The Jackie Gleason Show (TV Series) Ralph's Sweet Tooth (1954) User Reviews

One of the funniest "Pre-39" episodes

[lrrap · 8/10 · 21 April 2012]

Interesting to note that by the time CBS filmed the "Classic 39" season (1955-56), Jackie Gleason felt that the series was already on the wane in terms of freshness and originality. And while no one will dispute the brilliance of many of the "39", watching the earlier "Lost" episodes is a revelation.

Case in point is "Ralph's Sweet Tooth", which in many ways anticipates the fan-favorite "Better Living Through TV". "Sweet Tooth" is a real gem, and the first big scene in the apartment, with Ralph and Ed attempting to rehearse the TV commercial, is genuinely, profoundly funny.

The late-night toothache scene may go on a bit long, and Gleason's "petrified" routine that he uses during the TV rehearsal (as well as in "Better Living") does get a bit tiresome, but overall, the build-up in the final five minutes---as the live telecast is set to begin--is very well done. Especially funny is the business of Kramden's additions to the script ("It's goody-good candy", etc, which never fail to draw attention to themselves). Gleason's big moment at the end, as he chomps down on his Choosy-Chew candy bar, is classic slap-stick; try watching his facial contortions on SLO-M0 sometime--it's surreal.

Funny stuff.

Don't touch that dial!

[schappe1 · 9/10 · 8 February 2021]

No, it's not your vertical hold, (remember that?). That's Jackie Gleason's face, (Ralph Kramden), as he has to chow down on a sugar-laden candy bar on national TV with a terrible toothache. it's probably the greatest 'take' of all time. The method Ralph and Ed use to deal with Ralph's toothache the night before is also one of the great Honeymooner's moments.

When the "Lost Episodes" came out in the 1980's, a friend of mine who was big fan of the "Classic 39" expressed disappointment in them. he felt they were of inferior visual quality, being "kinoscopes", a record of a live broadcast created by literally bolting a film camera face-t0-face with a TV monitor and recording the show 'through the glass', compared to the Classic 39, which were simultaneously broadcast and filmed by a special process known as an 'electronicam'. I disagreed for two reasons: while the electronicam image and sound were of consistent quality, they had the 'distant' feeling of any old film. You can watch a black and white movie from 1955 and it might be a good movie but it looks like it was filmed in 1955 and you are stuck in 2021. The Lost Episodes may have some imperfections but if you look past them you can see the live performance and think that you are in 1954, when this episode was presented.

The second reason was that I felt the real peak of The Honeymooners in terms of story telling and humor was the year before the Classic 39, the 1954-55 season. The series has matured past the 10 minute sketches that were about arguments and become a full-blown show of it's own within the Jackie Gleason Show. it had fully developed characters and relationships, multi-faceted stories that lasted not 25 minutes as with the Classic 39 but 45 minutes and writers were at their peak. the humor was louder more raucous than the Classic 39 but once you get used to that you laugh harder. Some of these stories were re-done with the 60's Jackie Gleason Show but Jackie and Art Carney were older, more baggy-eyed and had lesser performers playing their wives so it wasn't as entertaining. these are the originals and the best versions of these stories.

So, If you've just watched "Ralph's Sweet Tooth", congratulations. You are about to go on a wild ride of laughs through the greatest season television's funniest show ever had!

It Yummy Yum Yummy

[Hitchcoc · 10/10 · 19 December 2017]

Poor old Ralph. He gets hired to do a TV commercial for a candy bar. He will receive a small fortune for it. Before this happens, he enlists Norton to help him and it's a total flop. But the worst thing is that the morning he is to do this ad, he gets a horrible toothache. The scene at the dentist's is funny, but the doing of the commercial will have you rolling. It seems that the gods continually attacked our poor bus driver. Nothing much goes right for him.