What's Happening!!

TV Series
1976–1979
TV-PG
24m

IMDb RATING

7.0/10

4.4K

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

Play trailer1:24

Dark Comedy Sitcom Comedy

A trio of black youths learn about life, love, friendship, credit cards, gambling, and a variety of other things while growing up in an inner city.A trio of black youths learn about life, love, friendship, credit cards, gambling, and a variety of other things while growing up in an inner city.A trio of black youths learn about life, love, friendship, credit cards, gambling, and a variety of other things while growing up in an inner city.

Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.0/10

4.4K

YOUR RATING

POPULARITY

3,974

269

Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 1 win & 3 nominations total

Episodes65

Browse episodes

TopTop-rated3 seasons4 years

Trivia
Fred Berry and Ernest Thomas walked off the show during the second season, demanding more money and better dressing rooms. Their demands were met. After the third season, Berry and Thomas convinced Haywood Nelson to join them in another walkout demanding more money. Even though the show ranked 29th in the 1978-79 season, ABC canceled it rather than deal with their demands.

Goofs
Throughout the entire series, it is made very clear that neither Mama nor Raj have a car, as often indicated by Mama needing to ride the bus to work and Raj always needing rides from other people (or walking) to his many adventures and escapades. Yet, in the very first scene of the opening credits, Raj is seen exiting his house with two cars parked in the driveway.

Quotes
Fred 'Rerun' Stubbs: I can't help it if I'm fat! It runs in my family.
Dee Thomas: Nobody runs in your family... they all waddle!

Alternate versions
During its syndicated run, the tag sequences that were included in the original ABC network versions were removed.

Connections
Featured in ABC's 50th Anniversary Celebration (2003)

User reviews22

Review

Featured review

Back In The Day

What's Happening was loosely based on the movie "Cooley High". It is sometime shown in reruns along with its vastly inferior sequel, What's Happening Now.

The heart of the show was the relationship among the three high school buddies, studious Roger, dim bulb Dwayne, and clownish Rerun. The late Shirley Hemphill got off some good zingers as the surly waitress of the malt shop the guys hung out in. Dee was the perfect snide and bratty kid sister to Roger, and Mama dished out discipline and love.

One of the best episodes was a two-parter that is seldom shown in reruns. Roger, Rerun and Dwayne were forced into illegally taping a Doobie Brothers concert (the rock group appeared as themselves) by some criminals. The tape recorder is discovered when it falls out from underneath Rerun's coat, and one of the musicians sees it. The Doobie Brothers then work with the three buddies to catch the criminals.