Ames Daily Tribune (Iowa)
Tuesday, Dec 27, 1955

TV Boners 'Nominated' For Honors
By Aline Mosby
Hollywood (UP)

(Text from the Gleason portion)….

"This is the season of "the year's best" awards. As a TV fan I would like to nominate honors for the funniest TV boners of the year. While TV producers are toting up their successes of the year, armchair viewers at home get a chuckle by remembering mistakes that millions of viewers saw. A gold engraved statuette for the all-time greatest fluff of 1955 should go to the Jackie Gleason Show.

Art Carney, playing the comic's sidekick, started to enter the Gleason apartment but couldn't get the door open. The quick-thinking Carney climbed through the window. This appeared to be a stroke of genius. Except it had puzzling moments for viewers. For one thing, the glassless window was supposed to have been closed. Furthermore, the Gleason apartment allegedly was on the 2nd floor."

1) This article makes it clear that this event did take place in 1955. Now, because it's referenced to as "The Jackie Gleason Show", this would make one think that this is a "Lost Episode" from January to June.

Or did it occur on "The Honeymooners" from 10/1/1955 - 12/24/1955 & was later edited out for repeats?

2) Depending on the story you read, depends on who was on stage at the time. Some accounts have it that Audrey was on stage & noticed that Art could not enter & did nothing. The following story has Gleason on stage...

http://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/9657/ReddThesis0902.pdf?sequence=2

Text from above article…

There was one scene where Carney was supposed to come in — come in the door. And Ralph says, “Come in.” And the door shakes and he can’t open the door. And Gleason shouts, “For God’s sake would you come in?” And there’s a moment of silence and there’s a window there. Suddenly Carney comes through the window. “I tell you, Ralph, there’s more than one way to skin a cat.” And now that’s gone.

The last line of the above text makes me wonder. "And now that's gone".
What does this mean?

Does someone know that this is either a forever Lost Episode or was it filmed for the Classic 39 & edited for rebroadcast.

Lost Episode or edited filmed Classic 39?

Thoughts?

Gotta admit, with today's culture this headline would not fly at all!

Great find. Since they called it "the Jackie Gleason show," I'm leaning more toward one of the Lost Episodes. The Classic 39 were edited before they were broadcast, so anything that was edited out never aired. Plus, later in the article, it says, "But even the filmed shows ranked up boners." Since there are no known sketches missing from 1955, I'm thinking "Halloween Party for the Boss." Yes, it was from October of 1954, but during the "season of 'the year's best' awards," as they put it, they sometimes look back to the latter half of the previous year.

Also, regarding the Sydney Zelinka quote, I think that's the only account I've read that has Gleason onstage during that incident. His memories must've been a little foggy because I remember another incident he mentioned differently:

But [in an episode Ralph and Norton] were on a park bench once eating their lunch at
lunch hour, and Gleason got into a coughing fit from cigarettes. A horrible cough for
about a minute. It was like his lungs were coming out. And when he came out of it —
you see, the standard line for that...[my ellipses] Carney would say, “I got to get a room
tonight” or something like that. You know?
So he comes out of this cough and says, “That Alice, she got to sleep with the
windows open.” Well, that was a brilliant line reading, because it’s in context. It’s in
character. It’s something that could happen. That’s the story of my life.
Here are a couple of quotes that have Audrey onstage during the window incident:
Of course, it happened to me as the only one left onstage, but, as I recall with clarity, while Jackie made his exit, hearing an ominous click as the door slammed. I thought there couldn't possibly be a lock on that door, no reason for it, but there was. Art was to enter next, but all I could hear were people jiggling the knob back and forth and whispering. Meanwhile, left all alone onstage, I resisted the temptation to exit myself through the bedroom door. I hummed my way over to the stove and started to put a pot on, stirring nothing furiously. Consequently, my back was to the window. It seemed as though an hour had gone by--it was probably a few seconds--when I turned to see Art coming through the window saying, "There's more than one way to skin a cat." He had forgotten to open the window, since there was naturally no glass in it. Jackie had sent him around to the Kramden fire escape outside our window, hissing, "Run, Aud can't stall out there forever." The next one supposed to enter was a Western Union boy. He knocked, and as I started for the door, Art said, "Good luck." The studio audience had caught on by now that the door had turned into concrete, and they loved it. Yet this time it opened to applause for the door, and, thank God, another live TV crisis was over.-From "Love, Alice."
One time, Norton is supposed to come into Kramden's apartment and talk to Alice. Norton tries the door. The door doesn't open. It doesn't budge. He tries again. Nothing. Finally, he climbs through the window. Since there's no glass in the window, he forgets to open the sash. He just steps right through. The audience howls. Carney ad-libs, completely in character, "There's more than one way to skin a cat." A Western Union messenger knocks at the door. By now, it's common knowledge that the door is a lost cause. Norton says, "Good luck, pal." But the door has been repaired. The messenger breezes in. The audience goes wild.-From "The Honeymooners Lost Episodes."

Bill is correct. Even though the article is 12/1955. There is another famous scene mentioned from Climax!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tris_Coffin

This took place on 10/7/54. So Carney climbing thru the window was from 9/25/54 - 6/4/55. & if Sydney Zelinka was on set when the incident occurred, it's most likely from 1 of these episodes that he is credited (on IMDB) for writing...

Ralph's Sweet Tooth (25 September 1954)
Game Called on Account of Marriage (2 October 1954)
Love Letter (16 October 1954)
The People's Choice (23 October 1954)
Halloween Party (30 October 1954)
Battle of the Sexes (13 November 1954)
A Promotion (22 January 1955)
Hero (19 February 1955)
Peacemaker (5 March 1955)
Stars Over Flatbush (2 April 1955)
A Weighty Problem (16 April 1955)
Principle of the Thing (30 April 1955)

My money's on "Halloween Party for the Boss." Going with the expanded episode theory: the opening scene could have Ralph leaving for whatever reason (maybe to go to work), after which Norton is supposed to come in, followed by a Western Union boy with an invitation to the boss's party. The next scene would probably have everyone trying on costumes, as in the earlier versions, leading up to them actually arriving at the boss's party and finding out it's not a masquerade. The window incident occurring during this episode could have something to do with it being lost. Perhaps it was used for a clip show at some point and never returned, or maybe Gleason lent or gave it to someone like Mike Douglas, who said it was his favorite episode.

Here is another article from the NY Times dated 11/30/58 citing Carney climbing through the window. This article adds...

"Gleason walked off stage, slamming a door which his partner in comedy, Art Carney, was to enter a moment later."

Add more info, but add more confusion as to which episode this is from...

Thanks to Bill S. for the heads up!

Found this article much easier to read.

BTW, here is another story for the "Climax" incident which took place 10/7/54.

http://lostmedia.wikia.com/wiki/Climax!_Premiere_Episode_%22The_Long_Goodbye%22_(1950s_CBS_TV_Show)

Here is the page from Audrey Meadow's book "Love, Alice."
The mystery continues...

more headlines about this....

2 new articles I found about this event...

The last article posted dated 1/16/55 is the oldest article I could find on this.

If this occurred during "Halloween Party For The Boss" 10/30/54,
this would make this article 75 days after the incident.