VHS How To Frame A Figg
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"How to Frame a Figg" is a 1971 Universal Pictures comedy on VHS, released through MCA Universal Home Video in the clamshell format that defined the studio's early home video catalog. Don Knotts stars as Hollis Figg, a bumbling city bookkeeper who stumbles into municipal corruption and spends the rest of the picture trying to outrun people far smarter than he is. It is a G-rated studio comedy built entirely around Knotts doing what Knotts did better than anyone else in that era.
By 1971, Don Knotts was operating in a specific register of American comedy that barely exists anymore. He had already wrapped his run as Barney Fife on "The Andy Griffith Show" in 1968, had taken his first solo Universal feature with "The Reluctant Astronaut" in 1967, and had built a reliable theatrical comedy pipeline with the studio across the late 1960s into the early 1970s. "Figg" came out the same year as "The Reluctant Astronaut" was still cycling through television syndication. The audience for this film knew exactly what they were getting: Knotts in a suit, eyes wide, neck craning, panic in full effect. Universal knew it too, which is why the painted clamshell artwork puts him front and center in a tan suit and polka-dot bow tie, that expression locked in. The MCA Universal Home Video imprint on this release places it in the early home video wave, when studios were pressing back-catalog comedies to fill rental shelves alongside new theatrical titles.
The blue banner, the painted cover, the exact expression Knotts deployed for twenty years.
The clamshell case carries painted cover art rather than a photo-composite design, which is consistent with early MCA Universal VHS releases from the late 1970s and into the 1980s. The Knotts likeness on the cover is recognizable without being photographic, a deliberate production choice for that print run. Condition on a piece this age comes down to the case seam and the cassette housing. Check the spine seam where the clamshell hinges, as splits are common on early-format plastic. Then flip it and look at the tape window on the cassette itself: the ribbon should sit flat inside the housing with no slack or visible creasing near the leader edge.
OWNER VERIFY: Confirm the MCA Universal Home Video pressing year from the cassette label or case spine copyright line, as clamshell VHS releases of this title span multiple print runs across the late 1970s and 1980s.
The blue banner, the painted cover, the exact expression Knotts deployed for twenty years.
The Rental Counter
Before streaming flattened the difference between movies, VHS was a physical act. Rentals, buybacks, Blockbuster sleeves, promo tapes, ex-rentals with security stickers still on the side. 70s tapes outlived the stores they came from. We keep them in their original cases where possible and note every sticker, sun-fade, and sleeve crease in the photography.
INSPECTED IN STORE / 707 E FREMONT, LAS VEGAS
Inspected in Las Vegas on June 2026. Each piece is a single unit, sold as inspected.
KEEP IT CLASSIC
This vhs how to frame a figg originates from the 70s era[01], represents Universal Studios[02]'s output, . Each piece in the shop is a single unit, inspected by hand in Las Vegas before listing. The data manifest to the right records the fields on file for this lot; where a field is empty it has been omitted rather than guessed.
INSPECTED IN STORE / 707 E FREMONT, LAS VEGAS
- VENDOR
- Universal Studios
- ERA
- 70s
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Every piece in the shop is a single unit. Once it is gone, it is gone.
707 E Fremont Street, Suite 1170, ground floor, east side of Downtown Container Park.
