From Good Times To Bad: Whatever Happened To The Cast Of Good Times?

Monte’s Breakthrough

After enrolling in theater classes at a local community college, in five years Monte successfully sold producer Norman Lear on one of his scripts for All in the Family. After pitching his idea for a show about a black family living in Chicago—very similar to his experiences growing up—Monte finally hit his big break. The success of Good Times earned Monte a beautiful home in the Santa Monica Mountains and a NAACP Image Award.

“Not only would Monte’s shows portray African American families, the individual characters would be multidimensional and the scripts would avoid negative stereotypes. He would break with tradition and illustrate that life for the working poor isn’t all about crime, drugs and cheap laughs,” as Los Angeles Times succinctly put it. But success wouldn’t last long…