The Practice (1976) from Warner Archive on 7/16/2019 (1 Viewer)

[Dave Lawrence]

Every time I think WAC is done with pre-90s TV shows, they surprise me. I just saw on the WAC site that the complete Danny Thomas 70s sitcom The Practice will be released in July. I don't know if this 27-episode series was ever rerun, but I've never seen it, except for a YouTube posting of the opening credits. So I look forward to finally getting to watch this. As a fan of 70s TV, WAC is doing a great job this summer with releasing this as well as another 70s rarity, Bronk.

 

[Neil Brock]

I was just the other day discussing which shows Warner had posted on their streaming channel but that they haven't released on DVD yet and this one came up. I recorded them on VHS off of there but I'll pick this up so I can dump the tapes. Other than the selected episodes of the detective shows, I think Cain's Hundred is the only other show they streamed that they haven't put out on DVD yet.

 

[Ethan Riley]

Whoa--that's another rare one. Somebody's really cracking open the vaults! I think I saw this once during its run, but I think it aired opposite "Alice".

 

[Neil Brock]

I never saw it originally but it aired in syndication weekdays during the early 80s in a package with several other short lived sitcoms, like It Takes Two and I'm not sure which others. Danny Thomas is always funny and Shelley Fabares is always beautiful.

 

[Lecagr]

Not really a fan of this show so I think I'll pass on this one. I did buy the DVD sets of Hank and The Jimmy Stewart Show and enjoy both of those.

 

[sjbradford]

I never saw it originally but it aired in syndication weekdays during the early 80s in a package with several other short lived sitcoms, like It Takes Two and I'm not sure which others. Danny Thomas is always funny and Shelley Fabares is always beautiful.

I think that package also included “I’m a Big Girl Now” (also with Danny Thomas) and “It’s a Living”. Reruns of the latter were popular enough that they revived it a couple of years later for first-run syndication.

 

[Robert13]

I just received my copy from Warner Archive. Very disappointed to find they are burned dvd-r discs. I thought all pre-orders were almost guaranteed to receive pressed dvds. What did everyone else receive?

 

[Neil Brock]

Don't know. Haven't opened mine yet but that doesn't bother me. The burned discs will still outlive me so its not something I worry about.

 

[phenri]

I don't think Warner Archive produces pressed DVDs anymore for older, short-lived shows like this one.

 

[Randy Korstick]

They normally don't do pressed discs for 1 season shows just multi season shows. But don't worry you will find lots of threads here about failed pressed discs but its tough to find one on failed WAC DVD-R's. I have over 500 Probably 300 of them are DVD-R and 0 failures. I wish I could say the same about all my pressed discs.

 

[Lecagr]

They normally don't do pressed discs for 1 season shows just multi season shows. But don't worry you will find lots of threads here about failed pressed discs but its tough to find one on failed WAC DVD-R's. I have over 500 Probably 300 of them are DVD-R and 0 failures. I wish I could say the same about all my pressed discs.

From my experience, it seems that pressed DVD's are the ones that can sometimes develop disc rot over the course of time. DVD-R's don't develop disc rot, but over the course of time the purple dye layer can occasionally dry up which will eventually make the disc unreadable and unplayable.

The Space 1999 DVD set I have from A & E is on pressed discs and those discs have developed disc rot. The playing surfaces on the discs look terrible and I'm surprised the discs are still playing in my DVD player. Maybe A & E used inferior quality DVD media.

Several years ago I made a trade with someone, and the stuff I got in the trade was on Philips brand DVD-R's. The discs played fine for a few years then suddenly stopped playing because the dye layer had dried up rendering the discs unplayable. Maybe the Philips company produced inferior quality DVD-R's, I don't know.

 

[JoeDoakes]

Is this show why George Sanford Brown left the Jeffersons and was replaced by fake Lionel?

 

[Randy Korstick]

From my experience, it seems that pressed DVD's are the ones that can sometimes develop disc rot over the course of time. DVD-R's don't develop disc rot, but over the course of time the purple dye layer can occasionally dry up which will eventually make the disc unreadable and unplayable.

The Space 1999 DVD set I have from A & E is on pressed discs and those discs have developed disc rot. The playing surfaces on the discs look terrible and I'm surprised the discs are still playing in my DVD player. Maybe A & E used inferior quality DVD media.

Several years ago I made a trade with someone, and the stuff I got in the trade was on Philips brand DVD-R's. The discs played fine for a few years then suddenly stopped playing because the dye layer had dried up rendering the discs unplayable. Maybe the Philips company produced inferior quality DVD-R's, I don't know.

If its a home made DVD-R then they might not last a long time. It depends on the equipment used to make them. Professionally made DVD-R's do not seem to have that issue. I have WAC discs that are now over 10 years and no signs of drying up.

 

[Lecagr]

If its a home made DVD-R then they might not last a long time. It depends on the equipment used to make them. Professionally made DVD-R's do not seem to have that issue. I have WAC discs that are now over 10 years and no signs of drying up.

For home recording purposes, I've been using Gigaware brand DVD-R's, Radio Shack used to sell them. I haven't had problems with these discs and so far none of them have dried up and become unplayable. A few discs wouldn't finalize once I was done recording, but that's the only issue I've had.

 

[Neil Brock]

Is this show why George Sanford Brown left the Jeffersons and was replaced by fake Lionel?

I didn't know George Sanford Brown was on The Jeffersons.

 

[JohnMor]

I didn't know George Sanford Brown was on The Jeffersons.

I think it would be news to him as well.

 

[Dave Lawrence]

Cue the promo voiceover:

"George Sanford Brown is Danny Thomas in David E. Kelley's The Practice, a Quinn Martin Production recorded in front of a mostly live studio audience...in Color.

Any resemblance between George Sanford Brown and actual actor Georg Stanford Brown is purely coincidental."

 

[JoeDoakes]

Sorry. Confused him with Mike Evans.

 

[MatthewA]

At least this show, which I have never actually seen, got aired, unlike another show that was supposed to launch on NBC on 1976: Snip with David Brenner and Lesley Ann Warren, which I believe Warner also owns since it was a James Komack show. They panicked over the show having about a gay male hairdresser even though the concurrent Norman Lear ABC sitcom The Nancy Walker Show* had a gay character as well and ran three months, preceding that same network's megahit Soap by a year. As a result, the show got pulled and only aired in Australia.

And Danny Thomas's next sitcom, I'm a Big Girl Now, took Diana Canova off Soap for a non-spinoff**, and neither of those lasted past 1981. Meanwhile, The Practice is linked to the actual Soap spinoff, Benson, by way of Didi Conn.

I think that package also included “I’m a Big Girl Now” (also with Danny Thomas) and “It’s a Living”. Reruns of the latter were popular enough that they revived it a couple of years later for first-run syndication.

The irony of that is that only the former actually had Susan Harris working on it.

*Which, along with Garry Marshall's Blansky's Beauties hastily created right after it ended, temporarily cost Rhoda Ida Morgenstern. That shows that Fred Silverman was playing a completely different game at ABC than he did at CBS. He tried to combine the two approaches at NBC with limited success.
**See also: Jason Bateman and It's Your Move, where one of Blansky's Beauties, Caren Kaye, played his mother. Fern Fitzgerald, the actress who played his mother on Silver Spoons, had a recurring role on Dallas at the same time while Ricky's mom was also a nurse on Dynasty concurrently.

 

[Neil Brock]

Sorry. Confused him with Mike Evans.

I can see the confusion. They're both . . . male.