Gloria is a 1980 film written and directed by John Cassavetes. It tells the story of a gangster's girlfriend who goes on the run with a young boy who is being hunted by the mob for information he may or may not have. It stars Gena Rowlands and John Adames.
Cassavetes did not originally intend to direct his screenplay; he planned merely to sell the story to Columbia Pictures. However, once his wife, Gena Rowlands, was asked to play the title character in the film, she asked Cassavetes to direct it as a personal favor.
Gloria was a spinoff television situation comedy that lasted one season on CBS, from September 1982 to September 1983. It starred Sally Struthers, reprising her role as Gloria Bunker, the daughter of Archie Bunker on the hugely successful 1970s sitcom All in the Family.
The setup of the show was that Gloria had been left at loose ends after her husband, Michael Stivic (who did not appear in the new series), left her and moved away to a commune. (Some viewers thought that this was somewhat of a contrived story about Michael, as over the run of All in the Family he became more conservative and seemingly had left his "hippie" past behind him). Gloria, to be closer to her father, decided to move with her young son, Joey (played by Christian Jacobs), and pick up the pieces of her life as an assistant to two veterinarians in Fox Ridge, New York. The veterinarians were played by Burgess Meredith and Jo De Winter; the character played by Meredith was also, conveniently, Gloria's landlord. Though Gloria ranked 18th in the Nielsen ratings for the 1982-83 season, CBS chose not to renew it for a second season, making it one of the few spin-offs of the successful All in the Family not to have a successful run.
Gloria is a remake of the 1980 film written and directed by John Cassavetes. The remake was directed by Sidney Lumet and starred Sharon Stone as Gloria. The film is also notable as George C. Scott's final film before he died.
Jack Dawn and his family are eliminated by the mob, because he was their accountant and was keeping a personal copy of their records. However his six-year-old Puerto Rican son, Phil, escapes with Gloria, a neighbor who was a former girlfriend of one of the gangsters. Gloria and Phil are chased throughout New York City because Phil has a black book containing the accounts of the mob. Written by Will Gilbert
