good times-related stories
Posted Sep 28th 2009 6:06PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: TV on DVD, Reality-Free
Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.
This might not be the biggest DVD release day in history, but it's certainly one of the business. There's something for everyone this week, including a bunch of "Fan Favorites" DVDs for various sitcoms, including
NewsRadio,
All in the Family, and
I Dream of Jeannie. That's a neat idea, though I wonder, if you're a big fan, wouldn't you already have the DVDs?
Oh, and remember
Day Break, the ABC mystery series from a couple of years ago? You can get the Complete Series. I don't think I ever saw the end of that show. You can watch it on
SlashControl, so maybe I'll start there before buying the set.
- All in the Family - Fan Favorites
- Ax Men - Season 2
- Barney Miller - Fan Favorites
- Bewitched - Fan Favorites
Continue reading New TV on DVD releases this week
Posted Mar 23rd 2009 2:10PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: TV Royalty, TV on DVD, Reality-Free
Actually, it's not every season of every show that Norman Lear produced and/or created. That would probably take two UPS trucks to deliver and a spare bedroom to store. But this sounds like an interesting collection nonetheless.
On June 9, Sony will release
The Norman Lear Collection, a 19-disc set that will include the first seasons of the shows that Norman Lear did over the years, including
All in the Family,
Sanford and Son,
The Jeffersons,
Maude,
One Day At A Time,
Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, and
Good Times. The set will include lots of bonus material, including new interviews with people like Rob Reiner and Jimmie Walker, along with the two unseen pilots for
All in the Family,
Those Were The Days and
And Justice For All (in the original pilot, the Bunkers' last name was actually Justice).
Continue reading How would you like all of Norman Lear's shows in one DVD box set?
Posted Nov 12th 2008 2:06PM by Jay Black
Filed under: OpEd, TV 101, Reality-Free
If you haven't heard, the country is in a recession and things are getting bad. I spend every afternoon watching CNBC and weeping. My father, who deals in real estate, calls me every night just to scream and babble incoherently. My wife splits her time between loading up the Model T to head out west Californee-way and burning our quarterly financial statements for warmth.
We're on an economic roller coaster right now, and I don't mean a reputable roller coaster like at Six Flags. We're talking one of those death-trap coasters that even the carnies won't ride. The depressing thing is that the whole bag of crap we're in right now just seemed to come out of nowhere, like the last season of
Roseanne. How did we get here? Why is this all happening now?
You might be tempted to blame the usual suspects: the president, the congress, the Stone-Cutters. But you'd be wrong. The real culprit behind this whole problems is
Friends.
Continue reading TV 101: How Friends caused the current financial crisis (OR: Say it ain't so, Joe the Actor)
Posted Oct 27th 2008 6:05PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: TV on DVD, Reality-Free
Here are the new TV DVDs, in stores tomorrow.Wow, if you bought all of the complete series sets being released this week you'd have a great start for your TV DVD collection:
NewsRadio,
The Flintstones,
The 4400,
Sanford and Son, and several others. The
NewsRadio set doesn't have anything that wasn't in the individual sets, but it's a great buy if you don't have all of the seasons. The
Mystery Science Theater 3000 set (the one with the collectible Crow and lobby cards) might already be sold out, so I'd check on that. I used to watch
Zoom back in the 70s, though I can't imagine buying the DVD set.
I don't think I've ever seen
The Doris Day Show, but it looks like something I might have to have.
- The 4400 - Complete Series
- Cathouse - Complete Series
- Dark Shadows - Vol. 6: Episodes 179-209
- The Donna Reed Show - Season 1
- The Doris Day Show - Christmas Memories
- Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman - Complete Series
- The Flintstones - Complete Series
- Girlfriends - Season 5
- Good Times - Complete Series
- The Little Rascals - Complete Collection
- The L Word - Season 5
- Millennium - Complete Series
- Mystery Science Theater 3000 - 20th Anniversary Set
- NewsRadio - Complete Series
- Sanford and Son - Complete Series
- Sister, Sister - Season 1
- War and Remembrance - Season 1
- Zoom - Back to the 70s
Posted Mar 4th 2008 2:23PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Celebrities, Obituaries
A roundup of TV people from in front of the camera and behind the scenes who have passed away.
- Dennis Letts: He was a teacher who taught at universities for 30 years and then decided to get into acting. He appeared in several TV shows, including Walker, Texas Ranger, Once and Again, and The CBS Summer Playhouse, as well as the TV movies Dallas: The Early Years, Challenger, and The Last Prostitute. On the big screen he was in Cast Away, Infamous, Passenger 57, A Perfect World, and many others. He died of cancer at age 73.
Continue reading TV Obits: Letts, Baer, Kenwith
Posted Aug 1st 2006 8:13AM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: TV on DVD
America's Funniest Home Videos - Athletic Supporters - Beavis and Butthead: The Mike Judge Collection - Volume 3
- Blue Collar TV - Season Two
- The Comeback: The Complete Series
- Curb Your Enthusiasm - Season Five
- Dallas - Fifth Season
- The Girls Next Door - Season One
- Good Times - Sixth Season
- Hazel - First Season
- Star Trek: TNG: The Klingon Fan Collective
Posted Apr 15th 2006 3:24PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Talent, Industry
Rather interesting
piece
over at
The Los Angeles Times, about Eric Monte, a writer who created such television classics as
Good
Times and
What's Happening, wrote the 70s film
Cooley High, wrote for
Moesha and
The Wayan Brothers, and even created the characters of George and Louise Jefferson on
All in the
Family.
He is now homeless and living in a shelter in Los Angeles.
Part of it is because of
a bad crack addiction he had (he's clean now), but a lot of it was because of a series of strokes he had, plus a
lawsuit he filed against Norman Lear, Bud Yorkin, CBS, and ABC for stealing his ideas for
Good Times,
What's Happening, and other projects (he got a million dollar settlement, years ago).
This is also,
as
Lee Goldberg says, a cautionary tale about the world of
self-publishing. Monte spent thousands of his own money to publish and market a book, but no one was interested in it.
Posted Mar 2nd 2006 10:41AM by Keith McDuffee
Filed under: OpEd, The Five, The Daily Best
Originally I was going to list the best catchphrases in
general, not limiting my choices to single words. But, as we only list five in our The Five posts, I knew early on that
it would be a near impossible task to list only five favorites. So, here we have it, the five best single-word
catchphrases of popular TV characters.
1. "Aeyyy!" OK, so technically this isn't
a "word," but you can't deny the popularity of the trademark call of coolness from the one and only Fonz of
Happy Days.
Continue reading The Five: Best single-word catchphrases
Six Mad Men characters who are in limbo after the finale
Fact or Fiction: Big Bang, Brothers & Sisters and CSI
The TV Squad Podcast: Linda Purl talks about The Office, we talk spoilers, and more
