Golden, Murray

Get Smart - Season 1 (The Original TV Series)

The feature film may have missed it by that much, but Get Smart, the TV series, still hits the target with deadly funny accuracy. The right show at the right time, Get Smart brilliantly spoofed the spy genre that was all the rage in 1965, with James Bond on the big screen, and such series as Danger Man, The Avengers, The Saint, < I>The Man from U.N.C.L.E., and I Spy more or less playing it straight on the small screen. Get Smart, on the other hand, had a license to kill…with laughter. Mel Brooks and Buck Henry created one of TV's all-time greatest characters, Maxwell Smart, Agent 86 of CONTROL, the super-secret agency vigilantly on alert against the forces of KAOS. Smart (Don Adams in his iconic, Emmy-winning role), an American Clouseau, was not stupid. Though all evidence to the contrary, he was, in his own mind, a suave and sophisticated spy, albeit one who would inadvertently lean against a freshly painted wall while shadowing an enemy agent. Get Smart hilariously deglamorized the business of espionage. Agents punch a time clock and dispute vacation time. Cool spy gadgets, such as the infamous Cone of Silence, are prone to malfunction. One running joke throughout the first season finds Agent 44 (Victor French) perched in a variety of unlikely and uncomfortable hiding places, among them a grandfather clock. Although the series would only get smarter and funnier in subsequent seasons (Bernie Kopell's KAOS mastermind Siegfried would be introduced in season two), the first season contains several essential episodes, including the Emmy-winning two-parter, "Ship of Spies," "Aboard the Orient Express," featuring a cameo by Johnny Carson as an unflappable conductor, "Diplomat's Daughter" with the arch --and decidedly non-PC-- villain, the Craw, and "Back to the Drawing Board," featuring Dick Gautier as Hymie the robot. From "Sorry about that" to "Would you believe," no show before Get Smart introduced so many catchphrases into the national language, while Smart and his partner, Agent 99 (the ravishing Barbara Feldon), were perhaps TV's first "will they or won't they" couple. Brooks and Henry contribute separate commentaries for the black and white pilot episode, while Feldon provides commentary for another, and purrs introductions to each episode (beware plot spoilers). With Get Smart, you will be witness to some of TV's funniest moments, sharpest writing, and expertly-executed physical comedy. And… loving it. --Donald Liebenson

Love American Style - Season 1, Vol. 2

Frustrated newlyweds and bickering marrieds, lecherous executives and bodacious secretaries, uptight squares and free-spirited hippies, suspicious wives and nervous husbands, inexperienced teens and swinging seniors. They're all part and parcel of Love, American Style, the era-defining anthology series that offered a comedic look at the so-called "new morality." Rebounding after studio-imposed DVD-interruptus, this three-disc set contains the 12 episodes that complete Season One. Each contains two or three playlets. Unlike The Love Boat, all are played for laughs: A honeymooning groom accidentally locks himself in an antique store's chastity belt; A bachelor pretends to have a wife and children to seduce a coworker who only dates married men; A harried man discovers his favorite restaurant has gone topless just as his wife surprises him for lunch. One intriguing story is "Love and the High School Flop-Out," whose story about an awkward teen who has the house to himself while his parents are out of town anticipates Risky Business, complete with friends who suggest he rent out the house for an "orgy." Love plays it completely straight. In one story, a newlywed complains her husband seems to be losing interest in her, prompting her mother to inquire if he is "strange." In another, an interior decorator in love with a mobster's daughter is dismissed by him as a "petunia" until he dispatches the thug's henchmen ("The fact that I have taste and a certain flair for color and design doesn't make me any less of a man," he argues). And in another, two bickering male business partners visit a marriage counselor to sort out their troubles. Of course, what really makes this show such a star-spangled affair is each episode's roster of character actors, TV Land cult faves, and future stars. Burt Reynolds already has his smirk going as a soldier whose wife has written a scandalous bestseller in "Love and the Banned Book." An 18-year-old Kurt Russell portrays a high school student poised to lose his virginity in "Love and the First-Nighters." Love American Style is hip enough to reference Alice B. Toklas, Bonnie & Clyde, Rosemary's Baby and Federico Fellini, but its chauvinistic attitudes now make the once-naughty show seem almost endearingly quaint. Still, to watch "Love and the Nervous Executive," which pairs prissy Paul Lynde with va-voom "Mighty Carson Arts Players" bombshell Carol Wayne, or "Love and the Big Night" with Tony Randall and Julie "Catwoman" Newmar, is to fall in Love all over again. --Donald Liebenson

Love American Style was an hour-long television anthology which originally aired between September 1969 and January 1974. For the 1971 and 1972 seasons it was a part of an ABC Friday prime-time lineup that also included Brady Bunch The Partridge Family Room 222 and The Odd Couple. Each week the show featured different stories of romance usually with a comedic spin. All episodes were unrelated featuring different characters stories and locations. The show often featured the same actors playing different characters in many episodes. In addition a large and ornate brass bed was a recurring prop in many episodes. Charles Fox's delicate yet hip music score featuring flutes harp and flugelhorn set to a contemporary pop beat provided the "love" ambiance which tied the stories together as a multifaceted romantic comedy each week.System Requirements:TRT: 622 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 097361322544 Manufacturer No: 132254

The Fugitive - Season Two, Vol. 1

Dr. Richard Kimble is accused to be the murder of his wife. The night before his execution he escapes. The only chance to prove his innocence is to find the man who killed hi wife. Kimble persecuted by the Lt. Gerard risks his life several times when he shows his identity to help other people out of trouble.System Requirements:Running Time: 771 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 097361327648 Manufacturer No: 132764

The relentless Lt. Gerard (Barry Morse) has always insisted that capturing fugitive Richard Kimble (David Janssen) was just "unfinished business." But in "The Nemesis," an essential episode that is one of the highlights of this half-season set, it's personal. An unwitting Kimble has stolen Girard's car to make a getaway, not knowing that it contains Girard's young son, Phil, Jr. (Kurt Russell). Phil Jr. is a chip off the old block (he cleverly leaves a trail of his precious football cards to point his father in the right direction), but a selfless act by Kimble raises doubts in the boy's mind. "You and dad can't both be right," he questions. This is just one of the compelling human dramas at the heart of one of television's Most Wanted series. Now in his second year on the run after escaping from the Death Row-bound train, Kimble is "tired of looking over his shoulder… tired of running." In "Escape Into Black," he visits a small-town diner and loses his memory after the gas stove explodes. In "When the Bough Breaks," he hops a freight car that also carries a traumatized woman who has abducted a baby. Until he can find the one-armed man (Bill Raisch) he witnessed running from his home the night his wife was killed, he will have to endure "another shabby room, another lonely night." Not that Kimble doesn't have his champions. In the season-opener, "Man in a Chariot," a college law professor, argues Kimble's case before his students in a mock trial. In "World's End," the daughter (Suzanne Pleshette) of his former defense attorney contacts Kimble with potentially devastating news about the ever-elusive one-armed man and schemes to run away with him. In "Escape into Black," a compassionate hospital welfare caseworker (Betty Garrett) tries to find the one-armed man while Kimble recovers.

The episodes in this set maintain an unflagging pace, thanks to taut direction (the late Sydney Pollack directed "Man on a String," in which Kimble is a very reluctant witness in a murder case) and excellent scripts (George Eckstein, who wrote "Man in a Chariot" and "When the Bough Breaks" would co-write The Fugitive's final episode, a television benchmark). Among the great character actors who guest star in these episodes include Tuesday Weld as a manipulative and very twisted sister in "Dark Corner," Slim Pickens as a poacher in "Nemesis," and Ivan Dixon as a doctor who discovers Kimble's identity in "Escape Into Black." The Fugitive taps into the primal fear that was one of Hitchcock's favorite themes: What would you do if you were falsely accused? Janssen is unforgettable in his signature role as the man whose every instinct is to flee the scene and not get involved with the strangers whose paths he crosses. But we offer viewers the same advice the professor gives Kimble in "Chariot": "All I ask is that you stay around and see what happens." --Donald Liebenson

Tabitha - The Entire Series

Samantha and Darin Stephens' little girl is all grown up and out on her own in TABITHA the enchanting spin-off series. Starring Lisa Hartman as a young single working witch Tabitha adds a little magic and fun to the lives of her relatives and friends including mortal brother Adam (David Ankrum) guardian witch Aunt Minerva (Karen Morrow) and Paul Thurston (Mel Stewart). Includes the entire 12-episode run plus the rarely seen original pilot episode starring Liberty Williams and Bruce Kimmel as the Stephens siblings.System Requirements:Starring: Lisa Hartman David Ankrum Karen Morrow Mel Stewart Robert Urich Running Time: 325 Min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 043396111820 Manufacturer No: 11182

It seems that this short-lived 1977 spinoff was not so much trying to recapture the magic of Bewitched as it was The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Like Mary, Lisa Hartman's Tabitha was an independent single woman working for a low-rent local television station. Where Mary had a letter "M" hanging on her wall, Tabitha had a "T." Tabitha, however, tried to turn our world on, not with a smile, but with a twitch of her nose. And without the benefit of brilliant writers or an able ensemble, Hartman was just not up to taking a nothing premise and suddenly making it all seem worthwhile. Tabitha, now a witchy woman, works as an assistant at KXLA with her mortified mortal brother, Adam, to whom she promises to "cut down on the nose action" (in the more-interesting unaired pilot included on this two-disc set, Adam is a warlock trying to lure his sister to the dark side). Tabitha is an exercise in diminished returns. Mel Stuart, as the beleaguered station manager, is no Ed Asner; a pre-Spenser Robert Urich, as the obnoxious, egomaniacal talk show host, is no Ted Knight; and Karen Morrow, as Tabitha's meddlesome, troublemaking aunt Minerva, is no Agnes Moorehead.

Not that Tabitha is without its TV Land charms. Reprising their roles from the original series are Sandra Gould and a bearded George Tobias as Gladys and Abner Kravitz in "The Arrival of Nancy," and Bernard Fox as Dr. Bombay in "Tabitha's Party." These episodes also feature welcome appearances by, respectively, Fred Willard as a gold-chain-wearing swinger and Werner "Col. Klink" Klemperer. For undiscriminating couch potatoes, Tabitha, may cast an irresistible guilty pleasure spell. However, fans of the original series will probably feel less bewitched than bothered and bewildered. --Donald Liebenson

Sigmund and the Sea Monster, Vol. 1

Sid and Marty Krofft created many wildly creative series for Saturday morning television. One of the most memorable was Sigmund and the Sea Monsters, the story of a sea creature, Sigmund, who runs away from his family's cave by the ocean and is adopted by two human children. This DVD from Kid Rhino showcases the first 4 of 29 episodes that originally ran from 1973 to 1975, and gave us quite interesting characters like Sigmund, Big Mama, and Sheldon the Sea Genie (played by comedian Rip Taylor). The shows are chock full of pop culture references from the time period, and feature many familiar voices behind the monsters. Although the plot rarely changes (the kids must keep Sigmund hidden from the other humans around them, despite the trouble that he causes), they are all enjoyable to watch. Each episode concludes with a song written by the team of Boyce and Hart (responsible for many of the Monkees' early hits) and sung by star Johnnie Whitaker (Jody on Family Affair). Of course, the theme song, "Friends," is widely remembered and as hummable as it ever was. The foam rubber and goggle-eyed monsters are far from scary, but do provide a glimpse into the past, when high-tech special effects weren't necessary to create fantasy worlds. The show revels in its simplicity, and it appears as if the actors had as much fun making the series as we do watching it. --Zachary Lively

Bruce Lee the Green Hornet

Green Hornet - Vol. 1

Trapper John, M.D.