What's Happening!!

Interesting note about this show. It was the creative brainchild of producer Eric Monte(who also co-created and produced "Good Times"),and produced under Saul Turtletaub, Bernie Orenstein and Bud Yorkin(of "Sanford and Son",and "All In The Family"),"What's Happening!" premiered on ABC as a summer replacement for "Barney Miller" on August 5,1976 but returned on November 13,1976 as a regular series running three seasons and 65 episodes until April 28,1979.

This was one of my fondest memories of childhood back in the day,coming home and watching the antics of Roger,Dewayne,and Rerun getting into all sorts of trouble only to get Roger's smart-mouth sister Dee and Roger's mother get them out of unsuspected situations. Interesting note on "What's Happening!!",though.....it got the idea from a 1975 film "Cooley High"(on which the show was based)about three Chicago kids who were having fun and getting into all sorts of trouble......The show(getting back to "What's Happening"!!) was based in the residental section of Los Angeles where the mom was the single parent with two children in the household. The show itself was side-splitting hilarious indeed catching the gang down at the soda stop coming up with some crazy scheme or another,and catching Rerun and Shirley(the waitress) battling it out,or getting some girl to go out with them. The show was a major top ten hit for the ABC network(which started off as a trial run,but returned in the fall as a weekly series). The theme score to the show was done by the great Henry Mancini,and its a classic. Some of the cast members reunited for a spin off called "What's Happening Now!!",with Roger getting married off,and Rerun and Dewayne having a business of their own,and the waitress Shirley who brought Rob's Place and is the owner. Rumor has it that two of the cast members of that show Dewayne,(played by Haywood Nelson),and Dee(played by Danielle Spencer) are living in North Carolina now,and Roger(played by Ernest Thomas)is doing feature films(notably seen in Denzel Washington's movie "The Hurricane") nowadays. Great show,as it celebrates it Golden 40th Anniversary!!! Happy Anniversary Roger, Dewayne and Rerun!!!

Anyone who is in their late thirties to forties should remember laughing to the antics of Raj(Ernest Thomas), Dwayne(Haywood Nelson), & Rerun(late Fred Berry) from the popular sitcom "What's Happening!" The show was centered around three ghetto Los Angeles black high school boys & their hilarious high jinks. Roger Thomas(studious & spectacled), Dwayne Nelson(nervous but loyal), & Freddy Stubbs(chubby & dimwitted) were the best of friends who spent a lot of time together at school & at Rob's Soda Shop. At Rob's was Shirley(late comedian Shirley Hemphill), the wise-cracking & worldly waitress who provided sparkling wit with insults to spare. When not with Dwayne & Rerun, Raj came home to strict but loving divorcée mother Mabel Thomas(late Mabel King) & cute but pain in the keister little sister Dee Thomas(Danielle Spencer). From one kind of trouble or silly situation to the next, the three guys never split up, always help each other, & find a way to persevere when the going gets tough.

The show was quite successful & can be shown in reruns on TVLand or Nick at Nite. Oldschoolers & kiddies alike can enjoy a show that gave me hours of unadulterated pleasure as a kid. "What's Happening!" did expand to an unsuccessful spin off called "What's Happening Now!" which featured the core cast all grown up. Raj & Shirley bought & co-owned a diner while Raj pursued a writing career. Raj also is married in this show to Ann-Marie Johnson & cares for her niece. Dwayne & Rerun are off on their careers while sharing an apartment. Dee Thomas is all grown up & in college. The comedy was not as sharp as the original series but kept loyal fans watching. The show did not last but entertained some nonetheless.

All said, "What's Happening!" holds fond memories of a time long gone. Three of the show's actors have passed on in recent years & the core thespians have been low key since the show ended. For those who watched & enjoyed the show, you know that successful sitcoms are hard to come by. Those of you who have not seen "What's Happening!", you missed out on a small piece of 70's Americana.

This was one of my favorite tv shows growing up! as other users commented, it was the first thing i would turn on after school! it was not only the funniest show, but it dealt with a single parent home, and i was raised in a single parent home, so i related to it. i miss seeing Raj make a fool out of himself, by being so nerdy and Dee, with all the sarcasm, you never stopped laughing....and Shirley, anything she said, made you laugh. i think if more people posted their comments, than maybe it will impact someone to syndicate the show! as you can see, the cast of the show never really made it, perhaps this could help their careers, so bring us RERUNS of "What's Happening"! we miss Rerun and all his dance moves...."Hey Hey Hey"!

What's Happening!! was one of the greatest shows of the late 70's. What I really liked about the show was that every episode seemed to have a different plot line to it. I gave it a 9 and not a 10 because it was canceled and did not go out on top. The reason why I gave it a 9 was because it captured positive late 70's black culture. It did not have to use " black exploitation" to make it a great show. In the entire run of the show (3 seasons) their never was a violent scene and they never had to use the "N" word to make it funny. My favorite character of the show was Rerun (Fred Berry) because he seemed to play the personality of the "loveable loser" to perfection which made him a great actor. Also, I liked Dee (Danielle Spencer) a lot because she handled the role of childhood star with grace. After her childhood acting days ended she didn't use the money for bad reasons. She went on to become a veterinarian. Which can show people that you can be a childhood star and still live a normal adult life (contatary to popular belief).

I was a senior in high school when this show debuted and even though I was a white kid in the 'burbs, I found much of what Raj, Rerun and Dwayne did and talked about easy to relate to because even though my own life was pretty far removed from black kids in the city, I think kids are going to be kids at heart, guys are always going to come up with ideas that seem better at their genesis than they actually end up being and "What's Happening!" seems to have been written with that at the show's core. It's a well-done sitcom that doesn't talk down to its audience.

I'll spare the character profiles and such because there are plenty of other reviewers here who've done a good job of that. What I will say is that 40 years after it first aired on ABC, "What's Happening!" holds up nicely. It was definitely an ensemble comedy that changed when Mabel King left the show, but the actors worked well together and had a good on- screen chemistry. Although "What's Happening!" wasn't as popular at the time as other sitcoms based on black families like "Good Times" or "The Jeffersons," it is definitely in their league in terms of the quality of acting and writing.

I didn't give it a "10" rating because there wasn't a lot of character development (hardly unique for sitcoms), Mabel King's exit meant the loss of the one character who seemed able to create order out of the chaos that usually ensued when the guys got into a jam and a sense of staleness was beginning to set in by its last season. Still, it rates a solid "8" with me and that "8" applies in 2017 as well as for 1977. "What's Happening!" endures as one of the better, if underrated, comedies of the late Seventies. Worth watching.