If you’re a classic sitcom fan, you know of the “Cousin Oliver” trope – when a sitcom, which is currently floundering in the ratings, tries to revitalize its audience by adding a previously never-before-referenced “cousin” or “neighbor” to the show’s lineup. This can be traced to the final season of The Brady Bunch, when the show introduced Robbie Rist as “Cousin Oliver” (I’m still not sure which side of the Brady family he was “cousin” to). That only lasted for a few episodes before the show finally went off the air; in fact, Cousin Oliver wasn’t even mentioned in any of the remaining Brady Bunch spinoffs – not the Brady Bunch Variety Hour (the one with the replacement Jan Brady), or The Brady Brides (you would think a dual wedding would have encouraged all the Brady kids to return), or A Very Brady Christmas (that one had a replacement Cindy), or The Bradys (that one had a fake Marcia). Trust me. Any time you have to introduce a “Cousin Oliver” to the show, you’re just padding out the episode count.
But what if I told you that Robbie Rist had another chance at sitcom stardom? And in this case, he would continue to work with the creator of The Brady Bunch, Sherwood Schwartz, on what would appear as a Saturday morning live-action sitcom?
And in true Sherwood Schwartz fashion, it was a situation comedy that – even to this day – I’m not sure I actually can admit I intentionally watched any episodes.
Brace yourself. This is Big John, Little John. And no, that’s not the title of some behind-the-curtain DVD at the rental store.
Again, in true Sherwood Schwartz fashion … the show’s premise is clearly explained in the opening theme music.
Yeah. This. This is what NBC had as part of its Saturday morning lineup. Thirteen episodes of this. And … um … yikes. I guess I’m trying to watch this today – the one episode that is currently on YouTube, which is linked above -and I’m scratching my head. Yeah, nobody expects Saturday morning television to have the same level of writing as an HBO drama, but a lot of these “I’m an adult in a kid’s body” jokes get a bit cringeworthy. In other words … I wouldn’t watch this TV series and then go watch The Tin Drum or something like that.
I think this was part of an NBC plan to populate their Saturday morning lineup with live-action programming – from 10:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.., they offered three hours of non-cartoon material, with McDuff the Talking Dog, Monster Squad, the third season of Land of the Lost (the “Uncle Jack” season), the aforementioned Big John, Little John, The Kids from C.A.P.E.R. and Muggsy. And while there are some fans that remember Monster Squad fondly, who barely remember The Kids from C.A.P.E.R., and aren’t sure what Muggsy was about – this Big John, Little John is still kind of a question mark. As in, “What particular batch of pharmaceuticals did someone poach from the Sid and Marty Krofft catering table to greenlight this program?”
Although … if you really want to get the true experience of a Saturday morning NBC block, complete with an episode of Big John, Little John sandwiched inbetween …
I got cha covered.
Chuck The Writer 
IIRC, Muggsy was a spin-off from the GO! anthology series it replaced. Blood, Sweat, & Tears frontman David Clayton Thomas sang the theme song. Monster Squad was an attempt to recapture the campy spirit of Batman from a decade earlier, and employed Stanley Ralph Ross as a producer/writer. The show also was the launchpad for Fred Grandy (who boarded the Love Boat a year later), and you had Julie Newmar, Jonathan Harris, and others as villains. Big John, Little John proved Sherwood Schwartz was losing his master’s touch, as if he hadn’t done that already with Dusty’s Trail 3 years earlier (Gilligan in the Old West was not a good idea). I think Robbie Rist didn’t return for any of the Brady follow-ups because he didn’t want to be typecast. He’d return to SatAM in the 80’s with Kidd Video, and, yes, he actually was a musician, too.
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