Beverly Hillbillies S2 (1 Viewer)

[Carabimero]

Got my set today with the lovely gray-faced discs you can't read without direct light on them. On the plus side, I got out my magnifying glass so I could read the episode guide insert and it looks like there are some great episodes in this set.

I got this used; am I correct in assuming that this cancels out a sale off CBS/Paramount's records?

PS - I got the new Indy movie and it's not grayed out--the disc has color art, thank God. So it's not a mandate across the board.

 

[DeWilson]

You won't see many studios leave the commercials in shows like this. Legally every single one of them has to be cleared - even if the company no longer exists but somebody still owns the brand..

Guess the studios never heard of "Fair Use"

 

[David Levine]

Guess the studios never heard of "Fair Use"

They have, but it doesn't apply. If the commercials are owned by somebody (or if they use a song that's owned by somebody), it's a lawsuit you aren't going to win.
Companies are very protective of their brands. There are many, many companies that have people on the payroll that only look for unauthorized use of their product - whether its running a commercial or their trademark appears in a background or an unauthorized product placement, whatever.
That's why you'll generally only find some of the smaller or PD companies risk it. They are either small enough to fly under the radar, or they aren't worth the time/money to go after.
It's too bad. We've had to remove some GREAT commercials from some of our Game Show releases for that very reason.
A 2nd example. We really wanted to include all the old He-Man toy commercials on the DVDs. We had access to the commercials, and Mattel had no problem with the *idea*, but none of the music or talent from 30 years ago were cleared for this usage, and it turned out we were looking at 10,000-25,000 dollars FOR EACH COMMERCIAL for clearances.
The only exception that I'm aware of is if a company sponsored an episode and that was built into the program - like having the Kellogs logo beneath the panelists on To Tell the Truth, for example.

 

[David Rain]

Unless -- in the hills, intermarriage might be common, and maybe Jed's wife was his cousin. They might have been implying that without coming right out and saying so.

I don't think Jed and his late wife were cousins. I believe in one episode Jed describes meeting her and wanting to marry her. I think her name is Rose Ellen. Granny's real name is Daisy Moses but it's never clear if that's her married or maiden name. She sometimes talks about having come from the Moses family which makes me think that's the name of her original family and not her married name. Granny mentions her own grandmother once in a while but seems to never talk about her late husband / Rose Ellen's father.
Apparently Jed & Granny's families knew each other from a long time before. In one episode, Granny says she helped raise Pearl but there never seems to be any explanation about the rest of Pearl's family including her clearly dead husband. Pearl disappears after the first season so there was no real reason to bring it up again after that.
Despite being obviously grown Elly May & Jethro are supposed to be mid-to-late teens at least when the show began. Jethro is still in school and Elly May is revealed to never have gone prior to the move to Beverly Hills. Their ages tend to go back and forth for the rest of the series depending on the plot of certain episodes. Perhaps the most amusing example is that Jethro is still being spanked (or threatened with it) long after he's grown.

 

[Corey3rd]

is there really a point in trying to straighten out the family tree? I don't think anyone cared that much on the show to keep it straight. Look at what a mess "The Odd Couple" is. They can't even get the story right on how Felix met Oscar.
Seeing how many CBS DVD titles are wrapping up this winter, I doubt they'll be abandoning the Beverly Hillbillies that fast. Plus it gets cable exposure with TVLand and WGN so they're making new fans instead of merely playing to a paying audience.

 

[Charles Ellis]

You're right, David- Jed's wife was the late Rose Ellen Moses Clampett. Elly May's full name (according to a later color episode) is Elly May Margaret Clampett. Jed and Pearl (Jethro's mom) were first cousins, but Jethro called him "uncle".

 

[DeWilson]

Jed and Pearl (Jethro's mom) were first cousins, but Jethro called him "uncle".

Gee, I always thought Pearl was Jed's sister.

 

[Gary Seven]

They really were confused themselves about that. There are several instances where it's clear the writers think that Granny is Jethro's grandmother -- when, in reality, she's not related to him at all.
Unless -- in the hills, intermarriage might be common, and maybe Jed's wife was his cousin. They might have been implying that without coming right out and saying so.
Another mystery is: Did Jed's late wife -- a woman whose widower husband and bereaved mother and daughter barely ever discuss -- look more like her mother or her daughter? There's quite a difference there!

In South America, your parent's cousin is considered your uncle/aunt...not sure about other parts of the world. Perhaps it's the same in the "hills".
Following that reason, then Granny would be Jethro's great aunt.
In any event, Jethro is related to Jed via his cousin Pearl, just a matter of what label to place.... cousin or uncle.
BTW, I assume the whole clan refers to Granny as "Granny" since she appears to be the clan's matriarch.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

Granny isn't Jethro's grandmother, great aunt or anything -- Jethro is related to Jed, and Granny is Jed's mother-in-law, not mother. (Unless, as I said before, we're supposed to understand that everyone in the hills is related to everyone else because they're all cousins.)
I, too, always thought that Pearl was Jed's sister, not cousin (although, if their parents were cousins, they could be both!) I have a vague memory that he referred to her as his sister early in the series, but I wouldn't swear to it.
I don't lay awake nights worrying about these things, but I always think it's fun to think about them.

 

[Carabimero]

The episode GRANNY'S GARDEN (I think that's the title, on disc one) had some jarring in's and out's to black...the episode seemed complete, though. Does anyone know what's up with that.

 

[David Rain]

It's hard to know on these eps just what's complete and unedited. The show has been so badly butchered in syndie for decades that it's hard to know whether scene fades or commercial breaks are the way they originally aired or were created for syndie eps.

 

[AndyMcKinney]

It's hard to know on these eps just what's complete and unedited. The show has been so badly butchered in syndie for decades that it's hard to know whether scene fades or commercial breaks are the way they originally aired or were created for syndie eps.

All of the real commercial breaks for this series have a brief music cue prior to the fade, though, don't they?

 

[Tim Tucker]

The episode GRANNY'S GARDEN (I think that's the title, on disc one) had some jarring in's and out's to black...the episode seemed complete, though. Does anyone know what's up with that.

Since this is one of the episodes MPI released, I checked it last night. There only appears to be one fade to black during the episode, right after Jethro puts Granny in Miss Hathaway's car and they all drive off.

 

[Carabimero]

Yes, why is it cut that way, is my question. It doesn't seem like all the episode is there.

 

[EdG]

Is it possible that the episode never had any commercial interruptions when

it originally aired? On the new set with the sponsor spot added in the show

clocks in at 29:05 and the other episodes with sponsor spots that I have watched so far clock in at 26-27 minutes. I might be wrong but it sounds to me that the music continues to play and does not stop during the fadeout on the MPI set. I remember watching the sponsor spot for this episode on the MPI set in the extras and thinking it was long.

 

[Carabimero]

Yeah, it's wierd because it doesn't feel like anything is missing content wise, but when those cuts happen, I feel like something was snipped.

 

[cajunhillbilly]

I believe that commercial breaks were usually less than a minute back in the 60s with only one or two 15-30 second commercials.

 

[darkrock17]

Where is The "Offical" First Season?

 

[Malcolm R]

" First Season?

Read the thread. It's been discussed.

 

[Craig Byrne]

I know it's incredibly nitpicky but I noticed an annoying mistake on the spine - the spine of the DVD reads "The Beverly Hillbilles." (Note the missing "i"). With all of the effort made to make a good set, couldn't the DVD packaging have gone through quality control?