Right this second I'm listening to the tail end of the
previously reported Stu's Show interview on Shokus Internet Radio, with several members of the
Leave it to Beaver cast and the DVD producer of Shout! Factory's upcoming
Complete Series set for that classic show. That producer, Brian Ward, has just given host Stuart Shostak the
Stu's Show scoop: the folks at Shout! Factory have acquired the DVD rights to
All in the Family!
As fans know, the classic sitcom ran nine seasons and starred Carroll O'Connor, Jean Stapleton, Rob Reiner and Sally Struthers. Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released the first six seasons on DVD between 2002 and 2007, but the remaining three seasons have been in limbo for home video release. Now Brian Ward has revealed that Shout! Factory has picked up the rights from Sony, and will be releasing
All in the Family - The Complete 7th Season on DVD in the future. A specific release date has not been finalized yet, nor are any other details available at this time. But stay tuned and we'll keep you updated as further developments occur!
My thanks to Brian, Stu, Jeanine Kasun,
Leave it to Beaver cast members Tony Dow ("Wally Cleaver"), Ken Osmond ("Eddie Haskell"), and Frank Bank ("Lumpy Rutherford"), and Earl Kress for a truly enjoyable
Stu's Show today! If you missed the program tonight, be sure to catch the re-runs over the next few days at
Shokus Internet Radio. It will also eventually be found in the archive at
StusShow.com.
UPDATE (6/24): Shout! Factory's DVD release of
All in the Family - The Complete 7th Season may not be too far off, actually! Overnight Amazon.com
added a listing for the title. It is not set up to accept pre-orders yet; this only asks you to "
Sign up to be notified when this item becomes available." Amazon often adds entries like that for unreleased titles that a decent amount of their customers are doing look-ups for, so their searches don't come up completely empty (for example, Amazon had a book listing like that for "
Harry Potter Book 7" around the time the sixth book came out, very long before the final book was up for pre-order or even had a specific title).
However, this listing is a bit different than those listings typically are: no date or artwork is shown, but it DOES say at this entry that Shout! will deliver a 3-disc set running approximately 600 minutes, for $29.93 SRP (the same list price upcoming Shout! releases of
Mad About You and
Rhoda have). Note that the quoted running time is a very early estimate and subject to change (the original broadcast season had 23 episodes, including a double-length season premiere and another double-length episode shortly after; those hour-long episodes are always split in half when seen in syndication). But since Amazon is putting in this level of detail so quickly, then it might bode well for a short waiting period before the rest of Shout's plans for the title are finalized. Stay tuned!
