Wissenswertes

Author Harold Courlander successfully sued author Alex Haley for plagiarizing parts of his novel "The African" for his 1976 novel "Roots," the book that served as the basis for this miniseries. Haley paid $650,000 in a 1978 out-of-court settlement.

When ABC programmed it to air on several consecutive nights in primetime, it was considered a revolutionary approach to programming a miniseries. Most were aired once or twice a week over several weeks. Several years later, the network revealed that it was aired that way to get the show "out of the way" in a hurry. The network felt that nobody would watch the story if it aired over a longer period of time.

When the miniseries debuted on ABC, it was presented as a factual history of Alex Haley's family. Historians and genealogists have found critical errors in his research work. Most of the story is either unsupported or contradicted by the available evidence.

Received thirty-seven Emmy Award nominations, and won nine. It was the first show to be nominated for every Emmy acting category.

Though presented as a true story, large parts of the series were later shown to be based entirely on fiction.