Oink, oink, DVD, oink

January 28, 2004 9:11 AM

Bon air! Nuit d`fête! More than likely, if you're of a certain age (I won't pretend to know the exact one) and live in the U.S., you know the theme song in English, at least. It's Green Acres, which came out on DVD on Jan. 13, and will hit TV Land this spring, after years of being hard to find and in bad condition when you could find it. Its reputation has been bolstered over time by praise from, among others, Matt Groening (see No. 50), who has reportedly called it one of the primary inspirations for "The Simpsons." Have you rented any old TV shows on DVD, ones you can't necessarily catch on cable or syndication, and reconsidered your opinion of them? Do shows that seemed modern at the time now seem backdated, or vice versa, or more influential than you might have guessed?
posted by raysmj (45 comments total)

...this spring, after years of being hard to find and in bad condition when you could find it...

Unless you lived in L.A., where KDOC re-ran it about eleventy times a day.
posted by Katemonkey at 9:24 AM on January 28, 2004

Green Acres and Cheers can be found on DVD, yet Northern Exposure is still lost in obscurity? There is simply no justice in this world.
posted by ZachsMind at 9:30 AM on January 28, 2004

"All in the Family" was one of the most controversial things around in its time, and having caught some reruns on cable, I think it's every bit as good as it was originally. I think the 'Honeymooners' has stood the test of time. Would there have ever been a Kramer were it not for Norton? "I Love Lucy" was huge in its day. I don't think anyone younger than my parents could stand to watch an episode today... "Family Ties" has been showing on, I guess, TV Land lately. I don't see how that show was ever seen as anything other than moralizing, sentimental crap.

Zachsmind is right, why no Northern Exposure DVDs?
posted by crank at 9:42 AM on January 28, 2004

"I just adore a penthouse view---Dahling, I love you , but give me Park avenue!" : >
This was also in perpetual reruns when I was little--It's funny to think there are kids today who will grow up watching Seinfeld and Roseanne eleventy times a day.

Bewitched holds up pretty well, I think, and Mary Hartman and Soap hold up incredibly well, but are not on often enough (late night weekends on tvland). I Dream of Jeannie is cringeworthy and totally unwatchable, i find.
posted by amberglow at 10:14 AM on January 28, 2004

There are various petitions online to get "Northern Exposure" on the air. I'm not sure what's the holdup there, and would love to hear what's up. (And "Green Acres" was almost certainly an influence on that show too. What's fairly interesting here is that, while moving to the sticks from the city was seen as clearly insane in the former, while small-town life in "Northern Exposure" is presented as quirky but fairly comfy and inviting, despite the lead's constant bewilderment.)

Another show that hasn't been released, due to a dispute between Viacom and CBS, is Hawaii Five-0, one of TV's longest-running series, which comes off as hilariously campy today, even while you notice that "CSI" and "Miami Vice" wouldn't have come to be without it.
posted by raysmj at 10:17 AM on January 28, 2004

Whenever I see a fire truck speeding through town, I think, "Emergency band practice." Whenever I trip a breaker, I think, "Can't plug in a 2 with a 6." Whenever I work up project estimates, I think, "One week."

Green Acres = pure genius.
posted by delapohl at 10:22 AM on January 28, 2004

That's intersting. A friend of mine has perhaps 12 episodes of Five-O on VHS.

I'd like to rent the UFO DVD series, but nobody rents it and I don't feel like spending all that money for a series that is obviously very dated (but deliciously campy).
posted by infowar at 10:23 AM on January 28, 2004

two words:

square. pegs.

someone put this out on dvd, pronteaux.
posted by pxe2000 at 10:29 AM on January 28, 2004

Which UFO series? NetFlix has a UFO series for rent that's dated 1970 and features Ed Bishop and Grant Taylor, "It's 1980, and aliens are invading earth, kidnapping people and harvesting their organs. They are opposed by S.H.A.D.O., a top-secret agency with headquarters in a lead-lined bunker 80 feet beneath a London film studio. Led by the dedicated Commander Ed Straker, S.H.A.D.O. deploys an incredible arsenal of high-tech weapons to stop the extra-terrestrial invaders.." Yeah that sounds deliciously campy, but when I read "UFO DVD series" and "deliciously campy" what came to my mind was Jack Webb's Project UFO which is apparently not out on DVD.
posted by ZachsMind at 10:38 AM on January 28, 2004

That SCTV, apart from a Best of Martin Short and a Best of John Candy, is unavailable is truly a disgrace. I still miss The Sammy Maudlin Show, Yosh and Stan Shmenge, Dr. Tongue, Ed Grimley, Edith Prickley, Bobby Bittman--How are ya?--Lola Heatherton and the MacKenzie Brothers, too.
Give me my SCTV!
posted by y2karl at 10:39 AM on January 28, 2004

I watched Green Acres religiously when I was a kid, but I can't imagine renting it now. I can recall the theme song perfectly, but the problem is getting it out of my head!

My So Called Life - the whole series (only 1 season *sob*) has been put out on DVD. The show is as brilliant as ever. Holds up so well, my teenage daughter can't believe it's "old."

The Groucho Marx "You Bet Your Life - the Lost Episodes" DVD is unbelievable in a different way. The people look like real people - you know, bad teeth, funny looking hair, and all that. The show has a very leisurely pace. Groucho is hysterical, but always respectful and a gentleman. Some of the guests and the DeSoto ads are so funny, it's kind of mindboggling. A view into a world that seems so far away.
posted by jasper411 at 10:46 AM on January 28, 2004

Square Pegs is on the Kitshen thing late at night on tvland, but I bet Sarah Jessica is holding up release of that--she wants to be seen as a sexy woman now, not the geek she really is ; >
posted by amberglow at 10:54 AM on January 28, 2004

The A&E box sets of The Prisoner and the Rigg-era Avengers are excellent.

Though the show was pleasant enough to watch, I always thought that Northern Exposure was what you got when you watered down Twin Peaks with the help of a focus group. Where's my second season of Twin Peaks on DVD? (Okay, that second season was nowhere near as good as the first, but, still.)
posted by Prospero at 10:54 AM on January 28, 2004

oops--Kitschen
posted by amberglow at 10:57 AM on January 28, 2004

"I Love Lucy" was huge in its day. I don't think anyone younger than my parents could stand to watch an episode today

Depends. If it's one of the ones where a crazy scheme causes everyone to be embarrassed, it holds up okay. Or one with sight/motion gags and wordplay -- the candy assembly line, or the wine-pressing, or the Vitameata Vegimen one -- can hold up okay. I'm told that I Love Lucy was basically the last gasp of vaudeville comedy, and I'd guess that a lot of the tropes come from there.

But if it's one of the ones where Ricky is spanking Lucy because she disobeyed him, and NOT in the fun way... all's I can say is

W.
T.
F.
Ricky?
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 11:28 AM on January 28, 2004

Bon Appetite - c'est incroyable!
posted by Pressed Rat at 11:42 AM on January 28, 2004

Raysmj: Hawaii 5-0 is running regularly on the Hallmark Channel, I have it set for a TiVo Season Pass. And Northern Exposure was either on the same channel or Oxygen but is now in one of those 'rest so we don't overexpose it' breaks. Surely it will be back on the air before the end of this year. No idea about DVDs for either but unless there are contractual issues, I will bet good money that pretty near every TV series ever released (for which the tapes still survive in decent shape) will eventually be put out on DVD simply because the cost of doing it is so low.
posted by billsaysthis at 11:58 AM on January 28, 2004

The series I'm waiting to see come back to cable is Mission: Impossible. Would be terrific if one of the nets would broadcast it in the original air date order.
posted by billsaysthis at 11:59 AM on January 28, 2004

Once Again

(damn html)
posted by Pressed Rat at 12:03 PM on January 28, 2004

I don't think anyone younger than my parents could stand to watch an episode today

Really? I unabashedly love it (and unless you're about 10 or 15, I'm not your parents' age). Some episodes are better than others, of course (and most of the final season where they jumped the shark to move to Connecticut is pretty meh), and the sexism of the period can inspire the gnashing of teeth (I used to have a t-shirt that said "I love Lucy but Ricky is a fucking pig"), but I think it's still frequently hysterical and can't really be underestimated in terms of its influence. Lucille Ball was much more than simply a last-gasp vaudeville comedian -- her physicality and comic delivery were excellent and really broadened the boundaries for women in comedy, and Desi Arnaz developed the 3-camera method of filming live before an audience, which is still the sitcom standard today.
posted by scody at 12:17 PM on January 28, 2004

I loved Land of the Lost as a kid, but seeing a DVD of a few episodes ... they wore way too much makeup. Which sort of shattered the illusion of a family who got lost while out on a routine expedition when the greatest earthquake ever known struck their tiny raft, and plunged them down a thousand feet below.
posted by WolfDaddy at 12:50 PM on January 28, 2004

Actually, the Ed Sullivan Show was really the last gasp of vaudeville in its traditional sense, although radio had been choking it to death slowly for the thirty years or so leading up to television. "I Love Lucy" proved that radio sitcoms would work on television.
posted by briank at 12:58 PM on January 28, 2004

Amen, Pressed Rat, "Rocky & Bullwinkle, the First Season" is the only DVD box set I own (and I am boycotting the Virgin and Tower stores that didn't even stock it when I was shopping locally).

At 11 years of age, "Green Acres" spooked me as much as "Twin Peaks" must have scared 11-year-olds when it first aired, but I now recognize and enjoy it as a classic of absurdity, surrealism and culture-clashing-comedy (and not just because the main character was Oliver Wendell Douglas - many sitcoms have recognized the comic potential of this name, a gratifyingly high number right after my short-lived career on Los Angeles radio in the '70s).

I've been exposed to many more sitcoms recently, having to share a small apartment with my TV-addicted and cable-poor father. I'm still trying to figure out why his all-time faves are (in order) "Married With Children", "All in the Family", "Seinfeld" and "Sabrina the Teenage Witch". But I get to join him watching even the ones he hates ("King of the Hill", "Becker" and "Everybody Loves Raymond"), and I have been cured of my fear of "That '70s Show".

But, to attempt to put this comment back on track, my personal hall-of-faves (besides those already mentioned: "Green Acres", "Square Pegs", "SCTV", "Bullwinkle", "I Love Lucy" - although for shark-jumping, the "Lucy Desi Hour" was infamous - and non-comedies "Avengers" and "Prisoner") include "Futurama" (even more than "Simpsons"), "M*A*S*H", "Dilbert" the series (more than "The Office"), anything with Bob Newhart, Martin Mull, Betty White or Chris Elliot (who has inexplicably turned up in recurring roles on "Raymond" and "According to Jim" in the same week...), from Britain: "The Young Ones" and all reincarnations of "Black Adder", and Nickelodeon's "Adventures of Pete and Pete" (to which "Malcolm" owes its life).

Being long-time HBO-deprived, my next DVD box set will be "Curb Your Enthusiasm: The First Season", although - hmmm - L.A.'s Museum of TV and Radio is doing matinee marathons of "Sex and the City"... Now there's a questionable dating opportunity: excuse me, I have e-mails to write.
posted by wendell at 1:01 PM on January 28, 2004

UFO Series Home Page (the one I was talking about, not the later Jack Webb series).
posted by infowar at 1:13 PM on January 28, 2004

It's criminal - criminal, I tell you! - that there's no DVD of America 2Night, a spinoff of Fernwood 2Night, a spinoff of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman. This thought came to me a year or two ago when I caught one of the episodes on some cable channel and remembered what a riot it was. The show, which seems in retrospect to have been largely improvised, was wildly uneven, but often uncomfortably funny, and there were moments of television unlike anything seen before or since. And with Martin Mull and Fred Willard anchoring the proceedings, even the lamest bits were tolerable.
posted by soyjoy at 1:23 PM on January 28, 2004

You sound like my family, delapohl. On the rare occasions my dad dresses up, we never fail to ask "Is that your stump-pullin' suit?" And when we're visiting the folks' house and need to use the bathroom, we always inquire "anyone in the Occupied?"
posted by Oriole Adams at 1:46 PM on January 28, 2004

News Radio will be my first boxed set DVD.
posted by mecran01 at 2:09 PM on January 28, 2004

News Radio was great. I've been able to download most of the episodes - only missing post-Phil Harman ones. Watching them occasionally is one of my guilty pleasures. A great sitcom is like a fine pastry - small and delicious but nothing you'd want to subsist on.
posted by TimeFactor at 3:26 PM on January 28, 2004

Green Acres was good, but I didn't appreciate I Love Lucy.

The show I'd really like to see again is the Phil Silvers Show. I think Phil Silvers is a comedy genius, although the younger crowd has never heard of him. (Only got 2 votes for this fark photoshop.)

What was the show with the pink submarine? I used to like that when I was a kid, dunno how it'd hold up now though.
posted by alex_reno at 3:35 PM on January 28, 2004

I wish The Associates had lasted longer. The episode where the young lawyer had to face his old law professor (John Houseman -- yes, The Paper Chase) in court was the best.

As for seeing a show in a different light the second time around, my nomination would be McHale's Navy. As broad and slapstick as the performances seemed the first time I saw them, Joe Flynn and Tim Conway did some deliciously subtle things that were more apparent in retrospect. (Chagrin Falls was just a silly name at first. It became delightfully absurd the more I thought about it.)

On preview, pink submarine --> Operation Petticoat
posted by joaquim at 3:39 PM on January 28, 2004

Ah, thanks, I knew petticoat was in the name, but the only thing that came to mind was Petticoat Junction, and I knew it wasn't that.
posted by alex_reno at 3:56 PM on January 28, 2004

I remember watching Green Acres as a kid, but it wasn't until I saw it as an adult that I appreciated the genus of the show. Alvy Moore as Hank Kimball. Oh. My. God.
posted by jaronson at 4:09 PM on January 28, 2004

Oh...and speaking of Petticoat Junction, does anyone else see the innuendo in the title/theme song?
posted by jaronson at 4:12 PM on January 28, 2004

sure, but then the naked sisters (Bobby Jo, Betty Jo, Billie Jo?) grabbing their towels in the water tank could have told you that, jaronson (the show was incredibly innocent and dullish, i think tho)
posted by amberglow at 4:59 PM on January 28, 2004

FWIW, the Meatmen cover both the Mission Impossible and the Green Acres theme songs. They do a pretty good job on both, I think.
posted by alex_reno at 5:05 PM on January 28, 2004

I suspect Elvis Hitler's "Green Haze" would either infuriate or tickle Green Acres fans. It's the Green Acres lyrics sung to Henrdix's Purple Haze. Try it, you won't believe it.
posted by infowar at 6:24 PM on January 28, 2004

Green Acres lyrics sung to Henrdix's Purple Haze. Try it, you won't believe it.

I find the Green Acres theme sounds best when sung in a hyper-Dylan accent. Works pretty good for most tv themes, come to think of it.

When we were thinking of bedtime songs to sing to our kid when he was little, the ones that first came to mind were Green Acres, Mr. Ed, Gilligan's Island & Beverly Hillbillies. Who needs mother goose?

Are there any current shows that actually have their own composed them songs? Don't watch that much tv, but can't think of a recognizeable one after Seinfeld... Frazier, I think?

One other note about 60's theme songs. Many were based on the chord changes to "I Got Rhythm." Check it out... The Flinstones being one of the more obvious.
posted by groundhog at 7:03 PM on January 28, 2004

The Dylan voice sounds best with the theme from "The Patty Duke Show." ("The Family Guy," although not a sit-com, exactly, has a dynamite theme song, by the way.)

Hendrix doing "Green Acres" would not infuriate me. Sounds rather Junior Brown-ish, but maybe not *quite* as delirious as his "Sugar Foot Rag," which mixes Hank Garland with licks from "The Wind Cries Mary."
posted by raysmj at 7:14 PM on January 28, 2004

Green Acres lyrics sung to Henrdix's Purple Haze

In a similar vein, Greensleeves, Amazing Grace, House of the Rising Sun, and the theme from Gilligan's Island are all interchangeable.
posted by joaquim at 7:48 PM on January 28, 2004

People always mention I Love Lucy as being the Yellow Rose of Texas slowed down, but i can't tell. Anyone know?
posted by amberglow at 8:11 PM on January 28, 2004

In a similar vein, Greensleeves, Amazing Grace, House of the Rising Sun, and the theme from Gilligan's Island are all interchangeable.

And the last is compatible with the melody of Stairway to Heaven.
posted by y2karl at 10:30 PM on January 28, 2004

The Dylan voice sounds best with the theme from "The Patty Duke Show."

After a couple of beers, I can do a killer Elvis Impersonator Bullwinkle--

Well, uh, bless my soul,
What's wrong with me?
I'm itching like a man
On a fuzzy tree....

--and a Bullwinkle Dylan, too, not to mention Bullwinkle's tribute to Johnny Mathis...
posted by y2karl at 10:38 PM on January 28, 2004

One other note about 60's theme songs. Many were based on the chord changes to "I Got Rhythm." Check it out... The Flinstones being one of the more obvious.

I'm trying to fit the "Flintstones" theme into "I Got Rhythm" and come up with zero. The "Jetsons" theme, though, fits it almost note by note.
posted by Oriole Adams at 11:06 PM on January 28, 2004

I want season two of Six Feet Under and if HBO doesn't release it soon I'll knock on their door and tell them they're a bunch of good-for-nothing jerkheads, I swear to God.
posted by The God Complex at 1:40 AM on January 29, 2004

I'm trying to fit the "Flintstones" theme into "I Got Rhythm" and come up with zero.

Not the melody, but the chord changes. Leave it to Beaver also.
posted by groundhog at 6:41 PM on January 29, 2004