Romantic sitcoms, more available on DVD

TV series

"Anything But Love, Volume One" (Fox, 1989-90, three double-sided discs, $39.98). This romantic sitcom — starring odd couple Jamie Lee Curtis and Richard Lewis — started out as an OK venture in its first season, which was only six episodes. And it got better as wacky Ann Magnuson joined the cast for the second season, sailing along quite well until it began to falter and ultimately ran out of gas in its third and final season.

This set carries us through the end of the charming and funny second season, with Curtis as a peppy writer who lands a job at Chicago Weekly with help from the magazine's top reporter (Lewis). Initially, they decide not to get romantic, as it would be awkward in the workplace and ruin their friendship. Yeah, right.

Curtis is great at this kind of comedy (think "A Fish Called Wanda," "Trading Places") and Lewis, playing his usual neurotic self, is also good. And they do have some chemistry, striving for an old-fashioned screwball-comedy sensibility.

Extras: Full frame, 28 episodes, audio commentary (by Curtis, Lewis and director Robert Berlinger), featurettes

"Mad About You: The Complete Third Season" (Sony, 1994-95, three discs, $39.95). This very funny show, particularly in the first few seasons, has Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt as a couple navigating the foibles of marriage. Notable episodes here include their stealing cable TV and causing a citywide blackout, and a flashback to their wedding. Guests include Lisa Kudrow (reprising her ditsy waitress role), Eric Stoltz as Jamie's old boyfriend, Carl Reiner as his "Dick Van Dyke Show" character Alan Brady, Jay Leno, Al Roker, etc.

Extras: Full frame, 24 episodes

"The Festival" (IFC/Docurama, 2005, two discs, $24.95). This Independent Film Channel series is a faux documentary that lampoons the Sundance Film Festival, here called the Mountain United Festival. Though ensemble in nature, it focuses primarily on a filmmaker who brings his years-in-the-making artistic effort, "The Unreasonable Truth of Butterflies," to the competition, hoping to land a distributor. Clever but also very "inside," and, as with so much of today's cable comedy, replete with foul language, female nudity and sophomoric humor.

Extras: Full frame, six episodes

Kids shows