Search - The Loretta Young Show - Christine's Children Series on DVD

Amy P. from PINEVILLE, LA
Reviewed on 5/19/2008...

This series is superb! Loretta Young is not only a wonderfully talented actress but absolutely gorgeous. She stars as a widowed mother bringing up a houseful of children and she does it in style! There's a little bit of everything here - crazy kid antics and a sweet love story, which comes about when Christine meets a magazine publisher in New York. Don't miss out on this one if you love classic TV!

The New Loretta Young Show: one of TV's lost treasures newly

Ron Wise | Cleveland, MS USA | 02/04/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

""The New Loretta Young Show" ran for one year during the 1962-63 TV season. It might have lasted longer if it had not been opposite the runaway hit "Ben Casey."



The amazingly talented Loretta Young plays a widow (Christine Massey) raising her seven children in a bedroom community outside of New York City. Christine's late husband was a noted writer, and she is also trying her hand at writing. Through her writing, she meets a New York magazine editor, wonderfully played by James Philbrook, and they develop a relationshhip that eventually leads to marriage.



This all may sound very corny and trite and, if it had been done in the usual early Sixties TV way, it could very well have been. However, this is not a cross between "Eight Is Enough" and "Ozzie and Harriet." Far from it.



Even though most of the 26 episodes center around Christine and her family, there's enough latitude to allow the show to go down some stange and sometimes dark roads. There are some sitcom-like themes in some of the episodes (and a few mild laughs), but there are also some themes that could easily have been part of Loretta Young's original anthology series.



There are episodes that deal with a cheating in school scandal, a date that almost turns deadly for one of the daughters, New York coffeehouse drug culture, a mental patient roaming Christine's neighborhood looking for his dead daughter, a neighbor who beats his son and must face up to it, stress-related emergency surgery, and some other topics that are pretty gritty for early Sixties television.



The bottom line here is that Loretta Young and the rest of the cast are true professionals and when I had watched the last episode, I was sad that there was not a second season.



At least VCI brought this "lost treasure" back so it can be enjoyed by Loretta Young's many fans, old and new."

Best of TV.

R. Christenson | Pine, CO USA | 05/28/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This series is surprisingly good. We found most episodes are original and profound family dramas, like the best of Leave It To Beaver sophisticated up a notch for adults. The first one guest starred Ted Knight, and later episodes have more guest stars, like Cloris Leachman and Victor Buono. Two or three episodes we did find boring, but over 20 others are outstanding. At the end of each show Miss Young sums up the point or moral in one simple sentence or quotation, and most of these are not the trite familiar ones you'll find on posters or calendars today, yet are timeless and ring true. Thanks to the great actress's family and VCI video for making these available to a new generation!!"

The Loretta Young Show-Christine's Children Series

S. Jorgensen | IA, USA | 09/19/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I am really enjoying this series, I had never seen it previously. My favorite is still the original Loretta Young Show, though. I have always been a Loretta Young fan! I hope that the rest of the original shows become available, as I would really like to complete the series.

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