TV history is now being written to DVD.
Fans and future historians will have no problem studying every nook and cranny of “The Sopranos,” “Seinfeld,” “Dallas,” “All in the Family” and “Hogan’s Heroes.”
Yet go back before the 1960s, into the black-and-white era, and the picture gets considerably less complete. Look for programs on DVD from the ’50s, even the late ’40s, and you’ve been lucky to find a single set at your store. The superb digital restoration of “I Love Lucy” was the exception.
But early TV is finally beginning to have its partisans, and they’re making up for lost time with a recent (relative) flood of impressive releases.
The video couldn’t be crisper or the collection more complete in this fall’s 12-disc set of the 1949-53 Western half-hour “Hopalong Cassidy,” which includes not only the hero’s entire TV run but previous theatrical features and an hour-long profile of star-producer William Boyd. New live-broadcast sets of the 1949-54 anthology half-hour “Suspense” and the early ’50s musical mayhem of comedy bandleader “Spike Jones: The Legend” may contain kinescopes — film recordings shot off TV monitors — but they’re watchably sharp. And they’re treasures to exist at all.
Or to come out on DVD at all. The titles mentioned above are from Infinity Entertainment, a hard-charging new brand from the folks who’ve lovingly packaged audio obscurities.
“We formulate things based on niche programming,” says Infinity’s Rick Buehler. Where off-brand DVD makers simply slap public-domain prints of pioneer TV shows onto cheap discs, “we go in and spend a great deal of money to take it frame by frame, to really clean it up where it’s just like what it was when you watched it on television.”
The Infinity sets not only look great, but since they’re authorized, they contain the original music (often replaced on cheap discs). Of course, the cost is different from the dollar store too. The 12-disc “Hopalong Cassidy” box is $80, while “Spike Jones” (with a bonus CD of radio shows) lists at $50 and the “Suspense” sets (each with 30 episodes) are $40 each. The market for older, often black-and-white or kinescope programs is considerably smaller, and that has traditionally discouraged the big studios.
“Our market is traditionally nontraditional,” stresses Buehler.
