October 1, 1955…”The Honeymooners” Debuts, Setting The Record Straight…

October 1, 1955…”The Honeymooners” Debuts On CBS

Setting The Record Straight On “The Honeymooners”

Above is a great shot of the cast and writers going over a script at Jackie Gleason’s office.

Today is the anniversary of The Classic 39 “Honeymooners” episodes done on film for the 1955-56 season on CBS. but the younger generation may not know, those characters were not new.

Actually, “The Honeymooners” live sketches began October 5, 1951 on Dumont’s “Cavalcade Of Stars” which Gleason began hosting in June of that year. That first sketch was six minutes long, but often, on that one hour show, they went as long as 45 minutes. These sketches continued into the late 60s.

When Gleason moved to CBS in the fall of 1951, they called Studio 50 (Ed Sullivan Theater) home, and the sketches continued on the new “Jackie Gleason Show”. It was the top show for CBS, but after a few years, Jackie needed a break from the grind of a live one hour show every week, so they decided to do a season of Honeymooners on film, which was done at Dumont’s Adelphi Theater a few blocks away.

About a third of the way through the 39 episode, Gleason began to rethink this half hour film idea. To him, 30 minutes was often not enough time to develop the story, and Perry Como’s one hour show on NBC was tough competition for a half hour show. The last show aired on September 22, 1956, and one week later, the live one hour “Jackie Gleason Show” came back to blockbuster ratings for another year, with the Honeymooners sketches included. And Away We Go! -Bobby Ellerbee

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