Norman Lear (center) created, developed and produced the hit show "All in the Family", which ran from 1971 to 1979. The politically charged sitcom starred Jean Stapleton, Carroll O'Connor, Rob Reiner, Sally Struthers and Mike Evans.
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Topline:
Norman Lear, who addressed serious issues in humorous sitcoms, died Tuesday in Los Angeles at the age of 101.
How he changed Hollywood: The families in Lear's shows had conversations about the real things that were going on in the 1970s. Before these shows, television worlds were simpler, nicer places, says Darnell Hunt, a leading scholar of racial representation on TV. They had plot lines like: "I burnt the pot roast. What are we gonna do we don't have anything for dinner. Or I have a talent show at school and I don't know how to dance."
Why it matters: Lear's roster of hit '70s sitcoms revolutionized television.
Norman Lear, who addressed serious issues in humorous sitcoms, died Tuesday in Los Angeles at the age of 101. Matthew Lawrence, a spokesperson for the family, said the producer and screenwriter died of natural causes. Lear was hailed for producing beloved television shows like All in the Family and The Jeffersons, and later, for his work as a political activist.
A post on his Facebook page said that he was "surrounded by his family as we told stories and sang songs until the very end."
The families in Lear's shows had conversations about the real things that were going on in the 1970s. Before these shows, television worlds were simpler, nicer places, says Darnell Hunt, a leading scholar of racial representation on TV. They had plot lines like: "I burnt the pot roast. What are we gonna do we don't have anything for dinner. Or I have a talent show at school and I don't know how to dance."
Then Lear's roster of hit '70s sitcoms revolutionized television.
"Those shows took on issues that couldn't be resolved," Hunt says. "They were issues that were at the heart of inequality and struggle in American society. He tackled everything from homophobia, sexism, racism, you name it."
If you watched All in the Family, you probably already have a sense of Lear's own family. Archie Bunker is reminiscent of Lear's own father, Edith was based on his mother, Jeanette, and America knew Lear's ex-wife Frances as the character Maude.
Lear grew up in a Jewish family in Connecticut. "I was a kid of the Depression," Lear told NPR in 2012. "I saw my father's brothers go belly up. My father was always belly up. It's very difficult for me to call my father what he was, so I use 'rascal.' He served time. He was in trouble a lot with the law. ... But I can't overstate how much I loved him. You hear me talk about him lightly because I cannot make him a villain. I loved him."
Lear dropped out of college and enlisted in the Air Force to fight in World War II. In his late 20s, he moved to Los Angeles. He struggled for several years, selling furniture door to door, taking baby pictures. Eventually, he talked his way into writing for a nightclub comedy act, which led to variety show gigs.
"He worked for Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, and then Martha Raye — this is a kind of who's who of television in that era," says Marty Kaplan, founding director of the Norman Lear Center at the University of Southern California.
Television writers join Jerry Lewis as they rehearse in May 1951. From left, Kingman T. Moore, Jerry Lewis, Ed Simmons, Norman Lear and Ernie Glucksman.
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Robert Kradin
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AP
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By 1971, Lear was almost 50. He had produced and directed some shows and movies, and his life was about to change.
"I'd read in TV Guide about this British show Till Death Us Do Part," Lear recollected in the DVD set The Norman Lear Collection. "That dynamic of the father and the son and the political arguments and the bigotry and so forth — that was my father," Lear says. "I grew up with that. I couldn't believe it hadn't been my idea, it was so clearly a show."
So he decided to make his own version. He cast stars like Carroll O'Connor and Jean Stapleton and he got a pilot filmed. But Lear had to fight for years to get All in the Family on air.
<em>All In The Family</em> stars Jean Stapleton and Carroll O'Connor (front) show off the Emmys they've just won in September 1978. Behind them are (from left) actor Rob Reiner, producer Norman Lear and executive producer Mort Lachman.
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When it finally did air, viewers got this warning first: "The program you are about to see is All in the Family. It seeks to throw a humorous spotlight on our frailties, prejudices and concerns. By making them a source of laughter, we hope to show — in a mature fashion — just how absurd they are."
The network was prepped for lots of complaints about the family patriarch, Archie Bunker's, unbridled racism. But people got it — and All in the Family made it to the top-10 for eight of its nine seasons.
"I set out to make people laugh, truly to make people laugh," Lear said. "But we approached it seriously. Our writers read two, three newspapers a day, paid a lot of attention to their kids and families, came in to talk about everything that was affecting us in our daily lives. And that's where we got our material."
All in the Family was the beginning of Lear's sitcom reign. Edith's cousin Maude, spun off her own show. Maude's housekeeper Florida and her family became Good Times — about a black family struggling with poverty.
And then came The Jeffersons, about a black family on its way up.
"The Jeffersons were unabashedly black," says Darnell Hunt. "It tried to engage race and class dynamics and gender dynamics at the same time. I remember The Jeffersons growing up, I remember feeling like, there really isn't anything else like this on TV so I have to watch this."
Hunt says the portrayal of a black family was far from perfect, but it had a level of realness that black audiences could relate to. The Jeffersons ran for 11 seasons — one of the longest running sitcoms on television. It became another Lear success story.
"He had at one point, three out of the five top shows on television, and this was a time when there were only three networks," says Kaplan. "Routinely, a show might get 50 or 60 million viewers. He was in direct contact with the living rooms and families of the country."
Lear took that reach seriously. He routinely fought with executives to get on storylines that reflected the social upheaval of the '70s, with the black power movement and women's liberation.
"It didn't escape our notice also that if you can get people to care when they laugh, they will laugh more," Lear told NPR in 2008.
By 1980, Lear was moving away from sitcoms, and toward political activism. "The mixture of politics and religion scared the hell out of me," he said. "And I went out and made a 60 second television spot."
In that spot, aimed at the religious right, Lear says: "There's something wrong when people — even preachers — suggest that other people are good Christians or bad Christians, depending on their political views. That's not the American way."
He says he never intended to start an organization, but People for the American Way "just sprung up around it."
Lear bought an original copy of the Declaration of Independence and toured the country with it. A nonprofit campaign that grew out of that tour called We Declare says that it registered nearly four million young voters ahead of the 2008 election.
Lear's passion and activism turned him into something of a lightning rod. "I've received a lot of death threats," he told NPR in 2012. "I never intended to be a lightning rod. Somebody asked me in an interview, if I had a bumper sticker, what would my bumper sticker be? And I said, 'Just another version of you.' And that's what I think we all are — versions of each other."
Lear thrived producing sitcoms. "Standing behind an audience of 240 people and watching an audience come out of its seat and go down and come back up again on a big laugh was a spiritual experience," he said.
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Ted S. Warren
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In more recent years, Lear had something of a comeback in Hollywood. For example, he helped reboot his series One Day At A Time. He was pitching pilots and holding political fundraisers, and recording twitter videos on his front porch — even after turning 100 years old.
Kaplan says Lear did all he did with humor and compassion.
"Norman divided people into wet and dry," Kaplan explains. "Dry people were calm, cool, unruffled. Wet people were emotional, and impulsive, and things get to them."
Lear considered himself a "wet" person — he teared up, he joined causes, he acted on what he believed — and his life was anything but dry.
Gab Chabrán
covers what's happening in food and culture for LAist.
Published September 10, 2026 5:00 AM
A fruit vendor sells on Whittier Boulevard in East L.A.
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Andrew Lopez
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Boyle Heights Beat
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Topline:
A recent AirTalk segment highlights the decades-long debate over street vending in Los Angeles. Despite efforts by the City Council and statewide law, enforcement remains murky at best, even though it's a fixture of Los Angeles culture.
Why now? During a recent debate, Mayor Karen Bass made a series of comments that cast street vending in an unsavory light, prompting an almost immediate backlash from her opponent, Nithya Raman, who has devised her own nine-point plan to address street vending if elected.
Why is it important? Street vendors are as much a part of L.A.'s identity as its restaurants — but the system meant to support them is so broken that only a fraction operate with full legal standing. As this becomes a defining issue in the mayor's race, it's worth knowing the difference between political rhetoric and how the rules actually work on the ground.
Last month, street vending became a flashpoint during one of the recent debates for L.A. mayor when incumbent Karen Bass said, "I do not think that you should have a food vendor in front of a restaurant. Period," drawing a comparison to unhoused encampments.
The remarks set off an almost immediate backlash. Mayoral candidate Nithya Raman, who has her own 9-point plan to support street vendors, said Bass "took a shot" at the street vending community and reiterated her commitment to work toward regulations and legalizing their operations.
Bass's office later eased its stance, saying it had directed the LAPD to stop issuing criminal citations to street vendors — and to dismiss any that had been issued in error.
Street vending remains part of the Los Angeles landscape, and the backlash from the debate brought to light just how confusing its legality can be. To understand how we got here, it helps to start with the basics.
Is street vending legal?
Yes. Since SB 946 in 2018, state law has decriminalized it. That means cities and counties can't criminally cite vendors or ban them from specific zones. They can, however, still enforce health and safety rules — things like sidewalk clearance and ADA access.
So why does it feel unregulated?
On a recent segment forAirTalk, Memo Torres ofL.A. Taco pointed to a stark gap between L.A.'s vending population and its permitted vendors. According to an email from the California Restaurant Association reported byFOX 11, an estimated 50,000 street vendors operate across Los Angeles — yet only 53 hold permits specifically for food sales.
Why so few permits?
Vending requirements largely mirror restaurant-grade standards — large refrigeration units, multi-basin sinks — that don't fit the reality of most vendor setups: flat-top griddles, folding tables, pop-up tents.
That isn't to say there haven't been efforts by the city to address the permitting gap. In 2024, the City Council, with Raman's backing, voted to drop the annual permit fee from $541 to $27.51.
Raman's mayoral campaign has since proposed another potential fix: extending a state permit category — currently used by vendors at farmers markets who share equipment like a communal three-compartment sink — to street vendors, so operators wouldn't need their own restaurant-grade setup to qualify.
What about health and safety?
County health inspectors technically oversee street food vendors, but both industry and vendor advocates agree enforcement is inconsistent — leaving reliable data on violations hard to come by.
Are vendors and restaurants actually enemies?
A 2015 Economic Roundtable study found that businesses located near street vendors were more likely to see job growth than those without nearby vendors.
What’s next
Proposals like Raman's permitting reforms aim to close the gap — but for now, most of L.A.'s vendors remain outside the formal system.
Outside the Melbourne Cricket Ground ahead of the NFL game between the Rams and 49ers. (AP Photo/Asanka Brendon Ratnayake)
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Asanka Brendon Ratnayake
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Associated Press
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Topline:
The longest road trip in NFL history has brought the San Francisco 49ers and the Los Angeles Rams to Australia’s sports capital for a season opener in front of more than 100,000 football-hungry fans packed into the Southern Hemisphere’s largest stadium.
Why it matters: The NFC West rivals are playing Australia’s first NFL game, and the starkly differing ways in which they made this epic journey have attracted almost as much attention as the two star-studded rosters preparing to put on a show.
The backstory: The 49ers have been Down Under for more than a week, adjusting their body clocks and winning over thousands of Aussie fans who appreciate their commitment to the historic moment. The Rams were only scheduled to arrive in Melbourne around dawn Thursday, roughly 28 hours before the Friday morning kickoff that’s necessary to play the game Thursday night in prime time in the U.S. That’s because head coach Sean McVay is convinced they can thwart jet lag and optimize their game readiness by staying home on California time.
What's next: The Rams and 49ers kick off at 5:35 p.m. Thursday night on Netflix.
The longest road trip in NFL history has brought the San Francisco 49ers and the Los Angeles Rams to Australia’s sports capital for a season opener in front of more than 100,000 football-hungry fans packed into the Southern Hemisphere’s largest stadium.
The NFC West rivals are playing Australia’s first NFL game, and the starkly differing ways in which they made this epic journey have attracted almost as much attention as the two star-studded rosters preparing to put on a show.
The 49ers have been Down Under for more than a week, adjusting their body clocks in the traditional manner and winning over thousands of Aussie fans who appreciate their commitment to the historic moment.
The Rams were only scheduled to arrive in Melbourne around dawn Thursday, roughly 28 hours before the Friday morning kickoff that’s necessary to play the game Thursday night in prime time in the U.S. That’s because head coach Sean McVay is convinced they can thwart jet lag and optimize their game readiness by staying home on California time.
Both teams agree this contrast in preparation is not a referendum on the best way to handle a pair of 16-hour flights with a football game in between — even if the rest of the world might see it that way after the final whistle.
Instead, this game is primarily a difficult early test for both the Super Bowl favorite Rams and the talent-laden 49ers, who also intend to be a title challenger. The coaching staffs and veteran players all know each other thoroughly after a decade of competition between Shanahan and McVay, who are both constantly looking for an edge.
“I don’t think there’s any right way to do it,” said defensive end Myles Garrett, who will make his Rams debut in Australia. “They have a plan, and I’m sure they consulted different teams and people to find out a way to combat jet lag and such long travel. We’ve done the same thing. I think we’re both riding our methodologies.”
Garrett will be joined by star cornerback Trent McDuffie and cornerback Jaylen Watson in their debuts with Los Angeles’ revamped defense.
“I’ve never been more excited to be wrong about something,” Shanahan said.
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Frank Stoltze
is a veteran reporter who covers local politics and examines how democracy is and, at times, is not working.
Published September 9, 2026 6:36 PM
The Jail complex in downtown Los Angeles
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Robert Garrova / LAist
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Topline:
The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has opened an investigation into the Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles, specifically looking into whether L.A. County has failed to provide environmentally safe, humane and habitable conditions for people held there.
The details: The jail has long been plagued by allegations of poor conditions. Monitors from the American Civil Liberties Union have documented problems including overcrowding, severe mold and mildew, and rodent infestations.
The context: The federal investigation is expected to focus on conditions within the facility and not the actions of the county sheriff’s deputies who staff it, according to the Justice Department. The new investigation is separate from a 2015 settlement between the county and federal government, which stemmed from allegations of inadequate mental health care provided at county jails.
What happens next: Investigators will determine whether the county has violated the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which protects against cruel and unusual punishment, and 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law.
Reaction: L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger welcomed the investigation, and said she had said for year that the jail was “antiquated, inhumane, and unfit for our workforce and those incarcerated there.”
Jason Wells
manages the daily news product that you hear and read every day.
Published September 9, 2026 5:13 PM
Smoke rises from a brush fire near the Getty Center on Sept. 9, 2026.
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CBS LA
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Topline:
Firefighters appeared to make quick progress against a brush fire the broke out Wednesday near the Getty Center.
What we know so far: As of 5 p.m., evacuation warnings had been issued for zones LFD-0895 and LF-0967, although the LAFD said no structures were immediately threatened as the water-dropping helicopters attacked the fire from above.
Read on ... for more on evacuations and weather conditions.
This story is no longer being actively updated. For the most up-to-date information about the fire you can check:
Firefighters appeared to make quick progress against a brush fire the broke out Wednesday near the Getty Center.
As of 5 p.m., evacuation warnings had been issued for zones LFD-0895 and LF-0967, although the LAFD said no structures were immediately threatened as the water-dropping helicopters attacked the fire from above. Forward progress of the fire was reported stopped shortly after 6 p.m. at a little over 20 acres.
