The writers have given Schneider some mildly dark qualities for a family-friendly sitcom as one episode reveals, apparently he likes to watch lesbian porn in his spare time. Or in the words of Lydia, the abuela played by the great Rita Moreno, he’s a bobo. Basically, he’s the 2017 version of the hipster doofus. In general, though, his lifestyle lines up more with Kramer from Seinfeld than the original Schneider: He has no real job to speak of (his parents own the building, so he lives rent-free) he has a ludicrous amount of free time he does pretty well with the ladies (I’m guessing he has the kavorka) and he regularly pops into the Alvarez’s apartment to mooch off their food. Schneider stills helps the Alvarez family make fixes in their apartment, and there are even some clever nods to the ‘70s embedded in his personality in the first episode, he briefly sports a ridiculous mustache, one that’s more handlebar than porn ‘stache, and it’s later revealed that he used to be the front man in a yacht-rock band. His standard uniform consisted of a white T-shirt with a box of cigarettes rolled in the sleeve, a denim vest, blue jeans, a tool belt, and a mustache that screamed, “I’m not a pedophile, but my upper lip hair makes you wonder, doesn’t it?” Even as a young child watching this show in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, a time when denim vests did not set off nearly as many alarm bells as they should have, I was creeped out by the fact that he had the keys to an apartment occupied by three women and could enter it whenever he pleased.Īs they recently explained in an interview with critic Alan Sepinwall, Royce and Calderon Kellett knew they were going to have to “rethink Schneider in bulk.” Instead of creating a revamped version of the sleazy blowhard, they came up with a clueless but well-meaning symbol of white privilege that fits in much more seamlessly in a traditional yet contemporary sitcom. But make no mistake: Schneider often behaved like a total jackass, bursting into the Romanos’ apartment unannounced, relentlessly hitting on Ann, and presuming that his voice was, de facto, the most important one in any conversation. Harrington infused the character with enough buffoonery and gentleness to make him likable. 1 would not have worked in 2017.įor those who are too young to have seen Norman Lear’s original One Day at a Time, Schneider was the super in the Indianapolis building where the divorced Ann Romano (Bonnie Franklin) lived while trying to raise two teenage daughters (Bertinelli and Philips). And thank God for that, because Schneider No. But as crafted by showrunners Mike Royce and Gloria Calderon Kellett as well as actor Todd Grinnell ( Desperate Housewives, Grace and Frankie), he’s been turned into an entirely different character. The theme song still opens every episode, but since the new iteration focuses on a Cuban-American family, it’s been given a jolt of syncopated energy courtesy of Gloria Estefan. There’s no Bertinelli, but there are two new teens (Isabella Gomez and Marcel Ruiz) who are just as charming, as well as an appearance by the other Romano daughter, Mackenzie Phillips. It’s still about a woman post-marital split, trying to raise two kids on her own and often confronting social issues in the process. The new One Day at a Time - which was released on Netflix last Friday, coincidentally on the first anniversary of the death of Pat Harrington Jr., the actor who played Schneider - has very wisely kept some of the core things that defined the first version. Ask any child of the ‘70s or ‘80s what they remember about the original One Day at a Time, and they will most likely mention the following: its catchy theme song, the crush they had on co-star Valerie Bertinelli, and Schneider.
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