50 free The Honeymooners trivia questions with answers. Bang, zoom! This quiz covers the whole run of The Honeymooners, from the six-minute DuMont sketch in 1951 through the Classic 39 episodes on CBS, the lost kinescopes Jackie Gleason kept in his vault, the colour musical revivals from Miami Beach and the 1978 specials that closed the story. Fifty questions ask about Ralph, Alice, Ed and Trixie, the actors who played them (and the ones who played them first), the Chauncey Street tenement, the Gotham Bus Company and the Raccoon Lodge. The easy questions want the bus driver's threat to Alice and the cartoon family that copied the Kramdens; the hard ones want Ed's middle name, the film system the show was shot on, the union that made Ralph an honorary member and the space probe with an instrument named after him. It suits anyone who watches the WPIX New Year's marathon every year, and anyone who wants to know why a 39-episode sitcom is still on the air seventy years later. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's article on the show, and each question carries the sentence that backs it up.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Ralph Kramden was employed as a driver by which fictional New York firm?
Gotham Bus Company
Ralph is never actually seen driving a bus in the show, apart from publicity photos, though he turns up at the depot now and then.
Q 02Ed Norton, Ralph's upstairs neighbour and best friend, worked for which New York City department?
The sewers
He described the job as 'sub-supervisor in the sub-division of the department of subterranean sanitation, I just keep things moving along.'
Q 03Ralph and Ed were both enthusiastic members of which fraternal lodge?
The Loyal Order of Raccoons
A blackboard at the lodge shows Ralph's dues in arrears in more than one episode.
Q 04Who played Alice Kramden in the Classic 39 episodes of 1955-56?
Audrey Meadows
Meadows was the third actress to play Alice; she later became a banker.
Q 05Which actor played Ed Norton throughout every version of the show?
Art Carney
Gleason recast both wives when the show moved to Miami but insisted Norton should never be played by anyone else.
Q 06Who played Trixie Norton in the Classic 39 episodes?
Joyce Randolph
Randolph did not appear in every episode and was paid $500 a week, against Carney's $3,500.
Q 07The Honeymooners began as a sketch on Cavalcade of Stars, on which struggling early network?
DuMont
Gleason's sketches lifted Cavalcade of Stars' audience share from 9% to 25%, but the network still could not afford to keep him.
Q 08The Honeymooners' filmed sitcom lasted one season. How many episodes were made, giving the run its nickname?
39
Gleason's contract actually called for 78 episodes over two seasons, with an option for 39 more.
Q 09Which car maker sponsored the 1955-56 series ('Brought to you by your ___ dealer')?
Buick
The sponsor plugs were cut when the show entered syndication in 1957.
Q 10What was the address of the Kramdens' and Nortons' apartment building?
328 Chauncey Street
Gleason himself grew up on Chauncey Street, and modelled the set on the apartment he remembered.
Q 11The Kramdens' neglected tenement apartment was in which New York City borough?
Brooklyn
The real 328 Chauncey Street is in Stuyvesant Heights, about eight miles from where the show pretends it is.
Q 12Ralph's most famous hollow threat to Alice was to send her where?
To the Moon
He never once carried it out, and Alice never once backed down.
Q 13Who played Alice in the first nine sketches of 1951-52?
Pert Kelton
Kelton was nine years older than Gleason, and the early sketches were far darker than the later series.
Q 21What did Gleason do on stage to signal to the cast that he had forgotten a line?
Patted his stomach
Meadows had her own cue: a glance at the icebox when someone else was supposed to fetch something from it.
Q 22Ed Norton served in which branch of the US military during World War II?
The Navy
He spent his G.I. Bill money on typing school but could not stand working in confined spaces.
Q 23Ed once admitted to holding how many charge accounts, which helped explain his nicer apartment?
19
He earned exactly the same $62 a week as Ralph but lived noticeably better.
Q 14Why did the original Alice lose the role when Gleason moved to CBS in 1952?
She had been blacklisted
Arthur Miller later wrote that the blacklisting traced to her husband marching in a May Day parade years earlier.
Q 15Gleason feared his new Alice was too attractive for the part. How did she change his mind?
She sent him photos of herself with no makeup
When Gleason learned the frumpy woman in the photos was Meadows, he reportedly said any dame with that sense of humour deserved the job.
Q 16Ralph Kramden was the model for the lead character of which 1960 Hanna-Barbera cartoon?
The Flintstones
Gleason considered suing but decided that being 'the guy who yanked Fred Flintstone off the air' was bad publicity.
Q 17Ed Norton's design, clothing and mannerisms also inspired which Hanna-Barbera cartoon character?
Yogi Bear
Ed also became Barney Rubble, just as Trixie became Betty Rubble.
Q 18Who composed the show's instrumental theme, 'You're My Greatest Love'?
Jackie Gleason
Lyrics were written for it but never sung; Ray Bloch's orchestra performed it.
Q 19The Classic 39 were captured live on film using which early-1950s system?
Electronicam
The superior picture and sound is why the episodes rerun so well compared with other live shows of the era.
Q 20All 39 episodes were filmed before an audience of 1,000 at which Manhattan venue?
The Adelphi Theatre
Gleason refused full rehearsals, believing they robbed the show of spontaneity, so flubbed lines were common.
Q 24Ralph's father is mentioned in only one episode, as having given the young Ralph what?
A cornet
The episode is 'Young Man with a Horn', and Ralph refuses to throw the instrument away.
Q 25During the show's run, Ralph Kramden was made an honorary member of which real organisation?
The Transport Workers Union
A Brooklyn bus depot was later renamed for Gleason, and its buses carry a 'face on the Moon' sticker from the opening credits.
Q 26A bronze statue of Gleason in bus driver's uniform stands outside which New York landmark?
Port Authority Bus Terminal
TV Land paid for it in 1999; the plaque calls Ralph 'Bus Driver — Raccoon Lodge Treasurer — Dreamer'.
Q 27What was the name of Alice's sister, whose new marriage Ralph nearly wrecks in 'Here Comes the Bride'?
Agnes
Ralph's bad advice to the groom causes the trouble, but everything works out by the end.
Q 28In an early sketch the childless Kramdens briefly adopted a baby girl. What did they name her?
Ralphina
The biological mother asked for the baby back; Gleason insisted the couples stay childless.
Q 29Which actress played Trixie in a single sketch as an ex-burlesque dancer before the role was recast?
Elaine Stritch
Gleason rewrote Trixie as a wholesome housewife after just one appearance.
Q 30In the celebrated episode 'The $99,000 Answer', Ralph flubs the composer of which song?
Swanee River
TV Guide ranked the episode No. 6 on its 1997 list of the 100 greatest episodes of all time.