The Month in Home Media highlights short-lived or rare TV shows released on DVD or Blu-ray in the United States during the previous month.
One season wonder Blondie (NBC, 1957) came out on DVD in September. Two volumes of “Television’s Lost Classics” were also released on DVD and Blu-ray last month. Volume One includes two hour-long dramas starring John Cassavetes: “Crime in the Streets” (The Elgin Hour, 1955) and “No Right to Kill” (Climax, 1956). Volume Two includes four unsold pilots: “Case of the Sure Thing” (CBS, 1951) with Reed Hadley; “Cool and Lam” (Unaired, 1958), with Billy Pearson and Benay Venuta; “The Life of Riley” (Unaired, 1948) with Lon Chaney, Jr.; and “Nero Wolfe” (Unaired, 1959) with Kurt Kasznar and William Shatner.
DVD/Blu-ray Releases
Highlight of the Month: Blondie (1957)
Based on the popular and long-running comic strip of the same name, the show starred Arthur Lake as Dagwood and Pamela Britton as Blondie. Lake earlier played Dagwood in a series of 28 films released between 1938 and 1950. The 4-disc set includes all 26 black-and-white episodes, newly transferred from the original 35mm elements.
Support Television Obscurities and purchase Blondie (1957) from Amazon.
Other Releases
–Television’s Lost Classics, Volume One [DVD]
–Television’s Lost Classics, Volume One [Blu-ray]
–Television’s Lost Classics, Volume Two [DVD]
–Television’s Lost Classics, Volume Two [Blu-ray]
–Lucy: The Ultimate Collection [Time Life]*
–Born Free: The Complete Collection
–The Triumphant Hour [Alpha Video]**
–One Step Beyond, Volume 16 [Alpha Video]
–Clutch Cargo, Volume 7 [Alpha Video]
–Cowboy G-Men, Volume 9 [Alpha Video]
–Captain Z-Ro, Volume 6 [Alpha Video]
*Includes four episodes of the short-lived sitcom Life with Lucy.
**This is an episode of the 1950s syndicated, religious anthology series Family Theatre, hosted by Father Patrick Peyton.
News
Something weird is going on with several recent short-lived FOX shows on DVD. LA to Vegas supposedly came out on DVD on August 28th. Best Buy and Barnes & Noble have it for sale but at Amazon it’s only available to pre-order. APB and Shots Fired are both for sale at Barnes & Noble but are sold out at Best Buy. APB is available at Amazon, but only from a third-party seller, while Shots Fired is “Currently unavailable.” These are all manufacture-on-demand titles, so maybe there’s a problem with the FOX MOD program.
Hit the comments with reviews of recently released DVD/Blu-ray sets or news about upcoming releases.
I received my DVD copy of “Blondie” a few days ago. The front cover artwork was autographed by Stuffy Singer.