Even This I Get to Experience

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The New York Times bestselling memoir from the creator of some of the most iconic television programs ever, including All in the Family, Maude, Good Times, The Jeffersons, and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.

“Charming, candid, and copious . . . There is still a lot of zest, passion, and whimsy in the man who taught Americans to laugh at their failings.” —The New York Times

Norman Lear’s iconic television programs—most memorably All in the Family—drew in as many as 120 million viewers each week. These shows dealt with the most serious issues of the day—racism, poverty, abortion—yet still left audiences howling with laughter. But TV is only a fraction of Lear’s tale. The renowned producer came of age during the Great Depression and fought in World War II, staging variety shows for his fellow airmen in addition to flying fifty-two bombing missions. After the war he caught his break as a comedy writer in Hollywood, soon working with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Movies with Frank Sinatra, Dick Van Dyke, and Jason Robards followed. Then came the ’70s and Lear’s legendary string of TV hits. Filled with moving insights and behind-the-scenes stories from the shows that redefined the medium, Even This I Get to Experience is a memoir as touching, funny, and remarkable as any of Lear’s unforgettable creations.

“Lear is one of the great storytellers of our time…This book should be required reading for everyone working in Hollywood.” —James Patterson

“One of the best Hollywood memoirs ever written . . . an absolute treasure.” —Booklist, starred review“Charming, candid, and copious . . . There is still a lot of zest, passion, and whimsy in the man who taught Americans to laugh at their failings.” —The New York Times

“The Norman Lear who emerges from Even This I Get to Experience is engaging and unpompous, an amusing storyteller who pokes fun at himself and writes with brutal honesty about his life, especially his childhood. And what a story!” —Wall Street Journal

“An entertaining, penetrating celebration of a richly lived life.” —Associated Press

“Immensely likeable…[Lear] isn’t always a mensch in Even This I Get to Experience (italics, characteristically, his), but at least he can write like one…. In this city, Norman Lear and his post-coaxial contemporaries built a mass medium with their bare hands. On good days — as Lear well recalls, and recalls well — they made it sing. If only more with their talent had lived so long; if only more who live so long had his talent.” —Los Angeles Times

“This is, flat out, one of the best Hollywood memoirs ever written… An absolute treasure.” —Booklist, starred review

“A TV titan on his memorable life and storied career. Lear, best known as the creative mind behind such classic comedies as All in the Family, Maude, The Jeffersons and Good Times, recounts his extraordinarily eventful life with his signature wit and irreverence. The result is not just a vividly observed and evocative portrait of a long life, but also a fascinating backstage look at the evolution of the American entertainment industry… Lear writes movingly of his service in World War II, his difficult upbringing and subsequent troubled marriages, and his commitment to liberal causes, evidenced by his founding of the advocacy organization People for the American Way and his purchase of an original copy of the Declaration of Independence. That he makes these subjects as engrossing and entertaining as his Hollywood reminiscences speaks to Lear’s mastery of storytelling and humor. A big-hearted, richly detailed chronicle of comedy, commitment and a long life lived fully.” —Kirkus Review, starred review

“[A] feisty, thoughtful autobiography… Lear pens sharply observed studies of the creative process on his many iconic productions and bares plenty of raucous, sometimes bawdy anecdotes—readers get to experience a nude and lewd Jerry Lewis…  [I]n keeping with the bigoted, mouthy, complex and loveable characters he created, Lear’s knack for sizing up a flawed humanity makes for an absorbing read.” —Publishers Weekly

“That Norman Lear can find humor in life’s darkest moments is no surprise—it’s the reason he’s been so successful throughout his more than nine decades on earth, and why Americans have relied on his wit and wisdom for more than six. It’s also why Even This I Get to Experience is such a great read.” —President William J. Clinton

“Lear is one of the great storytellers of our time…This book should be required reading for everyone working in Hollywood.” —James Patterson

“Norman Lear could never write a more dramatic, touching, or funnier tale of his life than he’s done here in Even This I Get to Experience.” —Carl Reiner

“Many have known the Man behind the stories. Now all of us can know the stories behind the Man. Archie, Edith, Gloria, and Meathead couldn’t have told them better!” —Bill Moyers

“Even This I Get to Experience is not just the brilliant, moving story of a man who has lived an amazing number of lives—from making it onto Richard Nixon’s ‘Enemies List’ to changing the face of television—but also a life manual on how to live a life of depth, purpose, and meaning.” —Arianna Huffington

“Norman Lear is a hero and a friend . . . he experienced so much in his life . . . sometimes I just want to sit down and ask him questions about life and his perspective . . . to do it right it would take years of interviews . . . but now that he wrote this book I can experience his journey and wisdom over and over again.” —will.i.am

“Fantastic stories from one of the wisest, most subversive, and most beautiful human beings the comedy world has ever known. Like the man himself, this book is charming, awe-inspiring, and hilarious.” —Trey ParkerNorman Lear was the television producer of such groundbreaking sitcoms as All in the Family, Sanford and Son, One Day at a Time, The Jeffersons, Good Times, and Maude. He received four Emmy awards, a Peabody, and the National Medal of Arts. As an advocate, Lear founded People For the American Way and supported First Amendment rights and other progressive causes. He died in 2023.

WHEN I WAS A BOY I thought that if I could turn a screw in my father’s head just a sixteenth of an inch one way or the other, it might help him to tell the difference between right and wrong. I couldn’t, of course, and ultimately he—and I—had to pay a serious price for his confusion.

In late June of 1931, just out of third grade and a month away from turning nine, I was eagerly looking forward to my first experience at summer camp. A roll of cloth tape imprinted with “Norman M. Lear, Norman M. Lear, Norman M. Lear . . .” sat on the kitchen counter, waiting for my mother to cut it up and sew my name into the clothes I’d be taking with me in a few weeks.

Meanwhile, my father was about to take a plane to Tulsa. None of my friends in Chelsea, Massachusetts, knew anybody who had ever flown anywhere. It had been only four years since Charles Lindbergh flew thirty-three and a half hours in his single-engine Spirit of St. Louis to get from New York to Paris, and the rare plane that was spotted in the sky had us kids chasing around in the street yelling, “Lindy, Lindy!” So Dad flying to Oklahoma was a big deal.

He was traveling on some kind of business—“Monkey business!” said my mother, who sensed that the men he’d fallen in with were not to be trusted—and for my upcoming birthday he was going to bring me back a ten-gallon hat just like the one worn by my favorite film cowboy, Ken Maynard.

“Herman, I don’t like this,” she told him. “I don’t want you to see those men.” But Herman, as always, knew better.

“Jeanette!” he screamed, the veins in his neck bulging as he stood over her with his nose all but pressing hers. “Stifle!” And off he went.

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