Flintstones on DVD Bullwinkle on DVD Dick Van Dyke Show on  DVDs Mary Tyler Moore Show on DVD Grizzly Adams on DVDs “The Mr Peabody on DVD  Please consider a donation so we can continue this work!

 

 

A catalog of all
the classic TV
shows on DVD!

What's Happening!! TV Show
- PART THREE -


What's Happening Now!!  castUP FROM THE ASHES

With the enormous, immediate success of The Cosby Show in 1984, suddenly producers were scrambling to mount sitcoms featuring African-American families. Producer Bud Yorkin reasoned a new series with a familiar cast would have a good chance in syndication, putting What's Happening Now!! into production.

What's Happening Now!! TV ShowSix years after leaving the airwaves, the entire What's Happening!! gang was back (with the exception Mabel King). In the new series, Raj was now married to a girl named Nadine (newcomer Anne-Marie Johnson), struggling as a writer, co-owner (with Shirley) of Rob's Diner and foster parent to an 8-year old girl, Carolyn.

Rerun was working as a used car salesman, Dee was off to college (and only rarely appeared on the new series) and Dwayne was employed as a computer programmer.

It's rare for a network show to continue with new episodes after cancellation and no primetime show had ever been revived in syndication with the original cast when What's Happening Now!! debuted in 1985. It became a minor trend thereafter; other examples include The New Leave It To Beaver and Mama's Family.

Plots on What's Happening Now!! were typical sitcom fare: a harmless romance develops between Dwayne and Dee, Nadine sneaks into a men's-only club Raj wants to join, Raj freaks out when he learns Nadine once posed nude (guess he forgot about his stint) and, of course, Raj's bitchy mother-in-law comes for a visit.

This new production was a pleasing update with comfortable, if not spectacular, ratings. Backstage battles began almost immediately when Fred Rerun Berry demanded more money or he would walk. He figured that producers would recognize he was the real star of the program (indeed, Berry supplied much of the spark of the new series) and would cave in to his demands rather than risk losing their considerable investment.

He was wrong. Rerun was fired and written out of the show before the first season ended. When the second season rolled around, the foster kid was out as well - What's Happening Now!! had lost its balance. With Shirley Hemphill once again playing the ersatz mother character and Rerun gone, there was little comedy edge, just a soft, mushy center.

New regulars were added for the third season in 1987 to bring the focus closer to the original Cooley High concept - Martin Lawrence (yes, that Martin Lawrence) and Ken Sagoes were brought in as high schoolers Maurice and Darryl. This was to be the final season.

What's Happening!!  TV ShowAFTER THE SHOW

Since 1988, the cast members of What's Happening!! have languished in relative obscurity.

Dee Spencer is reportedly now a veterinarian and occasional actor. She was seen on the soap opera Days Of Our Lives recently.

Ernest Thomas turned up as a guest on sitcoms like The Steve Harvey Show, Martin and can be seen in several films including a minor but superlative role in Spike Lee's Malcolm X in 1992.

Mabel King reprised her role as the mother of Steve Martin in the motion picture The Jerk, 2 in 1992. She died November 9, 1999 after a long bout with diabetes, having had both of her legs amputated as a result of the devastating illness.

The next month, Shirley Hemphill died at age 52, a victim of kidney failure. Largely forgotten by the television industry, she carved out a niche as a successful stand-up comedian in nightclubs and could be seen on shows like BET's Black Comedy Showcase. Hemphill was found December 10, 1999 by her gardener, face down in her West Covina, California bedroom. She had been dead for some time. In what must have been some great cosmic joke, Shirley had just completed filming a couple of workout videos shortly before she died.

Fred Berry struggled to find television work outside of What's Happening!! and his defection from the second series did nothing to help his situation. By the end of the eighties, Berry sobered up and became a Baptist minister preaching in Madison, Alabama. He legally changing his name to Rerun and turned up as himself on an episode of Martin in the nineties. In 2002, Rerun announced that he had lost 100 pounds; he was seen most recently in Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star, Star Dates and Scrubs.

Married a total of six times to four women, Berry died of natural causes in his LA apartment on Tuesday, October 21, 2003 at age 52. He had been ill because of a stroke.

What's Happening!! cast photoIn February, 2001, Bryant Gumbel hosted a What's Happening!! cast reunion on the CBS Early Show (see it here).

Eric Monte, creator of Cooley High and What's Happening!!, filed a lawsuit against CBS, ABC and the producers of Good Times, The Jeffersons and What's Happening!! for $400 million, what he saw as his share for creating those shows and characters. After filing the suit, he was virtually blacklisted in Hollywood. In the early 1980s, he received a million dollar settlement.

In 2006, the L.A. Times published a profile of Monte, who was living in a Salvation Army homeless shelter after years of industry abuse, a series of strokes and drug addiction. He still hopes for a comeback.

Want to see the show? The series is now out on DVD.

 

PART 1 / 2


Please consider a donation
so we can continue this work!

 

 

Amazon Prime - unlimited streaming
of your fave TV shows and movies!
Get your FREE 30 Day Trial!

PR4 & PR5 Pages for Advertising

“The

 

 

Video on Demand Rent or Buy

Entertainment Collectables

 

What's
Happening Now!!


CAST
Ernest Thomas - Roger "Raj" Thomas
Fred Berry - Freddie "Rerun" Stubbs (1985-1986)
Haywood Nelson - Dwayne Nelson
Danielle Spencer - Dee Thomas
Shirley Hemphill - Shirley Wilson
Anne-Marie Johnson - Nadine Hudson Thomas

Reina King - Carolyn (1985-1986)
Martin Lawrence - Maurice Warfield (1987-1988)
Ken Sagoes - Darryl (1987-1988)


Great What's
Happening
Webpage

 

 


'What's Happening Now!!' was popular enough for Columbia Pictures to shop the concept of 'That's My Mamma Now!,' a revival of the short-lived 70's sitcom starring Clifton Davis.

 

ORDER NOW:

ON DVD!
You deserve it


Catalog of all
Classic TV Shows
on DVD


TV on DVD
Hard-to-find Classic TV
Shows on DVD

 

Amos & andy DVDs

Good Times Season 5 on DVD

All in the Family on DVd

Cosby Show season 2 on DVD

 

tv on dvd


Local Kid Shows / Movie Stars on TV / Saturday Morning Shows / Video Vault / TV Goodbyes / Fabulous Fifties / Unseen Scenes / Game Shows / Requested Forgotten TV Shows / The Super Sixties / More Modern TV Shows / The New * * Shows / 1980's Wrestling / TV Blog

TVparty is Classic TV on the internet!
Classic TV on the Internet!

TV's Embarrassing Moments / Action Shows of the Sixties / TVparty Mysteries and Scandals / Variety Shows of the 1970s / The Eighties / The Laugh Track / 1970's Hit Shows / Response to TVparty / Search the Site / Add Your Comments

REQUESTED CLASSIC
TV SHOWS!

The Virginian / Men From Shilo
The Girl with Something Extra
My World And Welcome To It
Nanny & The Professor
The Smith Family
Shazam!
The Sixth Sense
Camp Runamuck
Run Buddy Run
Pistols N Petticoats
The Young Rebels / Lawyers
The Texas Wheelers
The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis
My Living Doll / Favorite Martian
The Pruitts of Southhampton
Captain Nice & Mr. Terrific
The Ugliest Girl In Town
The Beverly Hillbillies
Saturday Night Live
Shindig! & Hullabaloo
The Mothers-in-Law
Then Came Bronson
Holmes and Yo-Yo

James Garner as Nichols
Playboy After Dark
A Touch of Grace
Blue Coronet
Second Hundred Years
The New People
McKeever and the Colonel
The Rockford Files
My Mother The Car
Get Christy Love
The Magician
The Persuaders
It's About Time
Reverend Ike
Family Affair
The Gong Show
He and She
Hootenanny
Honey West
Amanda's
Way Out
Bearcats
Quark
Shaft
Hank

Requested Forgotten television Shows!
Classic TV Commercials / 1950's TV / 1960's TV / Punk Book / / 1970's TV / Groucho vs William F Buckley / / TV Games / Honey Boo Boo / Lucy Shows / Classic Cars / John Wayne / Gene Roddenberry / Rockford Files / Sea Hunt / Superman on DVD / Toy Gun Ads / Flip Wilson Show / Big Blue Marble / Monty Hall / Carrascolendas / Mr. Dressup / Major Mudd / Chief Halftown / Baby Daphne / Sheriff John / Winchell & Mahoney / Fireball X-L5 / Mr. Wizard / Captain Noah / Thanksgiving Day Specials / Disney's First Christmas Special / Saturday Morning Cartoons / The Magic Garden / Amahl & the Night Visitors / Holiday Toy Commercials / Lucy & Desi's Last Christmas Show / Joey Heatherton / Fat Albert / The Virginian / Bewitched / Death of John Wayne / 1974 Saturday Mornings / Chuck McCann / Rudolph Collectables / Shrimpenstein / Local Popeye Shows / New Treasure Hunt / 1966 ABC TV Shows / 1967 TV Shows / 1968 TV Shows / Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes & Baby Doll / Fridays / TV Moms / Red Skelton / Star Wars / KISS / Lancelot Link / Saturday Morning Cartoons / The Magic Garden / Wonder Woman / Classic Comic Books / Andy Griffith / Cher / TV Shows on DVD / Outtakes & Bloopers / 1967 TV Shows / Romper Room / ABC Movie of the Week / The Goldbergs / Daws Butler Commercials / Saturday Morning Commercials / Captain Kangaroo / Chicago Local Kiddie Shows / Boston Local TV / Philly Local TV / NYC Local Kid Shows / Amos 'n' Andy / Electric Company / Bette Davis / Judy Garland / Christmas Specials / Redd Foxx / Good Times / Sitcom Houses / The Oldest Italianate Architecture in the United States / What's Happening! / Winky Dink & You / big brotherSonny & Cher / Smothers Brothers / Commercial Icons of the 1960s / Soupy Sales / The Carpenters / Route 66 / Bozo / The Carpenters Christmas Specials / Local Kid Shows / Death of TV's Superman / Wonderama / Sesame Street / Bob Hope Specials / Little Rascals / 1980's Retro Gay T-Shirts / 1980's TV Wrestling / Fess Parker / Howdy Doody / TV Blog / Lost In Space / Pinky Lee / 1980's LA Punk Rock / Alex Toth Book / TV Terrorists / Irwin Allen / The Untouchables / Carol Burnett Show / Batman TV Show / Green Hornet / Today Show History / Our Gang / Doris Day Show / 1970's Commercials For Women / Bill Cosby in the 1970s / The Golddiggers / Lola Falana / 1970s TV Shows / David Bowie on TV / Hudson Brothers / Jackie Gleason / Hollywood Squares / Match Game / Bob Keeshan / Gumby / The Flip Wilson Show / Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour / The Bobby Darin Show / The Richard Pryor Show / George Burns / Lucy's Lost Christmas Special / Classic Christmas Toy Commercials / Cricket On The Hearth / 1950's Holiday Shows / Amahl and the Night Visitors / A Christmas Carol on TV / The Yule Log / Celebrity Commercials / Rudolph / Movie Posters & More! 
Classic TV Shows on DVD

Get it here!

SAVE MONEY
ON EVERYTHING!

TV Commercials on DVD Lost In Space on DVD Mr Peabody on DVD Carol Burnett Show on DVD Carol Burnett Show on DVD Mary Tyler Moore Show on DVD Rat Pack Golddiggers Book RAT PACK GOLDDIGGERS
/ / / Classic TV Blog / / / TV Shows on DVD / / / TV Show Reviews / // / TV on BLU-RAY
Looking for classic TV DVDs?/See below:
TV Commercials on DVD Wrestling DVDs Classic TV Books

Bionic Woman on DVD

TVparty is Classic TV on the internet!
Contact Us / Classic TV DVDs

TV Blog
Bionic Woman on DVD