The Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame will open its “Everybody Loves Raymond: Celebrating 30 Years” exhibit on Friday, Nov. 28, beginning at 11 a.m. at its Stony Brook location. The exhibit follows the Hall of Fame’s recent Billy Joel showcase and marks the 30th anniversary of the sitcom, which features a Long Island family. CBS will air its anniversary tribute on Nov. 24.
The exhibit will include the 70-foot-wide set from the 30th anniversary CBS special.
“It’s going to be amazing! If you are a big fan of the show, this is the Holy Grail of exhibitions,” set designer Kevin O’Callaghan told South Shore Press. “You actually could walk into the Barone family living room and sit on the couch. There’s a great photo opportunity.”
Other items on display include props such as the engraved toaster Raymond (Ray Romano) gave his parents for Christmas, the wooden fork and spoon that Marie (Doris Roberts) and Frank Barone (Peter Boyle) argued over, and Traffic Cop Timmy, the ventriloquist dummy Robert (Brad Garrett) used to teach traffic school.
“The exhibition itself is so beautiful that fan or no, you’ll become a fan after you see this,” O’Callaghan said. “We’re going to have projections on the walls of some of the great episodes. You can walk behind the set and look at what goes on in the background that viewers never see.”
The exhibit also includes a film by producer Tom Caltabiano, who documented the show during its 10-year run and amassed about 20,000 photographs. Everybody Loves Raymond aired from 1996 to 2005, received 15 Emmy Awards and 69 nominations, and continues to run in syndication.
As O’Callaghan described, “Everybody Loves Raymond was a TV series that brought families together. Families sat on their own couch and watched the show. The language, the attitude and the look of their house is Long Island. What I’m getting now is young people approaching me about the show and saying there’s something really deep in their heart about it…it was a ritual to watch the show.”
O’Callaghan said securing rights for the exhibit was a challenge, but those connected to the show, including actor Ray Romano and creator Philip Rosenthal, were “very supportive.” Romano said in a Hall of Fame press release, “The Barone family were Long Islanders. It’s our pleasure to share the show with the hometown crowd.”
O’Callaghan said, “They actually were filming a special out in California for the 30th anniversary. I flew out to California and saw the set and got completely nuts because it was so beautiful.”
Romano’s manager and producer Rory Rosegarten of Manhasset helped bring memorabilia from an earlier Everybody Loves Raymond exhibit at The Paley Center for Media in New York City to Stony Brook, according to the press release.
Tickets for the exhibit are available through the Hall of Fame website. Visitors can also view items from The Billy Joel Collection.
O’Callaghan, who designed both exhibits and the Hall of Fame space, encouraged the public to attend.
“I hope they leave there feeling very uplifted, very nostalgic,” he said. “Especially as we come into the holidays, what’s better than an exhibition about one of America’s great families, the Barones? You could be shopping in Stony Brook and go to see the Barones. It’s a win-win, especially this time of the year.”