“To the moon, Alice” is a familiar phrase of Jackie Gleason, as Ralph would say to his wife, played by Audrey Meadows. The Honeymooners was one of the first situation comedies of the 1950s. A half-hour show began as a segment on Cavalcade of Stars, then emerged even better on The Jackie Gleason Show in 1955.
The show developed with cast leavings, cast changes, and edited versions of close to 70 incarnations of what we call The Honeymooners. The series ended in 1971. If you look over the show’s history, you’ll realize it wasn’t a show, but it had stamina — popularity that people still recognize. So, it became a TV Sitcom.
Between 1976 and 1978, Jackie Gleason and his co-stars, Art Carney, Audrey Meadows and Jane Kean, were filmed in color with a live audience. Four shows were produced and filmed in Miami, Florida. The Honeymooners: A Christmas Carol was the second one made. It’s now available for your Christmas movie library.
The show opens with Ralph boasting about taking a trip to Miami with Alice as a Christmas vacation. Until his boss, played by Gale Gordon, asks Ralph to find a director for his wife’s Christmas charity play. The money raised gives homeless cats in New York City a feline Merry Christmas.
Ralph has concerns that the guy who takes the director’s job gets bumped up to the traffic manager. So, he accepts the task and tries to convince Alice that the charity play is more important than going to Miami. Charles Dickens’ play, A Christmas Carol, comes to mind, and Ralph rewrites the classic. The result is hilarious as it’s nothing like the original when Ed takes on the job as the inexperienced director. The best scene is when Ed plays both Scrooge and Tiny Tim.
Bonus features include an interview with Jane Kean and an extra episode from the 1960s sitcom.
The release gives the younger generation a chance to see how clean and straightforward a television show is possible. The Honeymooners: A Christmas Carol is everything you’d expect from a live television show of the 1960s. But this 1977 most likely will not garner fans. But if you are familiar with the show, you are in for a special treat. “Recapture my youth? If I keep this up, I’ll lose my old age!”