11 Classic Quotes From ‘The Brady Bunch’
“Wisdom” might not be the first word that comes to mind when thinking about The Brady Bunch, but it definitely encompasses the wide-ranging life lessons that the six Brady kids — and their parents! — learned over the course of five seasons.
The series follows Mike Brady (Robert Reed) and his second wife, Carol Martin (Florence Henderson), both of them widowed, and their ragtag crew of kids from previous marriages— Greg (Barry Williams), Marcia (Maureen McCormick), Peter (Christopher Knight), Jan (Eve Plumb), Bobby (Mike Lookinland), and Cindy (Susan Olsen) — as they all come together and learn how to exist as a blended family. The family’s housekeeper, Alice (Ann B. Davis), offers up plenty of wise-cracking opinions along the way.
Storylines often follow the typical sitcom formulas: competition amongst the siblings (“Marcia, Marcia, Marcia!” is a trademark line from middle sister Jan); love and dating; and doing well in school. The series aired from 1969 to 1974, and thanks to heavy syndication, inspired spinoffs, reunion specials, spoofy feature films, and more (HGTV’s A Very Brady Renovation, anyone?).
It was later criticized for failing to address some of the bigger social issues happening at the time, such as the Vietnam War, the rise of feminism, and calls for racial justice. But The Brady Bunch was focused on the microcosm of one family and its quotidian happenings from the start, intending to provide some lighthearted family entertainment during a tumultuous time in American history.
Here, we’ve highlighted 13 pearls of wisdom offered up by members of the Brady family over the years.
