I DREAM OF JEANNIE: Complete Series Blu-ray (Screen Gems/Sidney Sheldon Productions, 1965-70) ViaVision Entertainment

They say, ‘imitation’ is the cheapest form of flattery, and perhaps, nowhere in pop culture more auspiciously so than with I Dream of Jeannie (1965-70), the supernatural fantasy designed by author, Sidney Sheldon to rival the runaway success of Bewitched (1964-72) on ABC. Then, as now, Hollywood in general, and television in particular, reveled in copycatting success. And why not? It practically guaranteed another for their own. While Jeannie’s tenure as a delightfully deft and wacky competitor to Bewitched was neither as storied or as long (Jeannie bowed out after only 5 years to Bewitched’s 8), in its own inimitable way it set a fresh tone and style for joyfully escapist fluff and farce. Sheldon’s inspiration here was The Brass Bottle (1964), a Tony Randall/Burle Ives comedy made at Universal, ironically, also, to costar Barbara Eden, but as a mortal. Screen Gems, who had successfully marketed Bewitched to ABC, now set their sights on pitching ‘Jeannie’ to rival network, NBC.  Yet, Sheldon was not at all convinced Eden could pull off the role of this bright and bubbly supernatural servant. It was with some misgivings Sheldon also settled on a blonde genie, initially fearing too direct a comparison to Elizabeth Montgomery’s blonde witch. And the transparent similarities between the two sitcoms did not end there.

Both series began in B&W, but then, transitioned to color broadcasts; Bewitched after two monochromatic years, and, Jeannie after only one. Each series presented a female protagonist whose ‘otherworldly’ powers were the subject of much consternation for their harried male counterparts, and, each relied heavily on campy special effects to sell their wares. Last, but certainly not least, Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie each featured an iconic animated title sequence, (Bewitched’s, created by Hanna-Barbara’s Ed Benedict, and underscored by Howard Greenfield and Jack Keller; Jeannie’s scored by Hugo Montenegro to visuals from Warner Bros. alumni, Fritz Freleng). Initially, Sheldon resisted this sort of copycat approach, relying on a live-action sequence to open the first few episodes, narrated by Paul Frees. Alas, this did not impress the execs at NBC, nor Sheldon, who then embraced Freleng’s bouncy and abbreviated intro to the couple’s first cute meet, showing Major Nelson’s (Larry Hagman) NASA capsule splash down, with Nelson thereafter liberating Jeannie from her bottle to perform a dance for him.

To suggest NBC had faith in ‘Jeannie’ as a serious rival to Bewitched is misleading. Indeed, Sheldon’s desire to shoot the pilot and first season in color was quashed by Screen Gems exec’, Jerry Hyams as it would have added $400 more per episode to the budget. When Sheldon offered to fund these expenses himself, Hyams explained that the likelihood ‘Jeannie’ would survive her debut season were slim to nil. Although the series was nominally set in Cocoa Beach, Florida, cast and crew never left Southern California to film. The façade referenced for Major Nelson and Major Healey’s (Bill Dailey) offices was actually stock footage of NASA’s Flight Research Center, but the hilly backdrops frequently glimpsed just beyond Nelson’s home, bely the real location - the Hollywood Hills and Warner Bros. ranch playing host to Nelson’s home, previously used in the series, Father Knows Best. Meanwhile, interiors were built inside Sunset Gower Studios (a.k.a. the old Columbia Pictures backlot).

The real spark to transform and elevate I Dream of Jeannie from just a Bewitched knock-off was the intimate chemistry between co-stars, Barbara Eden and Larry Hagman. By all accounts, this was a happy set, with Hagman not above indulging in pranks to get cast and crew going, and Eden, adoring her costar, even as her otherworldly counterpart fawned over Nelson. Unlike Bewitched, Jeannie’s origin story is more than a bit muddled. In Season 2 it is revealed Jeannie was born a mortal centuries ago, transformed into a genie by the Blue Djinn (Eden’s real-life husband, Michael Ansara) to entrap her in the bottle after she refuses to marry him. As an interesting aside: Jeannie's iconic bottle was actually a ‘limited edition’ Jim Beam liquor decanter, created for the Wheaton Bottle Company by Roy Kramer. In Season 1, the bottle is decidedly weatherbeaten, reflecting its centuries-long submersion in sand and surf. But when I Dream of Jeannie switched to color episodes, the design and colors of the bottle were refreshed to create a flashier abode for Eden’s brightly clothed mischief maker.

Ansara would reprise the role of the Blue Djinn only twice more, before appearing in several other episodes, first, as King Kamehameha, then, Biff Jellico. As for Jeannie’s backstory… mid-way through Season 3, it was implied Jeannie had a sister who is a genie by birth. Later, in Season 4, Jeannie’s entire family made a guest appearance, all of them genies by trade with varying degrees of power, suggesting Jeannie too heralded from a supernatural house. Complicating Jeannie’s origins further was a 1966 paperback novel by Al Hine, who explained Jeannie’s real name ‘Fawzia’ marking it as a birthright from Tehran instead of the show’s implied South Pacific locale.

While Bewitched steadily evolved over its eight seasons to include overriding narrative arcs, thus making random viewing increasingly difficult, most of Jeannie’s episodes were designed with plots inclusive of their half-hour format, with only a few 2-part exceptions, and one notable four-week ‘mystery’ to coincide with a national ad campaign and write-in contest, for which the network awarded a grand prize for cracking a code that would save Jeannie from a terrible fate. The episode, Hurricane Jeannie, an extended dream sequence in which Colonel Alfred Bellows (Hayden Rorke) learns of Jeannie’s true identity, was original shown as the series’ penultimate episode. But when I Dream of Jeannie went into syndication, this episode was re-shuffled to the end, becoming the grand finale, and, ending with a close-up of Jeannie’s smashed bottle.

I Dream of Jeannie embarks upon its small-screen immortality after astronaut, Captain Tony Nelson’s one-man space capsule crash-lands on a deserted island in the South Pacific. While awaiting his inevitable rescue by NASA, Tony finds a bottle on the beach and inadvertently liberates Jeannie from her centuries-old imprisonment by the Blue Djinn. She, in turn, vows to dutifully serve him till the end of time. Much to Tony’s chagrin, Jeannie is instrumental in derailing his engagement to Gen. Martin Petersen’s (Barton MacLane) daughter, Melissa (Karen Sharpe). Interestingly, there are no lasting repercussions to this foil, and, Petersen and Melissa are simply written out of the show thereafter. Initially, Tony insists Jeannie spend most of her time in the bottle so as not to complicate his life further. Gradually, however, the boundaries in their détente relax and Jeannie is allowed free-range of Nelson’s fashionable homestead. While Tony’s life is complex on all fronts, Jeannie’s entire happiness depends on how well she is able to please her master.

Despite Tony's insistences to lead a normal ‘mortal’ life, Jeannie increasingly unleashes her magic to both enhance and upset Tony’s well-ordered life. Attempting transparency with NASA’s psychiatrist, Colonel Dr. Alfred Bellows leads to some genuinely hilarious misdirection, as Bellows cannot explain the curious circumstances that frequently manifest only to him in Tony’s absence. Tony’s own explanations seem either insane or idiotic to Bellows. Yet, he is repeatedly unable to prove his theories, either, that Tony is certifiable or being deliberately deceptive. Despite all evidence to the contrary, Jeannie’s powers are limited when she is confined to the bottle, and uncorking it leads to her forced loyalty to another until Tony is able to rectify the situation. During the first few episodes, everyone, including Tony’s best pal, Roger Healey are oblivious to Jeannie’s presence. Eventually, Roger learns the truth and embraces it, as well as the couple’s desire to keep everything a secret. Several episodes suggest Roger might try to claim Jeannie for his own. But nothing serious ever comes of this.

In Season 3, Jeannie’s evil twin (also named Jeannie, but a brunette) attempts to steal Tony away. The bad Jeannie is eventually thwarted in her various schemes. By Season 5, we meet Jeannie’s extended family, including her Uncle Sully (Jackie Coogan) who orders her to return to their native land of Basenji as its queen. When Tony inadvertently gives offence to the nation he is ordered by Sully, first – to wed Jeannie, and then, murder the ambassador of a neighboring province to prove his loyalties.  Alas, this plan backfires when Sully tries to force Tony’s hand. He disavows his love for Jeannie, but later, reconsiders just how much she means to him. Tony flies to Basenji, claims Jeannie for his own and returns to Cocoa Beach. Newly reformed, Jeannie elects to dress in modern attire and feign being just another mortal girl to please Tony and hide her truer self from the world at large.

I Dream of Jeannie is, decidedly, a time capsule derived from a far more stringent moral code in American pop culture. It’s also representative of a woman’s place in the home, with the expectation to merely fall in line with the whims and wishes of their male counterparts. These edicts, already slightly archaic by the end of the sixties, by today’s standards, are compounded by the fact the whole modus operandi of the show is to have a man fall for a woman whose one desire in life is to serve and please him in his every pursuit while, seemingly, possessing no aegis or motivation to carve out one of her own. Setting aside these cultural stereotypes and sexual politics, there is still much enjoyment to be gleaned from this time-honored and extremely well-written sitcom. The gags are corny, but affectingly so, and the performances by all could scarcely be more joyously farcical or engaging. Larry Hagman and Barbara Eden make for a formidable love match. Even from the early episodes it is apparent they will someday find true happiness in each other’s arms. While it takes Hagman’s alter ego five years to officially come to this understanding, finding ways to delay and derail this realization remains the cream of the jest that kept television audiences tuning in for more.

I Dream of Jeannie has had a horrendous history in hi-def. Nearly 4 years ago, Mill Creek Entertainment released a complete series on Blu-ray, in a shoddy cardboard sleeve with even shoddier spindle packaging inside, housing a series of discs that were basically not worth the ten-cents per, that it cost for the raw materials. Despite having competently rendered – if hardly perfect – scans to slap to disc, mastered by Sony Home Entertainment, Mill Creek chose the quick and dirty route, compressing too many episodes per disc, and thereupon reducing all of Sony’s hard efforts to a miserly congestion of softly focused and compression artifact riddled, VHS-quality junk, virtually unwatchable to anyone who acknowledges what hi-def mastering is all about. Suffice it to say, my personal displeasure with this set was monumental. There was chroma bleeding on the B&W episodes, and, smeared colors, halos and edge effects everywhere else. Just awful.

But now, I Dream of Jeannie arrives on Blu-ray a second time, from indie Aussie distributor, ViaVision, and still cribbing from the mostly ‘good’ work Sony put forth a little over ten years ago. The results this time are improved in all regards, though still not as pristine as one might have hoped. To be clear, stock footage of Cape Canaveral and NASA’s actual interiors is culled from stock footage shot ‘documentary style’ and exhibits a considerable downtick in contrast and crispness. There’s also a lot of age-related wear and tear in these shots. This, however, is as it always was and should be. So, no harm/no foul. The B&W episodes sport a creamy, but sharp layering of textures with excellent contrast and a light smattering of grain.

Color episodes reveal some gorgeous hues, particularly favoring reds and oranges, which pop as they should. On the whole, flesh tones are natural and appealing, though occasionally leaning to a pinkish cast. Again, owing to the vintage of these materials and the techniques used to film at the time, all this looks extremely solid. Less impressive is the baked-in edge effects that periodically creep into these transfers, more glaringly obvious in the color episodes.

The beaded and gaudy interiors of Jeannie’s bottle experience a lot of image instability, as do intermittent details in knives and forks, glassware, and other background information throughout the series. How bad is it? Not tragic. But not good, just the same. And easily avoidable, had Sony provided ViaVision with original scans, cleansed of this digital enhancement they added somewhere along the mastering line.  Given the epic improvements in the overall image quality – solid contrast, excellent color reproduction, wonderful black levels and a light smattering of grain indigenous to the source material, it would have been prudent of Sony – not ViaVision – to go back and eradicate the very minor, but still present, age-related garble that intermittently manifests itself throughout all 139 episodes presented herein.

No surprise here, the entire series is presented in LPCM 2.0 mono and, mercifully, in the show’s original 1.33:1 aspect ratio. Aside: it’s become ‘fashionable’, if incorrect, to recomposite shows originally shot in the academy ratio to conform to modern-era 1.85:1 TV’s. Not cool. Not at all.  Season 1’s B&W episodes are also represented in their misguided colorized versions, but only in standard def, and are NOT recommended for viewing. Frankly, it’s a rough slog. A vintage audio commentary co-starring Barbara Eden, Larry Hagman and Bill Daily is included on the series’ pilot. We also get ‘Out of the Bottle’ – a 2005 featurette slapped together by Sony back in the day when they still had the courage and wherewithal to market their own product under the studio’s banner, as well as ‘Fifteen Years Later’ – the reunion movie of the week that attempted to rekindle the old magic again for fans in 1985. It’s not entirely a successful effort and should be considered only for connoisseurs and devout fans of the original show. The movie is also presented in native 1080p and looks fine. The featurette is in interlaced 720i and certainly looks it. Finally, there is a handsomely assembled, hard-covered ‘press kit’. I’m really liking the time and money invested here. Bottom line: I Dream of Jeannie always had a luster all its own. ViaVision’s re-issue corrects most of the sins in the original Mill Creek fiasco. But Sony ought to have done the rest of the heavy lifting here to fix the aforementioned shortcomings that still persist. Judge and buy accordingly.

FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)

4 overall

VIDEO/AUDIO

3.5 overall

EXTRAS

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