What happened to the Honeymooners TV show?
Basically what happened was that Gleason thought they were running out of fresh ideas and wanted the show to be remembered for the quality. He didn’t want to run extras shows just for the heck of it if he didn’t think the quality would be as high. So he thought it better to end it early and sucessful than drag it on without good ideas. Kind of like an athlete retiring on the top even if he could have gone a few more years. These days, I am sure they could have made it go longer with more writers and money, but things were harder back then. In February 1956, the show was moved to the 8 pm time slot, but had already started to lose viewers to the hugely popular Perry Como Show. Gleason’s writers had also begun to feel confined by the restrictive half-hour format, and Gleason felt that they were starting to run out of original ideas. After just one season, Gleason and CBS agreed to cancel The Honeymooners, which aired its 39th and last original episode on September 22, 1956. In explaining
Basically what happened was that Gleason thought they were running out of fresh ideas and wanted the show to be remembered for the quality. He didn’t want to run extras shows just for the heck of it if he didn’t think the quality would be as high. So he thought it better to end it early and sucessful than drag it on without good ideas. Kind of like an athlete retiring on the top even if he could have gone a few more years. These days, I am sure they could have made it go longer with more writers and money, but things were harder back then. In February 1956, the show was moved to the 8 pm time slot, but had already started to lose viewers to the hugely popular Perry Como Show. Gleason’s writers had also begun to feel confined by the restrictive half-hour format, and Gleason felt that they were starting to run out of original ideas. After just one season, Gleason and CBS agreed to cancel The Honeymooners, which aired its 39th and last original episode on September 22, 1956. In explaining
