“The Andy Griffith Show,” the classic sitcom about the adventures of a small-town sheriff and his family and friends in the fictional Mayberry, North Carolina, remains a beloved show by many nearly 60 years after it ended. Now a bill in the General Assembly would make it the official state TV show of North Carolina. Neal Brower joined WFAE’s Marshall Terry to talk about “The Andy Griffith Show” and its North Carolina connections. Brower is the author of “The Essential Mayberry,” which was recently published in a new 25th anniversary edition. Brower also regularly lectures [about] the show.
Marshall Terry: OK, so you are the person to talk to when it comes to the show. So, for those who may not know, what makes “The Andy Griffith Show” so special for North Carolina in particular?
Neal Brower: I think the main thing is that it stars one of North Carolina’s favorite sons, Andy Griffith. And, Andy had a real talent for knowing what was right for a small Southern town. And, he had the ability to insert his ideas and his thoughts on what would make the TV Mayberry seem like a real place — a real place that turned out to be in North Carolina.
Terry: And there are references to North Carolina many times throughout the series.
Brower: There are. When the show first started, it was to be set just in the South. Andy would look at scripts, and if they were talking about a city or town in the area, it would be Capital City or some generic name, and Andy didn’t like that. So he said let’s use Raleigh if we’re talking about the capital. Maybe a few episodes later, Siler City instead of just some other name. And it became the TV Mayberry, a town in North Carolina, from that process.
Terry: One town that is not mentioned in the series is Mount Airy, which was the real-life inspiration for Mayberry. Why was it the inspiration?
Brower: It’s an inspiration for Mayberry because Andy grew up there, and that was his childhood remembrance and also as a young teenager, of what North Carolina was like. And it’s interesting that most of the writers, in fact all of them, were not from the South. They were from New York. And they just had a talent and a feel for writing small-town scripts.
Terry: It’s pretty easy to find reruns of the show on any given day. Why do you think it remains so popular all these years later?
Brower: I think because it’s so well written. The actors are really great in their roles. It’s based on love. That’s something Andy thought was important — that the characters love and respect one another. I think that draws people. There’s usually a moral taught in almost every episode.
And it looks like a real place the way it was filmed and produced. Mayberry looks like a real place that you could actually get in your car, drive to, and go visit.
Terry: Now, you have become this well-known authority on the show with your book and your lecture series. When did you first fall in love with the show?
Brower: I can actually remember when it was on its original run. I would watch reruns on TV all my life, but found a book in 1985 by Richard Kelly called “The Andy Griffith Show.” [It] had all of the episodes — there are 249 — listed in the back.
And at that time, VCRs had just come out. So I purchased one, and I decided I was going tape every episode of a TV series. And what better series than “The Andy Griffith Show,” since I had every episode title in the back of the book that I mentioned.
So I began taping the show every afternoon, on Channel 2 out of Greensboro. And it took me a year to get all 249 episodes. But that’s when it really bit me hard, this “Andy Griffith fever.” I realized how well the show was written, how well it was acted and just what high standards it has.
Terry: So many of the show’s plots involve Andy Griffith’s character, as the sheriff of Mayberry, resolving conflicts with his sort of down-home folksy philosophy. Do you think there’s a lesson in that for our society today in these divisive times we find ourselves in?
Brower: Yeah, I sure do. I think that Andy was always very diplomatic about what he said in the midst of a crisis or trying to straighten out a problem. He didn’t do it by force. He didn’t say you’re going to do this. He led [his TV son] Opie to understandings in many of these type of situations. He was very kind-hearted with Barney and Otis and all the people of the town. So Andy’s a good example of a peaceful leader.
Terry: All right. So what is your absolute favorite episode?
Brower: Well, that’s hard. But I guess the very best one that I think really captures the spirit of Mayberry is called “Man in a Hurry,” where Malcolm Tucker is a businessman from Charlotte. He’s going through Mayberry on a Sunday morning. His car breaks down. He can’t get it fixed, so he’s stuck there. He’s very high-tensioned, wanting to get out of town. But by the end of the day, he realizes there’s something special here in this place among these people — sitting on the front porch and talking with one another, making homemade ice cream, that type of thing. And he decides Mayberry is a good place to stay. So, even though his car gets repaired by Gomer and Goober by the end of the day, he stays overnight.
