DVD Zone: August
THE BILL COSBY SHOW: SEASON ONE
Shout! Factory
We all grew up with “The Cosby Show,” whether in its first run or in its ad nauseum syndicated repeats. The show was almost the perfect sitcom, and earned its place in the television hall of fame with its blend of characters you wanted to spend a half hour every week and genuinely side-splitting moments that came at a rate too numerous to count for a while. Bill Cosby made it all look so easy. More importantly than having a dead-on understanding of everyday family life, Cosby had a dead-on understanding of the medium of television.
Yet, as is the case with every successful performer, that kind of media savvy doesn’t come overnight. In most cases, there’s an extensive trial and error period.
A lot of people don’t even remember Cosby had done a sitcom before, but Shout Factory has released his first one. “The Bill Cosby Show” only aired for two seasons on NBC, and quite frankly it doesn’t stand the test of time.
Cosby plays Chet Kincaid, a Los Angeles high school gym teacher who, following the standard sitcom formula, finds himself dealing with events that inevitably spin out of control. Sure, there’s plenty of the trademark Cosby wit, but the show doesn’t have the quality ensemble of the later “Cosby Show.”
Instead, the episodes play like a small portion of his standup act expanded to fill a half-hour time slot. There are flashes of what we would see in later years, and the series marks his first collaboration with Quincy Jones, who did the show’s title theme as he would do in the future with “The Cosby Show.” The show also features some high-powered guest stars, such as Henry Fonda, Elsa Lanchester, and Cicely Tyson, as well as star of the future Louis Gossett Jr.
For bringing a legendary TV personality’s little-known early work back into the public eye, you would think Shout! Factory would have taken the effort to spruce it up a bit, but that’s hardly the case. The set only has a new interview with Cosby as a “special feature,” and the sound quality is downright dismal. The audio is so muddled at times that you can’t even make it out.
In a stellar comic career, “The Bill Cosby Show” is a mere footnote. But hey, we always have “Fat Albert” to fall back on.
Show: **1/2
Features: *
PINK FLOYD:
London 1966/1967
Snapper
With the passing of Pink Floyd founder Syd Barrett, the recently released Pink Floyd: London 1966/67 might seem like a good resource to find out more about the enigmatic guitarist. It’s not.
For one thing, there’s nothing new here. It’s been available to die-hard Floyd fans for years. All it is is a repackaging and renaming of Peter Whitehead’s 1967 film, Tonight Let’s All Make Love In London. And newcomers hoping for insight will find nothing of interest either.
The film consists of early Floyd jams “Interstellar Overdrive” and “Nick’s Boogie” set to Whitehead’s psychodelic camera work, with occasional shots of Floyd noodling in the studio and occasionally on stage. No interviews with the band are included, and the music itself isn’t interesting enough to maintain attention.
As far as the special features, all they’ve done is cut the actual interviews included in the original film and set them aside to be viewed separately. Late ’60s in-crowders such as Mick Jagger, Michael Caine, and Julie Christie get to pontificate on how groovy it is to be alive and in swingin’ London. You expect Austin Powers to show up at any moment.
I would say London 1966/1967 is for fans only, but the fans probably already have it, and have long forgotten it.
Film: *1/2
Features: *1/2
Also Available . . . The Film Noir Classic Collection: Vol. 3 (Warner Home Video) includes five overlooked classics such as Border Incident, Lady In The Lake, and On Dangerous Ground, as well as such noted directors as Anthony Mann and Nicholas Ray. The set also includes a bonus disc with a documentary called Film Noir: Bringing Darkness To Light, and some vintage short films.
— Timothy Hiatt
