Episode Reviews: "Letter To The Boss" & "Stand-In For Murder" (updated versions):

[Frank Gannucci]

Episode#90
TV: Only shown once on TV.
VHS/DVD: Never has been released.
This later version of “Letter To The Boss” has never been released. I have never seen it, but I have seen the original. I am sure it is one and the same so…

Alice is home and Trixie stops by to borrow a cup. Alice is taking out the right sleeves in Ralph's underwear. His right arm gets hot in the bus. His left one doesn't, because that's the arm he puts out the window. After Alice and Trixie make plans, Trixie leaves. Ralph come home and says that he's not hungry because he's just been fired from the bus company after nine years. Ralph complains about all the inconveniences he had to put up with as a driver like drunks trying to get on the bus without paying, old women yelling at him etc. Alice: "Don't worry Ralph' You'll get another job." Ralph: "Sure, I will but not a good one like this one." Ha! Ralph: "We'll have to change our style of living, that's all. Move out of here into a cheap apartment." Ralph: "Get rid of this furniture and get some second-hand stuff." There goes that man's laughing again. Ralph says to Alice that they will have to live of whatever money they have. Alice: "Swell. That will take care for tonight, but what about tomorrow?" Ha!

Ralph mentions that they should live with Alice's parents for the time being but Alice nixes that idea. He also brings up some job ads listed in the paper, but they are all for women. Ralph mentions that he only finished his schooling after the sixth grade. It would have been worse if he continued his schooling because it would be embarrassing if he, as a college graduate, being fired from a bus company. Ed Norton comes down, expecting to go bowling. Ralph says that he lost his job. Ed tries to cheer Ralph up, but only makes Ralph feel worse. Ralph hits on the idea that he will write a nasty letter to Mr. J.J. Marshall. Alice objects but her opinion falls on deaf ears. Ralph tells Norton to write what Ralph says. Here is the letter:

"Dear Mr. Marshall:

You dirty bum! You are a miserable low-life. You ought to turn in your membership card to the human race. After nine years of loyal service, I can truthfully say that you are the world's meanest man. You dirty bum!"

MPI Video says that this is a classic Kramden letter. Honeymooners.net says that the line of: "You dirty bum!" is delivered with such conviction that it looks like Ralph invented the insult for the occasion. This should to be shown to every getting a job-related class under the heading: "What not to write to your boss after you get fired." Both claims are probably correct. Ralph: "Sign it! ' Respectuflly yours: Etc. Etc.'" Ed goes out to mail the letter and says that he could get Ralph a job in the sewer. All he has to do is pass the floating test. Ha! Ed leaves. Ralph says to Alice that he used to get little kids on the bus and that he would let them pretend that they are driving the bus. Ralph: "Wait a minute! It's probably one of those brats that is taking my job." Freddie Muller comes by and says that Ralph hasn't been fired, but promoted. Ralph leaves to go get Ed before he mails the letter.

At the bowling alley, Ed fools around the custodian. He says that since he forgot to mail the letter and asks the custodian to mail it. What does the custodian get in return? Ed is going to try very hard not to litter the floor. Ha! Ralph comes in and finds out that his letter has been mailed and is worried that he will be really fired. Ed: "If he fires, you, send him another nasty letter." Ha! Ed is wearing his traditional Ed Norton outfit but he's wearing a longer, buttoned shirt. Ralph hatches a plan to get the letter. Ed: "What do I get in return?" Ralph: "That's a very selfish thing to say after what I did for you. Remember that race last year? You needed money to bet on that horse." Ed: "You didn't give me the money?" Ralph: "Yeah, the horse lost didn't he?" But when a policeman hears it, Ralph and Ed lie to him saying that they are rehearsing for a play. Ed (to the policeman): "Remember that 3rd grade class play and you were a tree?" Ralph says that he will give the policeman tickets. He leaves. Ed says that they have to get his address so they can send him the tickets. Ralph: "Only I have got a bosom friend like this."

They go outside to get the letter out of the mailbox. Ralph tells Ed to keep a look out in case someone comes by. Ed: "If you are worried about people seeing you getting a letter out of there, how do you think they will react when they see you climbing into it?" Ralph: "Boy, would I love to put one right through." In other words, he wanted to punch Ed. Ed has a solution. Ralph can't get the letter out. Ralph tries to get the letter out, but Ed says that someone is coming. Ed was just practicing to say that, so Ralph gets angry with him.

A mailman comes by and sees Ralph and Ed having the box almost upside-down so Ralph tries to cover it up. The mailman gets the mail out of the box and the the custodian comes by and says that he just gave the letter that Ed gave him to the mailman.

The next day, Ralph tries to get the letter before his boss reads it. He fails and the boss reads Ralph's letter. He doesn't mind the insults because he always gets them but becomes mad when the author didn't sign his name. Ralph happily faints.

At home, Ralph plans to go to the Royal Chinese Gardens and explains Alice the good news. Ed comes down to explain the fact that he went down and said Ralph didn't mean all of those insults that he wrote in the letter. He felt he had to do it out of niceness. Ed: "Whenever you are in trouble, Ed Norton lives upstairs." Ralph faints in a break dance style.

Episode #91
TV: Only seen once. It was shown at a R.A.L.P.H. convention in 1985. One of the people who posted on this board saw it. (I don't know who it was.)
VHS/DVD: For whatever reason, only the older and unfinished version has been released. Not this one.

A mob boss, who is a dead
ringer for Ralph, is holed up in his apartment because a rival gang leader, Barney Hackett, wants to bump him off. The guy (played by Jackie Gleason) wants to go to South America with the rest of the gang. Nick, one of his henchman, just came of a bus in which the driver, looks exactly like his boss. I wonder why? Nick (played by George Petrie) says that he offered the driver the idea of being a boss of an insurance executive at an insurance company. When Ralph up in the aparatment, the will get the rival mob gang to kill Ralph. (The rival gang will think that Ralph is the boss of the other gang.) Boss: "When that happens, we will all go to South America and it will be a Mardi Gras for the rest of my life."

Alice is home mixing plaster. She dances to "In The Mood" which is being played on the radio. Ed comes in and dances to the music with the bowl of plaster in his hands. Alice turns off the radio. Ed suggests that they all go out dancing one night. Ralph hates dancing so Ed says to bring th bowl. Ed tastes the plaster thinking it was icing. He tells Alice that. Ralph comes home and tastes the plaster thinking that it is icing. Alice greets Ralph and says that Ed tasted the plaster thinking it was icing. Alice: "Who would do a thing like that?" Ralph: "Nobody that I know." Sure Ralph. Ralph then says that one person offered him the job of being an insurance executive of an insurance company (whose name he doesn't even know). Alice gets suspicious. Ralph says that Alice has got no faith in him. Alice then offers Ralph and Ed some food for dinner. Ed helps himself and takes more on his dish than Ralp does. They eat while Ed talks about a similar situation that happened to him about someone offering him a better job than the one he had. That is how he got his job in the sewer. Ha! Ralph: "I'm mad at Alice becuase she thinks that there is no one stupid enough to offer me a job." Ed: "This guy sounds stupid enough." The guys who offered Ralph the job come in. Ralph says that he doesn't want to leave the driving job if this job wasn't steady. Man: "I'll tell you, you will have this job for the rest of your life." They start by offering Ralph $400 a week. Ralph coughs. The money is raised to $500 Ralph: "Norton, give me some water." Ed: "Keep coughing Ralph. You will be a millionaire in no time." The money is raised to $600 a week a Park Avenue apartment, and a chauffeured limousine. Alice can't stay with Ralph for the first days because the president will be in town and having Alice around will make the situation worse. Sure, it will. They leave and Alice comes back. Ralph tells Alice what happened and the news about the job. She is mad because he has to stay here for the first few days of Ralph's new job.

On the first day of the job, the boss is talking with one of his henchmen about how they are going to knock of Ralph. They are going to put Ralph in there as bait and when he opens up the blinds, that will be the signal for the Hackett mob to shoot and kill. A knock on the door is heard, so the boss hides in back of a screen. The henchman takes his time to answer the door. He probably did that to give Jackie more time to go into his Ralph Kramden character. (Remember back then, they didn't have the technology to put two characters played by one person in the same room on TV plus this episode was done live.) Ralph Kradmen comes in and says that this partment looks nicer than his old one when it ws brand new. He gets shown the bedroom, while the henchman talks from the main room what Ralph can find in the bedroom. He locks the bedroom door while the boss emerges from in back of the screen. That's revealing the fact that the "bedroom" had a passageway that lead to the back of the screen. Ed Norton comes in and talks to the boss thinking that it is Ralph. He even takes the bosses hat and "improves" it. That's funny. The boss and the henchman leave. Ralph emerges from the bedroom (which by this time must have been unlocked or it probably wasn't locked at all.) Ralph greets Ed and asks him when did he get here. Ed says that he was just talking to him. Ralph: "I guess I didn't hear you." The phone rings and it's Nick. He says that they just got Ralph a new car. Ralph goes to the window to open the blinds but changes his mind when Ed says that they can view it outside. They leave and slam the door which causes the blinds to open and the mob from across the street (which incidentally is the Hackett mob) starts shooting.

Next, Nick sends Ralph to Hackett's headquarters, to "sell him insurance." When Ralph walks in, Hackett thinks it's his archenemy looking for a showdown. Ralph doesn't suspect a thing. Barney's gang is shown to Ralph and Hackett calls him his family. Ralph: "Lovely family." Just as Ralph is invited to step into the back room, a cop walks in and insists that Ralph move his car.

When Ralph shows up at the apartment again with Ed, Nick decides they'll have to bump off Ralph themselves, and then dump his body in front of Hackett's joint. He mistakes his boss for Ralph, knocks him cold, and deposits him in the bedroom. They leave and Ralph hears a knock on the door. It's Alice. Alice comes by to visit Ralph on his first day on the job. Another knock on the door is heard and it's the boss' girlfriend. She hugs Ralph (thinking he is the boss) and Alice sees it and spark fly. Ralph says that he doens't know her while the girl claims that he does. She leaves. Ralph then spots the boss on the bed. Alice then calls the cops. Ralph: "So that's why she called me Harry." (Harry was the boss' name.) And Ralph's new carrer comes to an end. According to the one person who saw this episode at a R.A.L.P.H. convention who posted on this board, he remembered the Kramdens & Ed being happy in the end. The crooks also got what was coming to them.

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