Chico and the Man

1974

Seasons & Episodes

  • 4
  • 3
  • 2
  • 1

6.8| 0h30m| en
Synopsis

Chico and the Man is an American sitcom which ran on NBC for four seasons, from September 13, 1974, to July 21, 1978. It stars Jack Albertson as Ed Brown, the cantankerous owner of a run down garage in an East Los Angeles barrio, and Freddie Prinze as Chico Rodriguez, an upbeat, optimistic Chicano young man who comes in looking for a job. It was the first U.S. television series set in a Mexican-American neighborhood.

Director

Producted By

Wolper Productions

AD
AD

Watch Free for 30 Days

All Prime Video Movies and TV Shows. Cancel anytime. Watch Now

Trailers & Clips

Also starring Freddie Prinze

Reviews

Evengyny Thanks for the memories!
Beanbioca As Good As It Gets
Tymon Sutton The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.
Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,
Greatornot Very fine show with great acting by all the characters. Supporting cast of Della Reese and Scatman Crothers aka 'Louie the Garbageman', as well as Reverened Beemis and the mail lady are part of my childhood. OK, I must confess many of the jokes, as I watch the episodes now, come quickly in my mind to the punchline. A little corny and predictable in the comedy. Basically , you had oldtimer standup comic actor Jack Albertson pitted against the new kid on the block Freddie Prinz....An up and coming genius in his own right. 'LOOKING GOOOOOOOOOD', was every bit a catch phrase staple of the mid 70's as 'DYNOMITE' or 'AAAYYYYYYYYY'. The show definitely had it going on , of course until Freddies tragic death. There should never have been a 4th season. Gabriel Melgar did not quite cut it. In a nutshell , a fine sitcom, taking place in a car garage of an elderly white widower owner of 'said' auto shop with his completely different, young Hispanic , hip mechanic . Ed Brown and Chico Rodriquez will live eternally in the annals of TVLAND . This is a gem, for sure, hopefully if you catch it , you catch it with Prinz not Melgar.
PeruvianJew02 This is one of the only shows that you will literally laugh out loud watching. I began watching it a while ago when I was on vacation and there was a station devoted to old television shows. Though a lot of them don't hold up, this is most definitely does! The pairing of these two talented actors is incredible, it makes the show such a joy to watch. I only wish that it could have been on television longer and that Prinze was still with us today making us laugh and blessing us with his talent. It is very sad to know the tragic end of Prinze's life after watching the show because he really was a unique and wonderful talent and it is clear that he would have gone on to do much bigger things with his career.This show needs to be put back on pronto!
Brian Washington This show was well on its way to becoming one of the all time classics when the tragic death of Freddie Prinze occurred. You had the two classic themes in the show. One was the theme of age versus youth and the other was the clash of cultures between Chico and Ed. This latter them is reminiscent of the show which aired on the same night and network as this one, "Sanford and Son". You could pretty much see Ed in the Fred Sanford role and Chico in the Lamont role and it basically was the same, the older father figure constantly clashing with his young charge over how to run the business. It was these qualities that helped make this show the semi-classic that it was. Also, the supporting cast of Scatman Crothers as Louie, Della Reese as Della and Ronny Graham as Reverend Bemis really made it a fun show. Unfortunately, when the tragedy happened and they brought in Gabriel Melgar to play Raul (a.k.a. the new "Chico") that's when the show went downhill. They should have canceled the show at that point and spared us the pain of watching it decline. If that had happened it probably would still be remembered as a good sitcom.
richard.fuller1 For four years this show was on the air, and in that time, it went from a promising comedy into a tragic situation that sought to simply fulfil its bargain and quietly leave the air. Now, it is an interesting study of how things so good can go so bad so quickly. Veteran actor Jack Albertson was riding high on his success in 'Subject was Roses', 'Posiedon Adventure' and 'Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory'. Freddie Prinze was making it in stand-up, like Sienfeld and Carrey have done. Put the two together and after 'Sanford and Son' and a hit was born. We watched the shows and laughed, relating more to Prinze than the geriatric Albertson. Guest-stars galore were everywhere from Cesar Romero to Shelley Winters. Then Prinze shot himself and my young mind could not comprehend what that meant. Oddly enough, of his few appearances on programs, someone did joke with him on another show about if anything happened to him, the show would be called "--- and the man". I couldn't grasp the meaning of the words: commit suicide. Albertson, Della Reese and Scatman Crothers carried on with the show and a replacement latino was brought in, Gabriel Melgar. Eventually Reese departed and a young lady named Monica HIll joined the cast. The show had taken a truly bizarre turn. All it was missing by then was occasional musical numbers. Apparently Albertson was just completing any commitment made to the show and then he would not return either. There was an episode where they attempted to address the other Chico with Albertson and young Melgar. Melgar asked what happened to the other Chico, Albertson hesitates to say, but I thought the assumption was he had died. I believed they had even said this much at least. That this conversation is taking place in a church is truly thought-provoking. When Albertson would die a few years later, I thought that was it. Chico and the man were gone now, both of them. Who knows where Prinze could have gone. I have never heard Albertson speak about what happened or if there were any telltale signs that were missed. Della Reese later would have Redd Foxx die in her arms on 'The Royal Family'. It will always be a poignant memory to this child's hood and I will always enjoy the song, sung by Jose Feliciano, who did appear in an episode and sing it.