There are very few modern TV shows that I enjoy, but I’m a sucker for the classics, which I guess is what I consider any show that aired mostly before I was born in the 1980s. There are so many that I can and often do watch over and over again, and I’ve been doing so since my parents introduced them to me as a little kid — The Andy Griffith Show, Leave It to Beaver, I Love Lucy, Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, The Jeffersons, Three’s Company, Gilligan’s Island, Sanford & Son… I could go on.
One of those is All in the Family, a show I haven’t actually seen in years, but that I quote and think about often. I’ve actually been thinking a lot about it since Rob Reiner’s murder. I was doing some research on the show the other day, and I ran across something that I found kind of interesting but also sad. As of December 2025, All in the Family joins an exclusive club of beloved old shows that only have one remaining living main cast member.
Recommended: Beloved Classic TV Stars End Decades-Old Feud
For All in the Family, it’s Gloria Stivic herself, Sally Strothers. She’s 78 years old now, but she still acts in plays and was in a Netflix series last year.
Ron Howard, who played young Opie Taylor, is the only surviving cast member of The Andy Griffith Show. (I know some of you are going to say “What about Elinor Donahue?” who is still very much alive, but she’s not considered a main cast member and was only on the show for one season. I actually wrote about her a few months ago: “‘Andy Griffith Show’ Actress Sets the Record Straight on Why She Left the Show.”)
The list I saw on this topic mentioned Joyce DeWitt as the only living cast member from Three’s Company. She’s 74 now, and it appears that she was acting up until 2022. I’d put a asterisk next to this one though, because while she’s the only member of the OG cast who is still alive, Jenilee Harrison, who played Cindy Snow, and Priscilla Barnes, who played Terri Alden in later seasons of the show once Suzanne Somers left, are still very much alive.
Tina Louise, who played Ginger, is the only living cast member of Gilligan’s Island. At the age of 91, she doesn’t act anymore, but she does work one hour a week tutoring public school children in Manhattan. The New York Times did an article on her earlier this year and said she “does not like to talk about the television show that made her a household name.”
Todd Bridges, who is 60, is the only surviving cast member from Diff’rent Strokes, while 78-year-old Michael McKean is the only one left from Laverne & Shirley. And while several supporting cast members are still alive, Demond Wilson is the only surviving member of the core cast of Sanford & Son. He’s 79 years old.
This one surprised me because I didn’t realize he was still alive, but Max Baer Jr., aka, Jethro Bodine, is the only cast member of The Beverly Hillbillies who is still with us. He is 88 years old and hasn’t done any acting since the early 1990s.
Another one that surprised me is that, at the age of 95, John Astin is the only surviving cast member of the original version of The Addams Family, outliving both of his TV children. Lisa Loring, who played Wednesday, died from a stroke in 2023, and Ken Weatherwax, who played Pugsley, had a heart attack and died in 2014.
The one that made me the saddest was Jerry Mathers, Beaver himself, from Leave It to Beaver. Mr. Mathers is 77 years old and actually quite fun to follow on Facebook if you’re into that sort of thing. He became the last remaining main cast member of the show when Tony Dow died in 2022, which was a celebrity death that hit me had. I had a massive crush on Dow’s character, Wally Cleaver, growing up, and I followed his career as best I could over the years. He was actually a terrific artist later in life. Fun fact: Dow served his country in the California Army National Guard. Mathers also served in the United States Air National Guard.
It’s a quirky little club, but it also felt like a sign of the times in many ways, a sign that we’re losing an entire generation. One day, this part of our culture will be nothing but memories we can only find in reruns.
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