I really want Seasons 6-8 to come out even though I don't particularly care for Trish. I figure that if it does have any chance of coming out it will be a burn on-demand product available only on Amazon like the I Dream of Jeannie Reunion. Does anyone know how to contact Sony?
shareI'm sure we'll see seasons 6, 7 and 8. A few years back, I recall reading that the family has committed to releasing all seasons. The seasons have been released on a fairly regular basis (Season 5 was just released in 12/12) so I would expect to hear something soon. Not sure why you want to contact Sony, because they are not the ones releasing The Donna Reed Show.
http://www.tvshowsondvd.com/shows/Donna-Reed/1218
Spike71 is correct. Reed's children have committed to releasing the entire series in as timely a manner as possible. Considering they have released five seasons in four years, I think any complaints about the remaining seasons not being released just yet are premature.
I can't think of any older, long running show that has had such a consistent release.
Sony owns Seasons 6-8, not Reed's family. They have nothing to do with these later seasons. Sony is the reason these seasons are not on ME-TV.
shareWell, Me-TV is the reason seasons 6-8 aren't on Me-TV. I bet they could lease those seasons from Sony if they wanted to.
It's funny, for years, the syndication package consisted of seasons 1,2,3,5, and 8. Now that ownership of the first five seasons has reverted to Reed's estate, the syndication package is seasons 1-5. And now that Sony only has the rights to the final three seasons, my guess is that they won't put much effort into trying to sell the reruns.
Too bad things got split up this way.
If Sony owns seasons 6-8, they likely won't be released because Sony has a bad track concerning old shows. I have no idea how sales were for the first five seasons (I bought 'em all but that's not saying much) but I can't imagine Sony would even bother. It's a shame too as I haven't seen the later seasons.
It's odd that Reed's estate doesn't own the entire show. I can't recall an estate owning only half a show. Wonder what happened.
Donna Reed's production company co-produced the series with Columbia/Screen Gems (now Sony). I believe Donna's original contract was for five years, and her original agreement called for the rights for the shows to revert back to her estate/production company after a certain time period (50 years, I believe, because Reed's children just recently regained control). I'm guessing that when she signed an extension for the last three years, she didn't have the provision to eventually regain the rights (perhaps this was in exchange for her production company not having to put in as much capital for the production of the show).
Not sure at all if this is correct; just an educated guess.
Something else interesting: the first five years of the show have a copyright attributed to "Todon Productions", Donna Reed and Tony Owens' production company. The last three seasons attribute the copyright to "Screen Gems Productions", the television arm of Columbia Pictures. So Reed and Owen clearly had lesser ownership for those last three years.
shareI don't enjoy the character of "Trish" as much as that of "Jeff Stone" and "Mary Stone" either. But even "Jeff" by that point was less interesting, as Paul Petersen was an adult, and Shelley Fabares only made a few guest appearances after her Season 5 departure. By then, the main reason to watch "The Donna Reed Show" was for its star, and her interactions with Carl Betz and other series' regulars (Bob Crane, among them) and guest stars.
Baseball also made its impact on the series, with Don Drysdale and Willy Mays each appearing a few times, one episode I think together.
And Shelley Fabares and Paul Petersen having been teenagers during rock & roll's first generation resulted in their both having successful pop music careers, their characters singing some of those hits on the show, most notably Fabares #1 hit "Johnny Angel," and Petersen's #6 hit "My Dad." A few teen idols also made guest star appearances on the series, including James Darren and, in the very last episode (titled "By-Line--Jeff Stone"), singer Lesley Gore, who sang her hit "It's My Party." That episode even acknowledged the then-popular British Invasion of rock & roll, with a mention of Herman's Hermits.