't need no welfare state
Everybody pulled his weight
Gee, our old LaSalle ran great
Those were the days

And you know who you were then
girls were girls and men were men
Mister, we could use a man like Herbert Hoover again

People seemed to be content
Fifty dollars paid the rent
Freaks were in a circus tent
Those were the days

Take a little Sunday spin
go to watch the Dodgers win
Have yourself a dandy day that cost you under a fin

Hair was short and skirts were long
Kate Smith really sold a song
I don't know just what went wrong
Those were the days

Click here to play "Those Were The Days."

Incidentally, the show closed with a different song, "Remembering You," written by Roger Kelloway. Carroll O'Connor wrote lyrics to the song, which weren't used on the TV show, and sometimes you will see this song credited to Kelloway and O'Connor.

The sheet music to the AITF (opening) theme song, for some unknown reason, is hard to find. We did locate it in the compilation book, A Musical History of Television 1948 to Present, but unfortunately IT is not always available. ;(

Roger Kellaway - Remembering You - Sheet Music (Digital Download)

"Producers Norman Lear and Alan (Bud) Yorkin brought All in the Family into being by obtaining the U.S. rights to the hit British comedy series, Till Death Us Do Part, which aired on the BBC in the mid-1960s and featured the character of bigoted dock worker Alf Garnett. Lear developed two pilots based on the concept for ABC, with O'Connor (Mickey Rooney had been Lear's first choice to play Archie) and Stapleton in the lead roles. But when ABC turned down the series, then known as Those Were the Days, it appeared that it would never get off the ground. Luckily for Lear and Yorkin, CBS President Robert D. Wood was in the market for new shows that would appeal to the more affluent, urban audience the network's entrenched lineup of top-rated but aging series failed to attract. As a result, CBS jettisoned highly rated programs like The Red Skelton Show and Green Acres in an effort to improve the demographic profile of its audiences, and All in the Family seemed a perfect, though risky, vehicle to put in their place. CBS therefore made a 13-episode commitment to air the series beginning in January 1971, as a midseason replacement." —The Museum of Broadcast Communications

It seems today that all you see
Is violence in movies and sex on TV
But where are those good old-fashioned values
On which we use to rely?

Lucky there's a Family Guy
Lucky there's a man who, positively can do
All the things that make us laugh and cry*
He's our Family Guy!

Click here to play the "Family Guy Theme."

*In the original version of the Family Guy Theme, as performed on the TV show, the words "laugh and cry" were replaced with Stewie singing "effin' cry" (so Stewie!). However, at the start of season three of The Family Guy, FOX had Stewie's line deleted and the words changed back to "laugh and cry."

Walter Murphy - Theme from Family Guy - Sheet Music (Digital Download)