Obit: Jane Kean, Trixie in the color "Honeymooners"

[MCarney]

She was 90! Joyce Randolph, who was Trixie in the classic 39, is still alive.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...an-star-of-honeymooners-revival-dies/3776193/

 

[KeithE4]

She was 90! Joyce Randolph, who was Trixie in the classic 39, is still alive.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...an-star-of-honeymooners-revival-dies/3776193/

As is Elaine Stritch, the original Trixie Norton in the first Honeymooners sketch on Dumont's Cavalcade of Stars, at age 88.

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

If my memory serves me correct, Audrey Meadows and Joyce Randolph went to Miami Beach in early 1966 to co-star with Jackie Gleason and Art Carney in a full-hour color "Honeymooners" segment on what was then called "Jackie Gleason's American Scene Magazine".

The success of that show led Gleason to do full-hour "Honeymooners" shows roughly there weeks out of every four during the last four seasons (1966-1970) of his weekly variety show.

But neither Meadows nor Randolph wanted to move to Florida, so Sheila MacRae became the new Trixie and Jane Kean became the new Trixie.

If my memory serves me correct, Meadows returned to do Alice in a few "Honeymooners" specials taped in Miami in the mid and late 1970's, but Kean continued playing Trixie until the final "Honeymooners" special around 1978 or 1979.

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

(When Jackie Gleason decided to revive "The Honeymooners" on a regular basis in 1966 on his Miami Beach-based variety hour)...neither Meadows nor Randolph wanted to move to Florida, so Sheila MacRae became the new Trixie and Jane Kean became the new Trixie.

Typo Alert! (sirens and buzzers)

Of course, Sheila MacRae became the new Alice.

How could I be so dumb??

I guess I'm going to be kicked out of my local Loyal Order of Raccoon Lodge for such a grievous crime against American popular culture!

 

[MCarney]

Audrey Meadow's was Alice in the last B&W "Honeymooners" - a musical version of "The Adoption" (done earlier, one of the Lost Episodes) where Ralph and Alice try to adopt a child but the mother wants it back. It was done in Miami as part of "Jackie Gleason's American Scene Magazine". That's what gave Gleason the idea to bring them back on a more permanent basis.

 

[bpatrick]

That's because that episode earned Gleason the highest rating he'd gotten in years; when it aired in 1966, he was having his hands full against "Flipper" and "I Dream Of Jeannie" on NBC. The "Honeymooners" revival, say what you want about it, did put Gleason back among the top-rated shows; he was even number one in the Northeast in 1967-68.

Gleason had known Jane Kean for more than 20 years when he hired her to play Trixie. He and Lew Parker (Marlo Thomas's dad on "That Girl") were a comedy team in nightclubs in the '40s; they worked with the singing Kean Sisters, Jane and Betty. Lew Parker eventually married Betty Kean, but Gleason never forgot them. Joyce Randolph, OTOH, while she may not have wanted to move to Florida, has said on more than one occasion that she and Gleason did not get along for reasons I don't know. Audrey Meadows did come back to play Alice in the '70s ABC specials, but Jane Kean played Trixie on those; Sheila MacRae was often criticized as being too glamorous-looking to play a downtrodden housewife.

Ironically, both Sheila MacRae and daughter Meredith saw their shows canceled the same year, 1970, as both Gleason's show and "Petticoat Junction" were two of the first three victims (along with Red Skelton) of CBS's attempt to "modernize" its programming. (I would include "Ted Mack's Amateur Hour," but he asked CBS to take his show off the air that year.)

 

[LKellerIII]

Joyce Randolph, OTOH, while she may not have wanted to move to Florida, has said on more than one occasion that she and Gleason did not get along for reasons I don't know. Audrey Meadows did come back to play Alice in the '70s ABC specials, but Jane Kean played Trixie on those; Sheila MacRae was often criticized as being too glamorous-looking to play a downtrodden housewife.

Just speculating, but I read articles about The Honeymooners many years ago, and it was said that Jackie's lack of preparation and rehearsal led to a lot of tense moments on the set, and a fair amount of animosity from the cast. He was enough of a professional to cover up most of this - you can rarely detect his mistakes when you watch the shows.

RE: the glamorous MacRae - they frumped up Audrey Meadows to play Alice, but if you ever saw her in other roles in nice clothing and make-up, she was a very attractive woman, though perhaps not as 'hot' as Sheila.

 

[anotherguyTN]

I can remember seeing the color Honeymooners as a kid and liking the comedy but not caring about the music. It wasn't until the 80's when the "lost episodes" came out that I got to see any black & white episodes from the 50's and how much better they were than the color episodes from the 60's. It was probably in the 90's before I actually got to see the classic 39 when they were on cable.