THE GOLDEN GIRLS: Season One - November 23rd, 2004 (2 Viewers)

[David Williams]

Each Lifetime episode is missing somewhere between 2 and 3 minutes from the original broadcast. Sometimes the cut isn't noticeable, other times it's very obvious. One of the tricks they use to cut down on cutting the actual content of the episodes is to redo the end credits in super speed mode and shorten the main credits (omitting the lines "And if you threw a party/invited everyone you knew/you would see the biggest gift would be from me/and the card attached would say"). Season 5, I believe, suffers from the least amount of cuts due to some shows being under time (you'll know which ones are under because Lifetime left the openings intact).

 

[RobertSiegel]

"With all that extra material floating around in the Disney archives, and with the added great sales of season one (it has been on the top 100 at Amazon since it was announced, and has even hit number 1) maybe we'll see more of an effort made for Season 2."

I hope so Andrew, but I guess I am not going to count on it. Seems to me thgis was thrown together very quickly, cover graphics and extras included, but we can hope. Maybe if we all write Buena Vista Home Entertainment and let them know we want to see all those extras in the vault.

My friend who did the research project at UCLA on this show as I stated earlier was allowed to go through the vaults at Buena Vista Television. I just called him and asked him for more information. He was always supervised by the guard (I suppose so no one researching takes anything). He spent a full week there researching this program. He said he was able to view about 60 video tapes, and many of them contained over an hour each of outtakes. Aparently each tape was an episode and within those, during the taping, are all the mistakes and re-taping of the scenes. He was able to copy some of the original scripts that had director and writer notations, and there were some of Bea's personal scripts there as well with notes. He came across costume design sketches, unused scripts that were never filmed (probably rejected), what he said were over 500 photographs on the set, video taped interviews used to originally promote the show (sent out to shows such as Entertainment Weekly), boxes of video trailers used by affiliates, and 3 video tapes of 5 total hours of screen tests including several auditions. One tape he viewed showed about an hour and a half of the director, the stars and writers preparing for an episode. This gives us an idea of what's available for the studios to use on these dvd's, that they choose not to use. One episode script that was never used that he read was about Stan and Dorothy going away for a weekend before they attempted to get remarried, which makes me think the episode (which Dorothy almost marries Stan again) was supposed to be 3 parts. The other part of the story was Blanche attending a policeman's ball with Rose and being embarassed when several of the policemen talk and discover Blanche has had "more than one of them."

It's sad to know this material sits there, and that Buena Vista would not give us an extras disc per set, obviously there's enough to fill an extras disc for all of the sets. So I agree with you Andrew, I hope this changes in further volumes.

 

[Andrew Budgell]

Thank you so much, Robert for giving us a very informative description of what's in the Disney vaults! It makes me sad that they opted to throw in a useless Joan Rivers segment, instead of the wealth of video and text that is very much availible.

Robert, since you said you have worked as a graphic designer in the industry, I would love to know what you would prefer to see for box art! I'm sure it would be much nicer!

Andy

 

[RobertSiegel]

If I had designed that cover, I would have used the group photo taken before the show started, and definately would have chosen a much better typeface for "Golden Girls." I was kind of shocked to see what they did use. There's tons of great publicity shots that were taken when the show started. Also, you're welcome. When I found this thread I called my friend and asked what he found when he did his research project. Aparently he was given the task of completely documenting one tv series and chose Golden Girls. He spent over a month trying to get permission to look at the materials in the vault. He says he's going to send me some photos he copied there of auditions, ect.., I'll post them when that happens.

I have not worked as a graphic artist in the movie or tv industry Andy, but the majority of my work is in theatre and local tv and cinema here in Minneapolis, but even with that said, I still would have done a different cover for this set. That's just me though, some here have said they liked it.

 

[Malcolm R]

The packaging is awful. I can't believe anyone at BV would like it, let alone approve it to represent one of their best loved series. The season two artwork follows the same design.

And Estelle Getty has been ill for a long time. I'm not sure why ET is treating this like some new, exclusive report. You could pretty much tell that Getty was reading from cue cards much of the time.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Just posted my review:

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...hreadid=217832

Please continue some discussion there...the review threads get archived and get studio attention so I encourage folks to post. Robert, I'd especially love for you to share what you have learned about the potential special feature content in that thread (didn't want to take liberties and quote you directly in my review...but would love for you to share your comments in your own post for the other fans and studio visiting that thread to read).

Everyone... I'd love to hear your impressions especially once you get the set.

-dave

 

[RobertSiegel]

Boy, I am angry today. Finally I got through to the guy in Customer service at Buena Vista Home Video, whom I made a report with after the first set was released because it was mono. The response to him from the marketing/tech department is this:

"The Golden Girls were not in stereo. The reason they are on Lifetime is that Lifetime probably altered the mono track to become stereo for the broadcasts.' CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT ONE? This is TRUE stereo on Lifetime, 5 times a day. Horns in the right, audience in the surrounds. I reminded him of the 5th episode on disc 3 on the first set, that switches to full stereo surround for 2 minutes.

To everyone who cares, PLEASE keep sending in complaints. He gave me this address for a letter:

Buena Vista Home Entertainment
PO box 3100
Neenah, WI 54957-3100

also go to:

http://video.movies.go.com/support/home.html

and click on "report a problem." I plan on not buying any more of these sets until they are stereo. It's sad that Buena Vista takes us for fools with this type of response.

 

[RobertSiegel]

Boy, I am angry today. Finally I got through to the guy in Customer service at Buena Vista Home Video, whom I made a report with after the first set was released. The response to him from the marketing/tech department is this:

"The Golden Girls were not in stereo. The reason they are on Lifetime is that Lifetime probably altered the mono track to become stereo for the broadcasts.' CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT ONE? This is TRUE stereo on Lifetime, 5 times a day. Horns in the right, audience in the surrounds. I reminded him of the 5th episode on disc 3 on the first set, that switches to full stereo surround for 2 minutes.

To everyone who cares, PLEASE keep sending in complaints. He gave me this address for a letter:

Buena Vista Home Entertainment
PO box 3100
Neenah, WI 54957-3100

also go to:

http://video.movies.go.com/support/home.html

and click on "report a problem." I plan on not buying any more of these sets until they are stereo. It's sad that Buena Vista takes us for fools with this type of response.