Asher, William

Bewitched - The Complete Sixth Season

The magic on Morning Glory Circle continues as Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) Darrin (Dick Sargent) and Endora (Agnes Moorehead) return in Bewitched - The Complete Sixth Season. Notable for being Dick Sargent's first season as Darrin. Samantha a powerful member of the society of witches that has lived apart from (and disdained) humanity for many centuries falls in love with a mortal Darrin Stephens. Much to the disgust of most of her family she vows to give up witchcraft and become an ordinary suburban housewife raising a family (bearing Tabitha and Adam). Never able to give up her heritage completely the friction between the matriarchal moneyless society of her birth and the patriarchal capitalist society of modern advertising drives the comedy over eight seasons and 256 episodes from 1964 to 1971.System Requirements:Running Time: 760 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS UPC: 043396246973 Manufacturer No: 24697

Yes, yes, we've heard it before: Bewitched jumped the broom in season six when Dick Sargent replaced Dick York as Darrin Stevens, the most infamous cast switcheroo in TV history. But if you don't purchase this set, be advised that you will miss what Quentin Tarantino, when he hosted Saturday Night Live, proclaimed to be "the single greatest moment in television history": Serena's rendition of "I'll Blow You a Kiss in the Wind" in the episode "Serena Stops the Show." Beyond that, this season shows there was still plenty of magic left in this supernatural series. Over the course of the first five seasons, Bewitched replaced Louise Tates and Gladys Kravitzes, so why not Darrin? Besides, Sargent was originally tapped to star as Darrin (but he was contractually bound elsewhere). However, Marion Lorne, who won an Emmy as endearingly addled Aunt Clara, was irreplaceable. So when she passed away, a new character was introduced this season; Esmeralda (Alice Ghostley), a shy witch whose lack of self confidence caused her to fade when she got nervous, and whose good-intentioned spells invariably backfired. If this season suffers from anything, it's more a sense of been there, twitched that. There is yet another Halloween episode that battles the "ugly witch" stereotype, and several in which a spell gone awry is explained away as a concept for one of Darrin's ad campaigns (why else would there be a unicorn in the Stevens' backyard in the episode, "Samantha's Yoo-Hoo Maid"). And Endora (Agnes Moorehead) continues to cast embarrassing spells on Darrin, like transforming him into a yes-man in "You're So Agreeable," or compelling him to speak in nothing but clichés in "The Phrase is Familiar." But the writers did conjure up some fresh situations. In a two-parter, Darrin's newfound magic powers go to his head. In "Samantha's Secret is Discovered," Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) finally reveals to her mother-in-law (Mabel Albertson) that she is "a cauldron-stirring, card-carrying" witch. And this season, Samantha gives birth to warlock infant Adam. The adorable Erin Murphy, as daughter Tabitha, gives the show some added kid appeal with her misguided uses of her budding powers. In the season opener, she switches places with Jack (Family Affair's Johnny Whitaker) to climb the beanstalk and confront the Giant. In another episode, she creates a double of Samantha so she can go to the park. In addition to Montgomery's groovy dual role as Serena, this season offers the always-welcome return of Paul Lynde as practical joker and insult zinger Uncle Arthur and Bernard Fox as the cantankerous and contemptuous Dr. Bombay. This set's extras are limited to two random "minisodes" of The Partridge Family and I Dream of Jeannie. --Donald Liebenson

Bewitched - The Complete Fifth Season

Elizabeth Montgomery plays Samantha a witch who trades in her magical powers for marriage--or tries to anyway--in this classic sitcom from the 1960s. A witch who inherited her powers from her feisty mother Endora (Agnes Moorhead) Samantha agrees not to use her powers anymore when she decides to marry mere mortal Darrin Stephens (Dick York)--both of which actions disappoint her mother greatly. Not to worry though because most of the time Samantha just can't help herself using her magic and creating many a hilariously sticky situation for Darrin especially with his boss Larry Tate (David White). This release includes the fifth season in its entirety including episodes where Endora gives Darrin the world's biggest ego Uncle Arthur (Paul Lynde) transports Napoleon into the future and Samantha goes back in time to the streets of New Orleans in 1868.System Requirements:Running Time: 638 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 043396195097 Manufacturer No: 19509

Bewitched: The Complete First Season

My stars! The first, and perhaps most magical, season of Bewitched still casts an enchanting spell. For escapist fantasy, this series, no doubt inspired by the play Bell, Book and Candle, broke significant television ground. The Stephens were sitcoms' first mixed marriage. Advertising executive Darrin Stephens (Dick York) was mortal, and wife Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) was a witch. According to a retrospective segment included on this four-disc set, the Stephenses were also the first couple to sleep in one bed! And Samantha's mother, Endora (the venerable Agnes Morehead), and father, Maurice (Maurice Evans, most popularly known as Dr. Zaius in the original Planet of the Apes, were TV's first separated couple. Surely, Darrin did for advertising what Dick Van Dyke's Rob Petrie did for comedy writing. And nose-twitching Samantha certainly gave Mary Tyler Moore's Laura Petrie a run for the money in the sexy suburbanite sweepstakes. This high-concept series' saving grace was that Darrin insisted that Samantha not engage in any "hocus-pocus." But in this first season, she would be compelled to use her extraordinary powers to right social wrongs (such as derogatory-witch stereotypes in the Halloween episode "The Witches Are Out"), champion the underdog (a lonely boy whose overprotective mother won't let him play baseball in "Little Pitchers Have Big Fears"), or to restore a troubled boy's Christmas spirit ("A Vision of Sugar Plums"). Or, she might just want to turn the tables on an insulting former girlfriend of Darrin's (the pilot, "Darrin, Take This Witch, Samantha").

York and Montgomery had palpable chemistry. They also received able support by a stellar ensemble of character actors. Alice Pearce and Marion Lorne would earn Emmys for their signature roles as busybody neighbor Mrs. Kravitz and dotty Aunt Clara, respectively. George Tobias portrayed oblivious. long-suffering Abner Kravitz, with David White as Darrin's boss, Larry Tate. In today's more PC climate, Bewitched may offend the "ban Harry Potter" crowd. But for baby boomers especially, this inaugural set will happily conjure up vintage television memories. --Donald Liebenson

Elizabeth Montgomery stars as Samantha Stephens a pretty typical American housewife who just happens to be a witch in this beloved comedy classic. Included in this magical DVD collection is the Emmy ® Award-winning series entire first season- 36 episodes that introduce one of the funniest ensemble casts in TV history: Dick York as Samantha s mortal husband Darrin Agnes Moorehead as his witch-of- a-mother-in-law Endora Alice Pearce as nosey neighbor Gladys Kravitz George Tobias as her oblivious husband Abner and Marion Lorne as dotty Aunt Clara. Join them and a who s who of 60s pop icon guest stars- Adam West Raquel Welch Peggy Lipton and Arte Johnson- in this enchanting charming and hysterically funny look at the suburban lifestyles of the witch and famous.System Requirements:Starring: Elizabeth Montgomery Dick York Agnes Moorehead David White Alice Pearce George Tobias Marion Lorne Running Time: 917 Min. Copyright Sony Pictures Home Entertainment 2005Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/CLASSICS Rating: NR UPC: 043396110366 Manufacturer No: 11036

The Dukes of Hazzard - The Complete First Season

The Dukes of Hazzard was part of America's redneck fetish in the mid-to-late 1970s, otherwise evident in popular songs, movies, and television shows highlighting fast cars, truckers, citizens' band radio, moonshine, irreverent hicks, and clueless lawmen. Created by writer-producer Gy Waldron and inspired by his own 1975 bootlegging comedy, Moonrunners, Dukes milked seven seasons of material from the tale of a Deep South family of reformed whiskey-makers and their running feud with a greedy impresario and his chief lackey, a buffoonish, venal sheriff.

This three-disc set includes all 13 initial episodes of Dukes from 1979, a period fans fondly recall because some of the programs were shot on location in Covington, Georgia, rather than a Burbank backlot. Also noteworthy is that a couple of key characters, particularly Hazzard County's corrupt lawman, Roscoe P. Coltrane (James Best), hadn't gelled yet into permanent hayseed stereotypes and were arguably more interesting at the beginning. At the center of the action is Sheriff Coltrane's nemeses, cousins Bo Duke (John Schneider) and Luke Duke (Tom Wopat), a couple of wild boys buzzing through the backwoods in the "General Lee," a souped-up Dodge Charger. Bo and Luke are good at heart but have to behave themselves while on indefinite probation, complicating but not halting their efforts to vex Roscoe and his patron, diminutive bigwig Boss Hogg (Sorrell Booke). The enmity runs both ways: Roscoe and Boss Hogg, with the aid of witless Deputy Enos Strate (Sonny Shroyer), dream up ways of eliminating the Dukes--including their wise old Uncle Jesse (Denver Pyle)--but their efforts always backfire.

While every episode is a variation on the previous one, predictability is a virtue in Dukes. The series pilot, "One Armed Bandits," finds Luke and Bo, with help from their sexy cousin, Daisy (Catherine Bach), diverting slot machines (smuggled into Hazzard County by Roscoe and Boss Hogg) to sundry watering holes where they can raise money for Bo's girlfriend's charity. In "Money to Burn," Boss Hogg tries to frame Bo and Luke for robbing an armored truck, while in "Deputy Dukes," the unarmed guys are forced by Roscoe to escort a deadly prisoner from one town to another. The Dukes hit back in "Daisy's Song," investigating a scam that took Daisy for $50 and implicates, of course, Boss Hogg and Roscoe.

Yes, it's a show about rubes, car stunts, and a legacy of moonshine, but there's something comforting about it, in a tongue-in-cheek way. --Tom Keogh

Join Luke and Bo Duke--a couple of good old boys--and their cousin Daisy Duke as they stay just ahead of the sheriff in their souped-up 1969 Dodge Charger The General Lee and have fun thwarting the plots of the corrupt county boss.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS UPC: 085393226428 Manufacturer No: 32264

The Dukes of Hazzard - The Complete Second Season

The Dukes of Hazzard settled into a comfortable run in season 2. The show, originally shot on location in Covington, Georgia, was now permanently produced on a backlot in Burbank, California. While a couple of cast members (Ben Jones, who plays mechanic Cooter Davenport, and James Best, who portrays Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane) briefly boycotted the series in its second year (ushering in a parade of brief replacements, including Mickey Jones of the New Christy Minstrels, Dick Sargent of Bewitched, and James Hampton of F Troop), the actors relaxed into their now thoroughly cartoonish characters.

What else can one say: The General Lee, the souped-up '69, orange Dodge Charger that belongs to cousins Bo (John Schneider) and Luke (Tom Wopat) Duke, has a full tank and is ready to ride. The Duke boys, scions of a proud--though reformed--moonshining family, are still on probation with the law but continue to root out the criminal schemes of diminutive villain Boss Hogg (Sorrell Brooke) and his Wile E. Coyote-like lackey, Sheriff Coltrane. Uncle Jesse (Denver Pyle) is still a fount of grizzled wisdom as well as Boss Hogg's old whiskey-running nemesis. Cousin Daisy (Catherine Bach) still burns up the road with her short-shorts, and Coltrane's deputies Enos (Sonny Shroyer) and Cletus (Rick Hurst) remain idiots with an edge of sympathy. Season 2 highlights include a funny fan favorite called "The Ghost of General Lee" (also co-star Schneider's favorite episode), in which Bo and Luke are assumed to have drowned when their stolen car ends up at the bottom of a pond. Hearing that Boss Hogg plans to blame them anyway for a theft they didn't commit, the Duke boys haunt him and Coltrane with apparitions of the General Lee as a "ghost." NASCAR legend Cale Yarborough makes an appealing guest in a story about the development of a secret turbo charger and Hogg's effort to steal it, while Loretta Lynn turns up as herself in a damsel-in-distress tale, featuring the country superstar as a kidnapped hostage. "Witness for the Persecution" introduces a recurring theme on Dukes: Occasions in which the vile Hogg must be protected from his enemies by hiding out with (gasp) the Dukes. The best of The Complete Second Season, however, may be "Days of Shine and Roses," in which Hogg and Uncle Jesse, after watching a film of their old moonshine-delivery exploits with the Ridge Runners Association, get into an argument about who was best and decide to resolve the question with a grudge race. Special features include Wopat and Schneider's screen tests, and a documentary about the Dukes' 25th anniversary festival in Tennessee, featuring series stars and stunt drivers. --Tom Keogh

No Description Available.
Genre: Feature Film-Action/Adventure
Rating: NR
Release Date: 25-JAN-2005
Media Type: DVD

Bewitched - The Complete Second Season

There's magic in the heir when Samantha and Darrin welcome their new baby, Tabitha, in the second sensational season of BEWITCHED. Starring Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York and Agnes Moorehead, these 38 classic episodes also include a host of famous guest stars including Charlie Ruggles (Bringing Up Baby), Robert Strauss (Stalag 17) and Oscar® winner Richard Dreyfuss (Best Actor, The Goodbye Girl, 1977). Highlighted by the hilarious first appearance of Paul Lynde as Samantha's Uncle Arthur and Alice Pearce's final performance as hysterical neighbor Gladys Kravitz, BEWITCHED: THE COMPLETE SECOND SEASON is an enchanting comedy collection no witch can twitch her nose at.

Bewitched - The Complete Third Season

Welcome back to 1164 Morning Glory Circle for the third magical season of BEWITCHED! Join Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) Darrin (Dick York) and Endora (Agnes Moorehead) as they celebrate three major television events in this spellbinding four-disc DVD collection: the first episodes filmed entirely in color the delightful debut of baby Tabitha's "wishcraft" powers and the first-time Emmy® nominations for Montgomery and Moorehead! Featuring the hysterical return of mischievous Uncle Arthur (Paul Lynde) and the hilarious misadventures of bumbling Aunt Clara (Marion Lorne) BEWITCHED: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON is 33 enchanting episodes of comedy fun and magic!System Requirements:Run Time: 836 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/CLASSICS UPC: 043396136908 Manufacturer No: 13690

The introduction of color takes a bit of the magic out of Bewitched, but adorable toddler Tabitha brings her own special enchantment to this third season, which earned Emmy nominations for Outstanding Comedy Series. Also nominated were Elizabeth Montgomery as sophisticated, albeit domesticated, witch Samantha, Agnes Morehead as her disapproving mother Endora, and Marion Lorne as addled Aunt Clara, whose mis-spellings wreak havoc in the Stephens household, as when she unwittingly conjures up Ben Franklin in "My Friend Ben." As the season begins, "typical average baby" Tabitha reveals her heretofore-dormant supernatural powers. In the next episode, "The Moment of Truth," Darrin (Dick York) is distressed to find out about his daughter. "Remember 'normal'?" he wails to his wife. "We were going to have a normal married life" Though one laments that Serena is missing in action, the return of Bernard Fox as Dr. Bombay (in "There's Gold in Them Thar Pills") and Paul Lynde's practical joker Uncle Arthur are always welcome, even if Arthur's feud with Endora in "Endora Moves in for a Spell" never reaches the comic heights of season 2's "The Joker Is a Card" (the Yagazuzie Zim episode).

Other venerable character actors cast their distinctive spells, including Estelle Winwood ("Hold Me, Touch Me" in the original The Producers) and Reta Shaw (Mary Poppins) as Endora's sisters in "Witches and Warlocks Are My Favorite Things; Marty Ingalls as a rival ad agency spy in "Dangerous Diaper Dan"; Norman "Mr. Roper" Fell as Sigmund Freud(!) in "I'd Rather Twitch Than Fight"; and, in a bizarre cameo, Willie Mays as one of Endora's Halloween party guests in "Twitch or Treat." ("You mean he's a...," Darrin stammers. "The way he hits home runs?" Samantha replies, "What else?"). Sandra Gould, replacing Alice Pearce, joins the cast as busybody neighbor Gladys Kravitz. One of the season's most enjoyable episodes is "A Most Unusual Wood Nymph," which allowed York to break out of his confounded husband character to portray the lusty Darrin the Bold, a cursed 14th-century ancestor. And with the sight of the ravishing Montgomery in a castle-maid costume, who needs extras in this otherwise charmed four-disc set? --Donald Liebenson

The Dukes of Hazzard - The Complete Third Season

Season 3 finds The Dukes of Hazzard coasting on its popular 1980s formula. Cousins Bo (John Schneider) and Luke (Tom Wopat) Duke are still tearing up the road in their '69 orange Dodge Charger, the General Lee, while Boss Hogg (Sorrell Booke) everlastingly tries to frame them for everything from the theft of his cutlery at the Boar's Nest ("The Hazzardville Horror") to the heist of Stonewall Jackson's sword ("Along Came a Duke"). Meanwhile, leggy cousin Daisy (Catherine Bach) adds some dimension to her eye-candy character by becoming a reporter for the Hazzard Gazette ("By-Line, Daisy Duke") and a kidnap victim ("Enos Strate to the Top") whose innocuous photographs of Uncle Jesse (Denver Pyle) in Atlanta happen to capture a couple of bank robbers in action.

The predictability of the show in its third year by no means makes the series, created by writer-producer Gy Waldron (Moonrunners), anything less than shameless, tongue-in-cheek fun. Booke's cartoonish villain remains an outlandish self-caricature, chortling over every (doomed) opportunity to nail the Dukes and/or take Uncle Jesse's farm through a crooked boxing match ("And in This Corner, Luke Duke"), a bank robbery set up (by Hogg) to appear that Bo and Luke pulled off the crime during the wedding of Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane (James Best, in "Mrs. Rosco P. Coltrane"), and even by pretending to be amnesia victim Bo's father ("My Son, Bo Hogg"). After some cast uncertainty in season 2 (boycotts, etc.), things have mostly settled down and Booke's popularity is obviously in ascendance at this point in the show. Special features here include a special welcome by Schneider, Wopat, and Bach, and on-camera commentary by the same trio. --Tom Keogh

Get revved up and ready to go in 2005! Following the phenomenal success of Dukes of Hazzard Seasons One and Two on DVD Warner Home Video will release Season Three on May 31st complete with a FREE Movie Ticket* to the theatrical release starring Jessica Simpson Sean William Scott Johnny Knoxville Burt Reynolds Willie Nelson and more! With the #1 performing Action-Adventure classic TV series on DVD the much-anticipated theatrical release and the return of series to cable TV 'The Year of The Duke Boys' is here! Season Three contains 23 action-packed episodes in a 4-disc collector's set! * In initial ship units only.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS UPC: 012569691674 Manufacturer No: 69167

The Dukes of Hazzard - The Complete Seventh Season

The Duke Family -- cousins Bo and Luke assisted by their cousin Daisy and their uncle Jesse- fight the system and root out the corrupt practices of Hazzard County Commissioner Boss Hogg and his bumbling brother-in-law-Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane. The down home antics continue in the seventh and final season of this good ol boy TV series!Running Time: 822 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS UPC: 012569815490 Manufacturer No: 81549

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