Vintage TV shows now available online
I just checked it out. Yes its free otherwise I would not have posted this :).
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By now I’m sure you’ve heard of AOL Television’s new venture into the world of online delivery of television shows, In2TV. Though In2TV officially opens to the public this Wednesday, I was recently lucky enough to get a preview of its interface and offerings. So, what can you expect to see this Wednesday and beyond? Read on to find out.In2TV is a very ambitious project that’s been in the works for quite some time now with AOL.com and Warner Bros. Domestic Cable Distribution. In a nutshell, AOL will offer thousands of episodes from some of the most popular television series of all time via broadband distribution. You will be able to stream these television episodes in their entirety, with the option of viewing them in “Hi-Q” DVD-quality video. There will also be several games, puzzles and, yes, karaoke features available at launch time. (more…)
March 18th, 2006 at 11:57 pm
I don’t know if anyone here is as old as me, but if they are, they might remember a truly vintage TV show that we used to watch. This TV show was the center of much controversy, and ultimately it was yanked from the air and later from reruns. It was, of course, Amos ‘n Andy.
Now I hope y’all won’t run me outa here, but when I was a kid, I thought that show was the funniest one on television. Funnier than The Honeymooners. There was so much talent on that show you would be hard-pressed to assemble such a cast of great comic actors today. From Tim Moore to Spencer Williams to Ernestine Wade, great black comic talent, unknown today and therefore uncelebrated. It is a shame that these wonderful actors should be forgotten, and worse than that, accused of being a disgrace to the race. Terrible. It was a crime, the NAACP and Bill Cosby were the leading voices in condemning the show and the cast. This show is now available on DVD despite the politically correct naysayers. A cousin of mine, another ancient person, has Volume 1 (there are something like 9 volumes, but be careful of which collection you buy. I’m told that the quality of the transfers vary greatly), and we watched it together last weekend. It is just as funny as I remembered. And furthermore, I do not think it is racist at all. Stereotypes? Yes, of course. It is that kind of comedy, it harkens back to vaudeville. But it was no more stereotypical than The Honeymooners or The Beverly Hillbillies. Dumb, scheming white people are funny even if all whites aren’t like that. Similarly the dumb, scheming things that the Kingfish gets Andy into remain funny today. And most of the characters in that show, while black, were not stereotypes at all. They were black lawyers, judges, policemen, salesmen, bank managers, business owners, you name it. Amos himself is a hard-working cab driver with a lot of good sense. Hint: do not rent the old movie made in the 30’s. That is horrible, white men in blackface. But the TV show is all black and proud. And doggone funny.