Monday, March 18, 2024

TV One to Re-Air Original ‘Roots’; Louis Gossett Jr. Reminisces: ‘We Stopped the World’

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*TV One will broadcast the original 1977 miniseries “Roots” in primetime later this month.

The network’s airings of a remastered and enhanced episodes will begin Sunday, Oct. 18 at 8 p.m. and continue through Saturday, Oct. 24, skipping Oct. 23.

The original series, which aired over eight consecutive nights on ABC in January 1977, is based on a family’s history in The miniseries ran on ABC to unprecedented Nielsen ratings and nine Emmy wins.

The finale of the original “Roots” remains the third highest-rated program in TV history, per Nielsen, with 100 million viewers.

A+E Networks previously announced that a remake of the series is currently in production. The reboot is slated to be simulcast across A+E, Lifetime and History in 2016.

Both versions are based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning Alex Haley novel of the same name. The original “Roots” mini-series stars LeVar Burton, Cicely Tyson, Edward Asner, John Amos, Louis Gossett, Jr., Lloyd Bridges, Lorne Greene, Georg Stanford Brown, Leslie Uggams, Ben Vereen and O.J. Simpson.

Fiddler (Louis Gossett Jr.) holds Kunta Kinte (LeVar Burton) after he is whipped into accepting his new name, Toby
Fiddler (Louis Gossett Jr.) holds Kunta Kinte (LeVar Burton) after he is whipped into accepting his new slave name, Toby

Gossett, Jr., who played older slave Fiddler (tasked with teaching Toby – formerly Kunta Kinte – how to speak English and be an obedient slave), spoke about the experience of making “Roots” during a TCA panel for the PBS series “Pioneers of TV”:

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