True Colors (TV series)

Premise and first season

Set in Baltimore, Ronald Freeman (Frankie Faison) is a widowed African-American dentist who marries Ellen Davis (Stephanie Faracy), a divorced white kindergarten teacher who was one of his patients. Ron has two sons from his first marriage, 17-year-old earnest conservative Terry (Claude Brooks) and daydreaming 14-year-old troublemaker Lester (Adam Jeffries), while Ellen has a teenage daughter, studious, cause-driven Katie (Brigid Conley Walsh). Ellen's ex-husband, Leonard (played in guest appearances by Paul Sand), who is accepting of her second marriage, would occasionally visit her while attempting to get his life back on track. Although the series did focus on race issues, most episodes focused on the family adjusting to their new living situation and the three children going through adolescence.

Another source of contention for the family was Ellen's divorced mother, Sara Bower (Nancy Walker), who also had moved into the household. Sara disapproved of her daughter's marriage, although in a more subdued manner than previous bigoted TV characters confronted with race relations (Archie Bunker, et al.), nor was it ever explicitly stated that she disapproved of her new son-in-law on account of race. Despite her wry jokes centering on the occasional pains she had in her life, Sara possessed spunk, had an active dating life, and even in time, formed a good relationship with Lester, who thought that his step-grandmother was quite hip. One hint towards her outlook was when Ron removed an abscess tooth of hers, to which her attitude changes at being relieved of so much pain. Sara then praises Ron as a genius and becomes generous towards her grandchildren.

Originally, the basement of the Freeman home was a dentist's office, where Ron operated a private practice, but it later became Terry's bedroom after Ron rented space in an office building for his practice.

One instance in which the series directly tackled the issue of race was the first season episode "A Matter of Principal" (April 14, 1991). It was career week for Ellen's kindergarten class, and time for the students to choose what kind of profession to visit for a field trip. Ellen successfully coaxed the kids into visiting Ron's dental office. The plans coincided with a $250,000 donation that the family of one of Ellen's students was making to the school, in order for a new library to be built. When the mother of Ellen's student found out that her daughter's teacher was in an interracial marriage, she threatened to revoke her generous donation—unless Ellen agreed to cancel the field trip. This spurred an in-depth debate amongst Ellen, Ron and the entire family, which, after a showdown between Ellen, the mother and the school principal, culminated in her quitting the position at the school.

Second season

In the second season of the series, Faison was replaced by Cleavon Little as Ron Freeman. Walker, who was suffering from lung cancer, continued to star on the series, but ultimately only appeared in half the season's episodes due to her treatments and compromised health. Before long, due to the sudden loss of her physical mobility, Walker went on to appear in a motorized wheelchair for the majority of her second season episodes. Terry went off to Marshall State University that fall, not far from home. Ellen accepted a new teaching job at Cortez Junior High, and during the season, she finally realized her long-time talent as a painter. She began to showcase some of her work at local art exhibits, in hopes of launching a new side career. Early in 1992, perhaps to compensate for Walker's absences in certain episodes and most likely because of falling ratings, a new regular character, Robert (Norman D. Golden II), was introduced. Robert, who went by the nickname "Twist", was a young neighbor boy who attached himself to the Freemans, stealing scenes and causing an uproar, usually involving Lester and Terry along the way. Meanwhile, Little's physical appearance began to look more gaunt during the course of the season, as the actor disclosed he was battling colorectal cancer.

The second season premiere was also notable for tackling racial issues. The episode dealt with Lester facing problems and being given The Autobiography of Malcolm X. When Lester takes the book to heart and starts dressing and acting like Malcolm Little, he reconsiders when he sees his friends and family interacting with people of different cultures.

Cancellation and cast deaths

Despite the new plotlines, Fox shortened the season order for True Colors by February sweeps, and kept the episode total at 21. The new episode aired on April 12, 1992 wound up being the series' last, as Fox cancelled True Colors one month later. However, Nancy Walker, who had continued working into the winter months until she could no longer do so, died on March 25, 1992, after the series had produced what would be its last episode, but less than a month before the last original episode aired. Soon after its cancellation the series would lose another of its stars. On October 22, 1992, two months after True Colors reruns had left the Fox primetime schedule, Cleavon Little lost his battle with cancer.

Cast