Sanford and Son (TV Series) The Winning Ticket (1976) User Reviews

Not a lotto

[kevinolzak · 6/10 · 15 November 2016]

"The Winning Ticket" opens with Fred once again desperate to pay his debts. Knocking at the door is Timmy the Sign Man (Danny Dayton), wondering where he can put his little sign: "shall I stick it in the ground?" "you're close!" Timmy makes the junk man a deal he can't refuse, a lucky number contest offering a cash prize of $200, which will only cost him a 'small printing fee.' 30 days of giving away one free ticket with each purchase, with no actual winning number among them, sounds too good to be true for $25. Fred figures this will be their ticket to easy street, but Lamont knows better: "is that where the poor house is located?" Timmy has been working the same con around town with partner Le Duc (Danny Wells, who played a similar character in "Can You Chop This?"), the latter in possession of the winning ticket, but they have a surprise in store from Sanford and Son, with a little help from Aunt Esther.

The contest nobody could win...or can they?

[hockeytown11 · 8/10 · 7 June 2017]

So Fred is talked into sponsoring a winning number contest where there's no winner, and though Fred knows running such a thing is illegal, he is not only talked into it when explained that nobody really asks for the winners of the contests, he also increases the prize amount to $500. We do of course learn the contest is rigged to have a winner after all, as the man who sells this has an accomplice with the winning ticket. We learn Fred and Lamont don't make enough to cover the winnings, which is when Fred confesses the truth about the contest to Lamont. When the time comes to reveal the winning number, the accomplice shows he has the winning ticket and threatens to go to the police if they don't pay up. Fred and Lamont are left in a bind until Fred figures out how to make a duplicate ticket and enlists Esther and Bubba to thwart the man's plan. While they still lose $250 to Esther, Fred learns a valuable lesson and they don't wind up in the poor house.