African-American TV Shows Trivia Quiz

Answer: False

Born in Racine, Wisconsin, in 1934, Barbara McNair was one of the most versatile African-American entertainers of the 20th century. A star of Broadway, television, music, as well as movies (she appeared with Sidney Poitier in "They Call Me Mr. Tibbs" and with Elvis Presley in his last movie, "Change of Habit", in 1969), Ms. McNair began her career as a nightclub singer and got her big break on Arthur Godfrey's "Talent Scouts" TV series in the 1950's. She also attended UCLA to study music where one of her classmates was Carol Burnett.

And, like Carol Burnett, she also hosted her own variety program called "The Barbara McNair Show", from 1969-1971. The show featured some of the biggest stars of the day like Sonny and Cher, Tony Bennett, and Bob Hope. After the show ended, Barbara went on to make guest appearances in some of the '70's most popular tv shows such as "McMillian and Wife" and "The $10,000 Pyramid". She died of throat cancer in February 2007.

Answer: "Roll Out"

"Roll Out" premiered on CBS in October, of 1972, and only lasted until the first week of January, 1974. The show was about a military trucking company that deilvered supplies to French soldiers during World War II and was loosely based on the 1952 movie "Red Ball Express".

Other notable cast members were Theodore Wilson, ('High Strung'), who would go on to play 'Sweet Daddy' Williams a few years later on "Good Times", and Ed Begley, Jr. ('Lt. Robert W. Chapman'), who would have better success on the critically acclaimed 1980's hospital drama "St. Elsewhere".

Answer: "Snoops"

"Snoops" was a show about a professor of criminology (Chance Dennis) and his wife (Micki), who worked as a protocol aide for the U.S. State Department, starring real-life husband and wife Tim and Daphne Maxwell Reid. The couple would always find themselves in the middle of some sort of mystery that needing to be solved each week and featured a stellar cast of actors and actresses such as Moses Gunn (Chance Dennis, Sr.) and Lynn Whitfield (Denise Kendall), as Chance's father and sister, respectively, along with Raymond St. Jacques and Barbara McNair as Micki's parents, Gen. Ben and Virginia Martin.

The show ran from September, 22, 1989 until July 6, 1990, on CBS.

Answer: Seattle

"Under One Roof" was a mid-season replacement for CBS, from March 14, 1995 until April 18, 1995. Taking place in Seattle, Washington, "Under One Roof" was a good show with a strong cast that tried to present an African-American family in a drama instead of the usual comedic genre.

Neb Langston (James Earl Jones) was a widowed, ex-police sergeant who shared his home with two generations of his family. The cast included his son, Ron (Joe Morton), who ran a hardware store, and his wife, Maggie (Vanessa Bell Calloway); their two children, daughter Charlie (Essence Atkins) and ten year old, diabetic son, Derrick (Ronald Joshua Scott); Ron's sister, Ayesha (Monique Ridge); and, Neb's foster son, Marcus (Merlin Santana). Depite the strong cast and stories, however, the show only lasted six episodes, which was truly a shame, in my opinion.

Answer: True

On October 9, 1973, Richard Roundtree reprised his role as private investigator, John Shaft, on the small screen in "Shaft". The series was a direct continuation of the movie trilogy and was very unique in the fact that, unlike other television series', it was 90 minutes per episode (it aired Tuesdays at 9:30 p.m.). Due to the show's length, another very unusual thing about it was the schedule it was on.

Instead of airing weekly, as most series do, "Shaft" was on every third week, so you seldom saw it twice in the same month.

It was cancelled after its last show on September 3, 1974.

Answer: Demond Wilson/Ron Glass

Demond Wilson and Ron Glass were the black 'Oscar' and 'Felix', respectively, from October 29, 1982, until June 16, 1983. Unfortunately, the writers of the show chose to recycle old plots from the previous run instead of coming up with fresh ideas for this incarnation of the series. The show was shown on rare occasions on TVLand.

Answer: report

"That's My Mama" followed the life of Washington, D.C., barber Cliff Curtis (Clifton Davis) and his mama, Eloise (Theresa Merritt), as they butted heads about his bachelor lifestyle after the death of Cliff, Sr. Mama was always trying to set her son up with a 'nice girl' so that he could give her some grandchildren, but Cliff enjoyed his life as a bachelor and his barbershop too much to settle down. And, like any barbershop, there were a lot of crazy characters that hung out there, like Wildcat (Jester Hairston), an older gentleman who never got his haircut, but could always direct Cliff and the other barbers on what they were doing wrong, and Junior, the neighborhood gossip. His familair catchphrase whenever he entered the shop was, "I got it, I got it, and I got to report it".

Although the show had a following, it never broke into the top 25 during its time on the air and was cancelled on Christmas Eve, 1975, after airing a repeat episode. The last new episode aired on December 17, 1975.

Answer: "The New Bill Cosby Show"

On September 11, 1972, "The New Bill Cosby Show" debuted on CBS, at 10:00 p.m. After two very sucessful shows on NBC ("I Spy" and "The Bill Cosby Show"), Cosby decided to try his hand at hosting a variety show since the genre was so popular during that time. With guest stars such as The Jackson Five, Harry Belafonte, and Sidney Poitier showing up, the show was always a 'must see'. There was also a segment of the show where a drunk (Foster Brooks) would come out and do a skit and, while it was funny back then, it definitely would not be allowed now with today's heightened sensitivity to alcoholism.

Due to the glut of so many variety shows at the time, "The New Bill Cosby Show" got lost in the mix and was cancelled after one season. Even though his first attempt at a variety show failed, Cosby would try his hand at another variety show, in 1976, on ABC, simply entitled, "Cos"; however, this show didn't even last half the season as it was cancelled after two months due to poor ratings.

Answer: Grady

"Grady" premiered on NBC on December 4, 1975 and lasted until March 4, 1976. The series followed Grady Wilson, one of Fred Sanford's closet friends, as he moved out of Watts and into upscale Westwood to live with his daughter and her family. The cast included Carol Cole as Grady's daughter, Ellie Marshall; Joe Morton, as Ellie's school teacher husband, Hal, and Haywood Nelson, who would go on to better success as 'Dwayne Clemens' on the show, "What's Happening", as their son, Haywood.

After the show was cancelled, Mayo returned to "Sanford and Son" (by now, the name had changed to "The Sanford Arms") and remained with the show until it ended. In 1996, Mayo began teaching drama at Clark-Atlanta University in Atlanta, Georgia. He passed away in 2001 of a heart attack.

Answer: Dr. Ben Turner

"City of Angels" was a fantastic show that was never given enough time to catch on with a mass audience. Although there was a small group of loyal watchers (myself included), the show's timeslot was switched several times from Thursdays, to Tuesdays, to finally settling in on Wednesday nights. All of this jumping around hurt the show moreso than the writing, which was extremely good.

The cast was stellar, led by Blair Underwood as Dr. Ben Turner. Vivica Fox (Medical Director Lillian Price) was Turner's boss, as well as his former fiancee', which led to some very awkward situations due to the fact that they both still had feelings for each other. Michael Warren (CEO, Ron Harris) who was always looking for ways to cut hospital costs, thereby butting heads with Dr. Turner, and Hill Harper (Resident student, Dr. Wesley Williams), who is now on "CSI: NY", were just a few of the stars who made this show are real gem to watch. The show ran from January 16, 2000 to December 21, 2000.

Answer: False

Although it is true that "Bustin' Loose" was both a movie and a TV series, Richard Pryor did not reprise the role for the television version. That role went to former "Good Times" star, Jimmie 'J. J.' Walker. Walker played Sonny Barnes, a con-man who was given a five year sentence to work with orphans and at-risk youths in Philadelphia.

The show lasted only a year, from September 26, 1987 to September 10, 1988, and produced 26 episodes.

Answer: Baby

Denise Nicholas starred along with Demond Wilson in the comedy "Baby, I'm Back", in January, 1978. The show was about Ray Ellis (Wilson) who abandoned had his family in Washington, D.C. seven years ago and fled to California to escape his gambling debts. Because of the length of time that he was away and his not keeping touch with family, his wife, Olivia (Nicholas), declared him dead and re-married.

After hearing of this from an old neighborhood friend, Ray returns to D.C. to try and reclaim his family by moving into the same apartment building where they live.

This throws everything into chaos because now Olivia's marriage to her new husband, Wallace, is in question, legally, and she finds that she still has feelings for Ray. In the last episode, which aired on April 24, 1978 (the show didn't actually get cancelled until August of that same year), Olivia does not make a decision between the two men, but packs up her kids, two year old, Angie (Kim Fields) and seven year old, Jordan (Tony Holmes), and moves to Guam based on advice from her friend, Anita, and her mother, Luzell (Helen Martin).

Answer: Get

On January 22, 1974, on ABC's "Movie of the Week", Teresa Graves brought 'Det. Christie Love', who often worked undercover for the Los Angeles Police Department, to life and in September of that year "Get Christie Love" became a weekly series. The movie was based on the Dorothy Uhnak novel, 'The Ledger', and was extemely popular, so ABC tried to capitalize on the character's already built in following. However, the show failed to do as well as the executives thought it would and cancelled it on April 4, 1975.

Ms. Graves was a cast member of "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In", from 1969-1970.

Answer: Criminology

"Paris" followed the exploits of Capt. Woodrow "Woody" Paris who, by day, was just another cop doing his job to "serve and protect" the public. By night, Paris taught criminology at a local college and used his team of special investigators to decipher the cases that their colleagues could not. The show ran from September 29, 1979 until January 15, 1980.

James Earl Jones has had an incredible acting career on both the big and small screens and his deep, baritone voice is instantly recognizable; in fact, Jones will probably be best remembered from a series of movies that he never actually appeared in. He was the voice of the villain, Darth Vader, from the first "Star Wars" trilogy from the late 1970's to the mid 1980's. Actor David Prowse actually portrayed Vader in the movies.

Answer: "Gideon's Crossing"

It is a real shame when good shows with strong casts and stories go unnoticed and are cancelled before their time, such is the case with many of the shows in this quiz. "Gideon's Crossing", starring Andre Braugher as Dr. Ben Gideon, the head of the oncology department at a fictional hospital somewhere in New England, definitely fits this bill, too. Dr. Gideon's team would take on those medical cases where the patients had no where else to turn and were willing to try the most cutting-edged experimental treatments. Braugher's portrayal of the calm Dr. Gideon was a complete 180 degree turnaround from his protrayal of the intense, "in-your-face", Det. Pembleton, and it really showed his range as an actor so well.

The show was inspired by the book "The Measure of Our Days", by Dr. Jerome Groupman, and premiered on ABC on October 10, 2000 to a large fan base and critical acclaim as a top-notch show; however despite these positive things, the series was surprisingly cancelled by ABC in May, of 2001, although the last new episode to be aired was on April 9, 2001.