Some are going to say “Pow! To the Moon, Alice” at this. The Honeymooners, the famous 1950s sitcom starring Jackie Gleason and Art Carney, is being reimagined for a new CBS series in development.
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Producer for ABC sitcoms Black-ish and Mixed-ish Lindsey Shockley is writing a pilot produced by actor Damon Wayans, Jr., and his producing partner at Two Shakes Entertainment Kameron Tarlow, reports Deadline.
The reboot is being described as a feminist spin wherein new couple Ruth and Alex are bickering “co-heads” of their household.
“Ruth and her husband Alex…are determined to have a marriage where they are true equals in every way,” Deadline says of the new Honeymooners. “But what happens when a marriage has two heads of the household? Are they co-heads? Or no head at all?”
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Kelly Park, director on such TV shows as Raven’s Home, Punky Brewster, Call Me Kat, and How I Met Your Father, is attached to direct and executive produce with Shockley, Wayans, and Tarlow.
Damon Wayans, Jr., is the son of a comedic actor who starred in Blankman and such TV shows as Lethal Weapon, Damon Wayans. He’s known for his roles in sitcoms Happy Endings and New Girl and also the film Let’s Be Cops.
The Honeymooners began as the brainchild of star Jackie Gleason on his variety show. It spun off into a sitcom about the cantankerous but lovable bus driver Ralph Cramden who lived in a cramped Brooklyn apartment with his wife Alice (Audrey Meadows).
Ralph and his buddy Ed Norton (Art Carney), a sewer worker, spent the bulk of their time trying to strike it rich with their schemes and failing miserably.
Considered a classic of American television up there with Happy Days, M*A*S*H, I Love Lucy, and Star Trek, Honeymooners only lasted a season but carried on in reruns for years afterward to be discovered by new generations.
Audiences appreciated its depiction of working-class life in less-than-ideal conditions although its jokes making light of domestic battery wouldn’t fly today, and we probably won’t see much of that – from the husband’s point of view at least – in the new series.
Honeymooners was famously an inspiration for another cultural staple, The Flintstones, well before a cinematic reboot came about starring Cedric the Entertainer in 2005. That attempt did very poorly and failed to spawn any further adventures of Cedric as Ralph Kramden.
CBS’s relaunch doesn’t have a premiere date but chances are good it will end up with both the Primetime slot and on Paramount Plus. Tell us how that and this report registers with you down below.