Christmas With Danny Kaye

Two Happy Holiday Episodes of The Danny Kaye Show
I just got this two episode DVD of THE DANNY KAYE SHOW--Christmas episodes from 1963 (the first season) and 1966 (the fourth and final season). What a joy! I really enjoyed watching them. I will watch them again with my family at Christmas. If you love classic TV variety shows (as I do) you will really enjoy this.

Episode One: December 25, 1963 (glorious black & white)

Guest Stars: Nat King Cole & Mary Tyler Moore, The Clinger Sisters
Opening...Danny
Opening Dance Routine
'Comes Once in a Lifetime' (song)...Danny
Danny Introduces Mary Tyler Moore
Sketch--Danny & Mary as husband & wife 'The Night Before Christmas'
Mary Tyler Moore song & dance routine (playing a silent screen siren)
Danny introduces Nat King Cole
"Get Me to Church on Time" (song from My Fair Lady)...Nat King Cole
"The Christmas Song" (aka Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)...Nat King Cole
banter between Danny & Nat
'Jingle Bells'/'Jingle...

Danny Kaye - the "total entertainer". When variety show ruled!
Danny Kaye was an American icon - though, sadly, unknown to today's TV and movie generation. He was not only a great movie actor (who over, 60 didn't grow up thinking Has Christian Andersen looked exactly like Kaye?) and comedian, but he was one of early television's top entertainers. He could sing, dance, do comedy sketches and pronounce some of the must difficult languages - including some he actually made up! And, I'm not even mentioning all the children's charity work he did for the United Nations. He was - like jazz legend Louis Armstrong (who co-starred with Kaye in the film "The Five Pennies") - a real Ambassador!

In the 1960s Kaye had a TV variety show - a genre that really no longer exists - and luckily he was able to preserve the videotapes. They are now owned - as far as I know - by his only child, Dena and this is what I certainly hope is the first in a series of DVD releases. 2012 marks the Kaye Centenary and, just in time for Christmas comes the DVD with two...

A Danny Kaye, Harvey Korman & Jamie Farr Christmas! But 7 minutes cut from episode 2.
I was pleasantly surprised to see Harvey Korman & Jamie Farr as regulars. I have not seen this show since it's original broadcasts and didn't remember these two talents being a part of the show.
And seeing a "Dick Van Dyke Show" aged Mary Tyler Moore outside of that show brought me back to 1963. I'm not used to seeing her at that young age outside of the D.V.D. show.

What makes these shows pleasant is that everyone seems to be having fun, especially when Jamie Farr gets accidentally tied to a chair and can't get loose!

SHOW #1 Episode #1.14 Dec. 25, 1963 (B&W - 51 minutes) The video quality of the first show is as good as the old B&W video cameras can give. It seems to be mastered from the original video tape and not a 16mm film kinescope. The image is sharp, however there are dark halos around any bright objects creating a kind of solar-eclipse effect. The audio is clear as it is important to hear the clarity of the songs.

Danny welcomes...

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