The Goldbergs Creator Adam F. Goldberg on Sharing His Family with the World

When Adam F. Goldberg was a kid growing up in the 1980s, he recorded a lot of his life on videotape—everything from his family arguing during holiday dinners to his friend and him pretending to be New Kids on the Block.

Decades later, these hundreds of videotapes—yes, you read that right, hundreds—provide the perfect fodder for his ABC TV hit sitcom The Goldbergs.

The show actually began, in a way, nearly a decade ago. Goldberg shared some of the videos with Doug Robinson, a producer with Happy Madison Productions (founded by Adam Sandler). Robinson loved them and Goldberg recalls, said to him, “We’ll do this show when you’re ready.”

So when Goldberg became ready, he showed a bunch of videos to people at ABC, and they loved them. But he wasn’t completely comfortable with sharing his personal family stories on TV. “I wasn’t ready to fully commit. It’s very complicated to literally put your family on TV,” explains Goldberg. “I’m not Chris Rock—I want to know how Chris Rock grew up. I naturally assumed no one cared at all how a nerdy kid from the suburbs of Philadelphia grew up.”

As a result, Goldberg originally named the show “The Silvers.” He also made one other change—since it wasn’t supposed to be his family, he changed his oldest brother, Eric, to a girl, Erica. The original tone of the show was going to be edgy like “How did I survive this?” Goldberg says. Whereas the actual show takes a more nostalgic look back with the attitude of “Do you remember how awesome this was back then?” Goldberg wasn’t even going to include clips of his real videos in the show.

“Then the president of ABC at the time, Paul Lee, called me and said, ‘I want you to show your videos after every episode, and I want to name it The Goldbergs.’”

When it was The Silvers, Goldberg told his family members that he was doing a show based on their family. When he then told them the show had changed and would be The Goldbergs, they were, understandably, a bit nervous.

“I’m not going to lie. All of my family members have had moments where they’re upset with me because I’ll cavalierly write a story just to be funny,” says Goldberg. While a lot of what happens on the show did happen to Goldberg and his family members, sometimes there are situations that happened to other writers on the show, and they get added. For example, the audience may believe that everything in an episode happened to each family member, but in reality, some parts of it didn’t. And that can be tough on the real family members who have real lives.

“I do run the stories by them if I think there’s anything remotely edgy or something they might have a problem with, and there have been times where one of them will say, ‘I’m not comfortable with that, especially if you’re going to show a video and say that it’s all true,’” explains Goldberg. “But nobody argues that the characters aren’t them.” Barry is Barry. Beverly is his mom. Even Erica, who is a girl, embodies characteristics of Goldberg’s real brother Eric. “It’s the spirit of my brother, who is the voice of reason and also incredibly defiant.”

In real life, Goldberg’s mom, Beverly, has called her children “delicious” and often says, “I have failed as a mother.” Beverly Goldberg even mailed the show boxes of sweaters and pantsuits that she wore during those times. Often what you’ll see Wendi McLendon-Covey, who plays Beverly on the show, wearing is actual Beverly Goldberg attire.

“These are all real people,” says Goldberg. Murray, his dad, and Pops, his grandfather, both of whom have passed away, are accurately portrayed in the show. Also real: Coach Miller, the school principal, the Kremps (their neighbors), Bill Lewis—Murray’s best friend, and even the friends of Barry known as the JTP.

Sometimes it’s not easy to use people from real life. “I did an episode about Adam being bullied on the bus, and I had to call the guy who bullied me on the bus and say, ‘I want to do a story about this,’” says Goldberg. Turns out that the former bully works in Hollywood as movie producer and is a friend of Goldberg’s. “So I cast him as the bus driver in the episode, and he yells at his TV self!”

Goldberg has even had former classmates appear on the show—in adult roles, of course—with the actors who are portraying them as kids. Even some of the toys on the show are really Goldberg’s. As a collector of vintage ‘80s toys, they used a lot from his personal collection in early episodes. “I gave them my collection, and they put it around the set,” explains Goldberg. “Even more impressive is that my Mom saved anything that has to do with her children. So all of my artwork as a kid, any piece of pottery that I ever made her, any clay ashtray—she sent all of it out, and that’s all on the show.”

There are limits, though, and Goldberg admits that there are stories he will never tell and videos he will never show. “There are a couple of videos that [while] America would love them, they’re just too embarrassing,” laughs Goldberg. “So yeah, there are stories that we could never put on ABC.”

Goldberg laid down certain rules with ABC regarding the show, though: one of the rules is that there will never be anything remotely sexual between Beverly and Murray. “I never saw my parents kiss,” quips Goldberg. The other? Beverly has to curse—which is bleeped—each episode. “It always comes from a place of love, but Beverly gets so overwhelmed with how much she loves us that she’ll curse a lot,” says Goldberg. And when people complain about the cursing, he refers them to his Mom, who is on Twitter.

The Twitter thing, though, has been known to backfire on Adam. “If I don’t call my Mom back, she’ll go on Twitter and say, ‘Adam hasn’t called me, I’m worried about him,’ and strangers will say, ‘You’re horrible. You go call your Mom right now!” laughs Goldberg. “It’s very complicated.”

The season finale of The Goldbergs airs Wednesday, May 18, 8:30 p.m./7:30 p.m. central on ABC-TV.

Go call your Mom after you watch it. She worries, you know.

In the meantime, enjoy these hilarious clips from The Goldbergs.

In a recent episode, Beverly’s kids try to give her a good “Smother’s Day.” While it doesn’t work out, Beverly loves it.

For more great clips, click "Next" below.

Beverly learns how to play football in a way that only she will understand.

Barry (portrayed by Troy Gentile) raps two lines on the spot and thinks he can get a gig and an album. You know this will work out just fine, right?

Beverly buys Jams for Adam (potrayed by Sean Giambrone).

Erica (portrayed by Hayley Orrantia) and Barry play their song, “Love Ninja.” The reaction from Pops, the great George Segal), is hilarious!

Adam and Dana (portrayed by Natalie Alyn Lind) meet Weird Al…who portrays himself from the ‘80s.

Adam tries to shave, and his family, well, they’re The Goldbergs.

Barry gets his Risky Business moment thanks to Erica and his girlfriend, Lainey, portrayed by AJ Michalka. I’m still laughing as I write this.

No Goldberg video collection would be complete without some info about Beverly’s sweaters, as they’re practically a character on the show. Enjoy!