Color 'Honeymooners' tops new DVDs

A new "Honeymooners" collection, starring Jackie Gleason and Art Carney, is among TV shows scheduled for DVD release on Tuesday — hourlong color broadcasts that aired in the late 1960s.

• "The Color Honeymooners, Starring Jackie Gleason: Collection 1" (MPI, 1966-70, not rated, $39.98, three discs). One of the great comedy teams of television was born when Art Carney became Jackie Gleason's second banana in 1950 on the variety show "Cavalcade of Stars." And especially when they demonstrated their amazing chemistry in the first "Honeymooners" skit a year later, with Gleason as hapless Brooklyn bus driver Ralph Kramden and Carney as his neighbor and best friend, sewer-worker Ed Norton — characters they would play together on and off over the next two decades in Gleason's various musical-comedy series.

In 1964, Gleason's show was relocated from New York to Miami, and in 1966, after a nine-year absence, Carney rejoined him and "The Honeymooners" returned. Each week, the color variety "Jackie Gleason Show" was performed live before an audience on a theater stage, just like a stage production; if there was a goof, it stayed in. And from 1966 through 1970, half were devoted to full-hour "Honeymooners" shows, often as musicals with comic songs.

The bulk of this set is a multi-episode trip to Europe, which Norton wins in a cereal-slogan contest, with Sheila MacRae and Jane Keane as their wives. The shows are perhaps a bit old-fashioned, but the old chemistry is still there, and the Gleason/Carney team is still hysterical.

Extras: Full frame, nine episodes, featurette, optional English subtitles, chapters.

• "Commander in Chief: Inaugural Edition, Part 1" (Touchstone, 2005-06, not rated, $37.99, two discs). Geena Davis is well-cast as the first woman president, and the first few shows are good, but it rapidly deteriorated in quality, leading to its cancellation after only 18 episodes.

Extras: Widescreen, 10 episodes, chapters.

• "Family Affair: Season 1" (MPI, 1966-67, not rated, $39.98, five discs). This amusing half-hour family sitcom benefits greatly from the presence of a pair of savvy and charming veterans, Brian Keith, as a swinging well-to-do bachelor in Manhattan, and his faithful manservant, played by Sebastian Cabot. Turning their lives upside-down are three newly orphaned children . . . and you can guess the rest. Among the kids is local favorite Johnnie Whitaker.

Extras: Full frame, 30 episodes, making-of featurette, chapters.