I finally got to see the film Alice Doesn't Live Here Any More from which the Alice series is taken and now I certainly have a better perspective on the series. The film was quite a bit more serious than this TV situation comedy. In fact in only the last third of the film does Melvin Sharples and his diner figure into the plot of the film.But it's the whole show here. Vic Tayback was the only member of the cast of the film to repeat his role. In the film Alice is fleeing from Phoenix after a bad relationship and she stops in Tucson and takes a job at Mel's Diner to pay the rent and save up before she moves on to California. Here Linda Lavin has settled in at Mel's Diner and while the show centers around her trying to raise her son Philip McKeon, the other members of Mel's wait staff also have episodes centering around them. Beth Howland plays Vera the somewhat naive one and Flo, the one who's seen it all was the irrepressible Polly Holiday. That catchphrase of her's 'kiss my grits' became legendary. Oddly enough when Holiday quit the women who played Flo in the film, Diane Ladd joined the cast. But the show really lost something after Holiday quit.Alice the series was a bit more family oriented than the mature drama the film was. Still those servers in Mel's Diner and Mel himself made an indelible impression bridging those Carter-Reagan years in the American psyche.

http://www.liquidation-dvd-sets.com/product.php?productid=3932344 Finally Alice is on DVD.....I grew up watching this series.....Loved all the shows even when FLO left.....A lot of people said the show was not as good when FLO, left...But to me a die hard fan, did not mind....Everyone brought something to the show.....I would love to see this in reruns on TV Land or somewhere....Cannot believe the DVD set of the complete TV series is under 100 bucks..Just hope the quality is good....What does everyone else thank of FLO's series...I thought it was okay, but it should have bee more revolved around another diner which FLO was the owner....Thanks

This was one of the funniest shows of its time, at least for the first few years when Polly Holliday was still on. People may call it trashy, but I look at it as a comedy about everyday people and didn't rely on politics or lots of slapstick like a lot of other shows that were around when this one was. The characters all blended nicely. You had working mother Alice, man hungry Flo, dim bulb Vera and gruff on the outside, but tender on the inside Mel. Also, you had the diner patrons in Earl and Henry who helped to make this show what it was. The only thing I didn't like about the show were the constant attempts to try to replace the person who was the one breakout character on the show, Flo. She pretty much invented one of the most memorable catch phrases of the 1970's in kiss my grits and she was the main reason people tuned in every week to watch the show. Dianne Ladd was okay as Belle, but once Celia Weston came in as Jolene, that pretty much ended my love for this show.

Am I the only one who ever caught this? There is an episode of "The Flintstones" involving Fred and money hidden in a bowling ball, where he gets a burglar to write a fake apology note explaining the disappearance of the money even though he is the one that really took it. The writers were so lazy that they actually took that episode and converted it, virtually line for line, into an episode of "Alice." What were they thinking, "HooHaa, anyone who watches this show is so stupid they'll never realize it!" ? Talk about reheating those leftovers in that diner! Think I'll pass.