Lessac, Michael

Taxi - The Complete First Season

Hail, Taxi. It's great to finally have one of the defining sitcoms of the 1970s available on DVD to take out for a spin. This character-driven humane comedy from the creators of The Mary Tyler Moore Show rolled out of the garage with a full tank of gas: a lightning-in-a-bottle ensemble, smart, witty, and compassionate writing, and extraordinary characters. The Sunshine Cab Company was a much grittier workplace than the sunny WJM newsroom. Its down, but never out employees--single mother Elaine (Marilu Henner), aspiring actor Bobby (Jeff Conaway), hapless boxer Tony (Tony Danza), reptilian dispatcher Louis (Danny DeVito), naive rube John (Randall Carver), and indeterminately foreign mechanic Latka (comic iconoclast Andy Kaufman)--struggled to keep rolling along. Judd Hirsch's salt-of-the-earth cabbie Alex Rieger solved everyone's problems but his own. Half hours don't get more moving than the Humanitas Prize-winning episode, "Blind Date," in which Alex tries to befriend an embittered overweight woman, or funnier than "High School Reunion," in which Bobby impersonates Louie at Louie's reunion to impress his mean former classmates.

Along for the ride in this Emmy-winning first season are a pre-MagnumTom Selleck and Mandy Patinkin ("Memories of Cab 804") and life force Ruth Gordon, who was honored with an Emmy for her performance as one of Alex's most memorable fares ("Sugar Mama"). The poignant episode "Paper Marriage" features Christopher Lloyd as burn-out Reverend Jim, who would join the ensemble in season 2. Regrettably, this three-disc set is a stripped down model, with no commentary or interviews. But there is nothing hack about Taxi itself. This is "must-own" television fare. --Donald Liebenson

Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 08/22/2006 Rating: Nr

Titus - Seasons 1 & 2

Studio: Starz/sphe Release Date: 06/06/2006 Rating: Nr

Titus - Season 3

The comedic chronicles of Christopher Titus's profoundly dysfunctional family came to an end with Titus's third season (2001-2002), and while it's not known if Titus and his co-producers knew that the bell was tolling for their risky show, the go-for-broke tone of these episodes certainly suggests that they weren't going to leave the airwaves without raising a ruckus. How else to explain such hit-the-brakes storylines as "The Trial," which has Titus's mother (played in this season by Connie Stevens) facing a jury for the murder of her abusive husband (with former spouse Ken Titus, played by the consistently uproarious Stacey Keach, itching to testify against her), or the verboten romance between Tommy (David Shawtraw) and Titus's pregnant sister (Elizabeth Berkely) in "Tommy's Crush," or the two-parter "Insanity Genetic," where Titus's fears that his family's instability might threaten his relationship with Erin (Lost's Cynthia Watros) land him in jail. The episodes compiled in this set are raw, occasionally taboo, and definitely not TV Family Night material (although maybe they should be), but series fans and those looking for comedy with some emotional bite will appreciate that this underappreciated series has finally made it to DVD. The set includes commentary by Titus and co-producers Brian Hargrove and Jack Kenney, and interviews with Keach, Watros, and Zack Ward, who played Titus's brother Dave. --Paul Gaita

This half-hour comedy chronicles the hilarious world of Christopher Titus and his totally messed-up poor white trash family. Between his drunken father, his dimwitted brother, and his goody-goody best friend, it's amazing Titus is alive, let alone engaged to a "normal" girl.

The Drew Carey Show - The Complete First Season

Studio: Warner Home Video Release Date: 04/24/2007 Run time: 489 minutes

After the release of a six-episode Television Favorites sampler, The Drew Carey Show has earned a well-deserved promotion, DVD-wise, with this complete first-season set. Few television workplace comedies so keenly or hilariously captured the mind-numbing drudgery and soul-crushing despair of cubicle culture as The Drew Carey Show, a kindred spirit to the "Dilbert" comic strip. The pilot episode introduces the bespectacled, buzz-coiffed Everyman, a "go-getter" in his seventh year as the assistant director of personnel in a Cleveland department store, a position, he notes, "of indirect respect and oblique power." The giddy delights of The Drew Carey Show are many, from the smile-inducing theme song, "Moon Over Parma" ("We're going bowlin' / So don't lose her in Solin") to one of TV's most likeable ensembles: Ryan Stiles as goofy Lewis (or, as Jason Alexander joked on Comedy Central's Drew Carey roast, "Kramer-lite"), Diedrich Bader as Oswald (less of a doofus here than in later seasons), Christa Miller as tomboyish Kate, Drew's lifelong platonic friend and unrequited crush, Kathy Kinney as Mimi, Drew's office nemesis, who is Bluto to his Popeye. The appealing Katy Selverstone is also featured as Lisa, with whom Drew has a secret inter-office romance that will last but this one season.

After the enormously telegenic Friends cast, Drew and company are "a cold little splash of reality," portraying relatable, regular people. In this first season, the series is still finding its feet (enjoy them while you can: Drew's hillbilly neighbors, and the voice of Kevin Pollack as Drew's abusive boss, Mr. Bell). But by season's end, as guest star Jamie Lee Curtis (as Drew's hard-partying barber) polkas with Mimi in the hilarious episode "Playing the Unified Field," the series has established its spontaneous, off-center niche. While there are no episode commentaries, this set puts in some valuable overtime with "Life Inside a Cubicle," a retrospective in which cast and series creators reflect on the series' rocky beginnings. --Donald Liebenson

Taxi - The Complete Second Season

Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 09/16/2008

Taxi - Seasons 1-3

No Description Available
No Track Information Available
Media Type: DVD
Artist: TAXI
Title: SEASONS 1-3
Street Release Date: 09/13/2005
Domestic
Genre: TELEVISION

Taxi - The Complete Third Season

From the melancholy opening notes of the theme song, Taxi promised to be a different kind of sitcom, epitomized by the show's central character, Alex Reiger (Judd Hirsch, Ordinary People): down to earth and compassionate, with neuroses that smacked of real life and not the forced zaniness of too many television shows. Alex was the conscience and emotional caretaker of a makeshift family of cab drivers working out of a grungy garage in New York City, run by the domineering Louis De Palma (Danny DeVito, who would go on to be a bigger star than the rest of the cast in movies like Get Shorty and Batman Returns). Taxi didn't always maintain a degree of realism--if you haven't seen it in a long time, you may be surprised by some of the cornier jokes and bits of slapstick--but at its best, the show managed to merge sadness and humor into rich and satisfying stories.

The third season has many standout episodes. Alex learns that his daughter is getting married but hasn't invited him to the wedding, which leads to a surprisingly sparky confrontation with his ex-wife (guest start Louise Lasser, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman). When single mom Elaine (Marilu Henner) is embarrassed by meeting a more successful high-school friend in her cab, she lies to save face and Alex steps in to back her up. Aspiring boxer Tony (Tony Danza, Who's the Boss?) can't decide how to tell Elaine that her new boyfriend made a pass at him. Tony's sister (guest star Julie Kavner, the voice of Marge on The Simpsons) falls in love with the addled but affable Jim (Christopher Lloyd, Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit), much to Tony's dismay. Also crucial to the show's success was the oddball presence of Andy Kaufman, whose quirky, unspecifically-Eastern-European mechanic Latka Gravas sometimes made an awkward fit with the rest of the ensemble. But even at his most eccentric, Kaufman was always weirdly watchable, especially in his bizarre, season-closing transformation into the loungy Vic Ferrari. All in all, the third season is an excellent sampling of this sterling sitcom. Sadly, there are no commentaries or other extras. --Bret Fetzer

Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 09/13/2005

The Drew Carey Show (Television Favorites Compilation)

Studio: Warner Home Video Release Date: 02/28/2006 Rating: Nr

It's a five o'clock world, and before it was unceremoniously pink-slipped in 2004, few television workplace comedies so keenly or hilariously captured the mind-numbing drudgery and soul-crushing despair of cubicle culture as The Drew Carey Show. This representative collection samples six episodes spanning the 1995 series' first four seasons. The pilot introduces the bespectacled, buzz-coiffed Everyman who works as the assistant director of personnel in a Cleveland department store, a position, he notes, "of indirect respect and oblique power." Misery loves company, and the company Drew kept formed one of TV's most amiable ensembles, including Ryan Stiles as Lewis (or, as Jason Alexander joked on Comedy Central's Drew Carey roast, "Kramer-lite"), Diedrich Bader as goofus Oswald, Christa Miller as Kate, Drew's lifelong platonic friend and unrequited crush, Kathy Kinney as Drew's office nemesis, Mimi. Craig Ferguson later joined the cast as Mr. Wick, Drew's pink slip-happy boss. "Playing the Unified Field" features a smoldering Jamie Lee Curtis as Drew's barber, a hard-partying danger-seeker who agrees to go out with Drew ("Don't bore me"). "We'll Always Remember Evaluation Day" finds Drew torn between his job and his secret girlfriend, a fellow employee (the enormously appealing Katy Selverstone). "Drew Blows His Promotion," the highlight of the collection, culminates in a practical joke that literally backfires in a symphony of flatulence. "My Best Friend's Wedding," the climax of season 3's Oswald-Kate story arc, would be best appreciated in a complete-season set. "DrugCo," with the monkapotamus (not to mention Charles Nelson Reilly), is one of the series' most bizarre episodes.

The Drew Carey Show was distinguished by its spontaneous, off-center sense of humor, exemplified by such throwaway bits of business as Ferguson's Sean Connery and Michael Caine impressions in "Promotion," and the wholly unexpected blockbuster production numbers ("Five O'Clock World" and "Cleveland Rocks") that became the series' signature. One could quibble with the episode selection here, but it's great to have Drew back on the job, or at least on DVD. --Donald Liebenson

House of Cards

When Ruth Matthews finds that her young daughter has withdrawn from reality, she and a well-meaning doctor struggle to come to the aid of the child. But when conventional science appears unable to reach the little girl, Ruth embarks on a journey within herself to unlock the mysteries that hold her daughter captive in this passionate and heartrending tale of a mother's love - and a family's determination to heal. Kathleen Turner, Tommy Lee Jones

House of Cards [Region 2]