Even though The Honeymooners was made a few years before I was born, it became part of the lexicon through the sheer number of repeats. Remarkable considering there were only 39 episodes circulating. So classic were those "classic 39", they were shown and shown again.Gleason revealed in the early 1980s that he had many more in storage. These were the kinescoped ones. (A kinescope is a film camera pointing and filming off of a special television monitor. While not finest of quality, this process was the only way to record anything off of a television system. Ampex introduced the first video tape recorder back in 1956 and they were snapped up in quantity.)
The Honeymooner 'kines' were not as good in technical or picture quality as the "filmed 39", but they were sorely needed to expand the show's library of episodes.
The entire Honeymooner cast -- Art Carney, Joyce Randolph, and Audrey Meadows -- was outstanding, but Gleason was the character. A blowhard, Ralph Kramden was always scheming, generally to make things better for him and his put upon wife, but usually amounting to futility at the end of the day... or episode. (Sounds like Fred Flintstone.)
As the moment I am reading "The Life and Legend of Jackie Gleason", by the late Pulitzer Prize winning author, William A. Henry III.
The book is very interesting. Big surprise.
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