A Question About A Running Joke In "The Goldbergs"

Cafe Society
1

Seems like every episode this season, the script has included a joke about another Adam Goldberg at Adam’s school being persnickety about the two keeping their names straight.

Obviously the source of this joke is the fact that the producer of The Goldbergs, and the man whose life the show is based on, Adam F. Goldberg (born 1976), shares a name with another man in the entertainment industry named Adam Goldberg (born 1970), an actor.

I know that in the entertainment industry it’s required (or at least, heavily recommended) that two people who share the same name differentiate themselves in some way - either by using a prominent initial or adopting a stage name.

My question is, is the older Adam Goldberg, who was working 20 years before the younger one, really being a dick about the name thing in real life? Or is the show just riffing off of the entertainment industry tradition for laughs?

2

Before IMDB killed their message boards, someone asked the same question there. Someone replied that the actor Adam Goldberg had complained about the similarity in names.

3

They apparently had a twitter war 2 years ago, and it wasn’t pretty. No idea what’s happened since between them.

ETA: The actor Adam Goldberg was in Saving Private Ryan - he’s the soldier who gets stabbed with a bayonet during the final battle. I suspect he’s better known for that than for the TVLand show referenced in the article I linked.

4

I remember him as “Eddie” from Friends.

5

I like the show. Although, this years’ episodes seem blah

6

Tangent question: is this a true, hard-and-fast and strictly enforced Screen Actors Guild rule? Or, as HeyHomie writes, merely a “recommendation”?

7

SAG-AFTRA Says…

8

theres a Vanessa Williams that was on Melrose place and " THE vanessa Williams (the singer and actress former miss America) who was confused all the time so they made mps vanessa put her middle initial in her name which is l

there was a running joke the first would make about it in appearances about being asked to sing in auditions …

9

If the producer isn’t an actor and therefore not a member of SAG-AFTRA, does this rule apply to him?

10

Last night’s show-thumbs down

I figured out what the best thing is about the show; THE MOTHER!

11

I thought at the end of one of the shows they had a clip of the other Adam Goldberg?

12

You didn’t like it? I thought it was hilarious. Plus it was a nice coincidence that the entire episode was about the conflict between the producer of this show and the actor Adam Goldberg. Very meta or self-referential or whatever the term is.

There was even a bit in which the mother, Beverly, said something about she wouldn’t contact the other Adam Goldberg any more. Later, the Adam F Goldberg character said to the other one that their conflict was silly and that they were minor.

(Although in writing this post, I can understand the frustration of the actor Adam Goldberg; it’s tough to make clear which you’re referring to.)

13

I don’t remember that. But Martin Kove (who played the sensei of the Cobra Kai dojo in the original movie) was in a short scene at the end as “Master John”. I thought perhaps we’d see William Zabka, but unfortunately not.

14

I was surprised to not see Zabka since they had the whole scene with Erica coming to the realization that she was the Zabka. Getting Kove as the touchy feely sensei made for a great capper though.

I’d like to see actor Adam Goldberg show up on the show. I know they’ve had a bit of a beef over the name and whatnot and it seems like the actor is kind of grumpy about it. He does have a bit of a point since he broke first but I don’t see the point of being a dick about it.

15

IIRC, “The Goldbergs” debuted around the same time as season 1 of “Fargo”, in which Adam Goldberg played the hit man with the deaf partner. I remember doing a “wait…what?” double take and looking up Adam Goldberg on IMDb and discovering they weren’t the same.

16

Went to check out what Zabka’s been up to for the past 30 years or so … had no idea he’s been an Academy Award nominee.

17

I thought last night’s episode was actually pretty good. Like another poster said, it was all sorts of meta and self-referential (The Goldbergs is good at that).

As for the Adam (1976) vs. Adam (1970) beef: truthfully, they’re both kind of being dicks about it. As 1976 Adam said in the show last night, “He (1970 Adam) is kinda inconvenienced every now and then”), which, truthfully, is spot-on. Nevertheless, 1976 Adam keeps harping on the beef, sneaking in references in every episode and generally being a putz about it.

They both need to move on, IMHO.

18

Total WAG on my part, but S. Goldberg has been putting these references in the show and I think it was a slow build to this ep. After this, I’m OK with them dropping the joke.

19

Almost certainly not. Case in point: Christopher Lloyd the actor vs. Christopher Lloyd the producer. Neither uses a middle initial.

20

Now that AJ Goldberg and Adam F. Goldberg have worked out their differences through mutual crane kicks, maybe that other Erica Goldberg who posted all of those “Erica Goldberg’s Valentine’s Day Disco is Dead Party” fliers will show up.

My favorite part of this “the other Adam Goldberg at school” gag was when people would say “Don’t worry, nobody cares about either one of you” or “Nobody cares about his dumb feud with the other Adam Goldberg.”