In order to enjoy the movie updating of TV’s classic The Honeymooners, it’s best to forget about Jackie Gleason and Art Carney as Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton. I realize that’s not easy to do because those late, great actors made such wonderful magic together on the small screen. But if you go with the flow of the film and focus on the antics of Cedric the Entertainer and Mike Epps, who bring their own comic flair to these same roles, you might find the crazy schemes hatched by this new Kramden/Norton duo very funny indeed.

Kramden (Cedric), who drives a bus in New York City, always has big plans for making money. And he can count on his buddy Norton (Epps), a sewer “engineer,” to help -- no matter how farfetched the ideas. When Norton finds a train in the sewer system, lights go on in Kramden’s head. Why not buy the train and start up a touring business for visitors to the Big Apple? As in all of Kramden’s money-making ventures, he misses a few little details which sink the project. But there’s always another idea. And the next one is a dilly. Finding a greyhound in a dumpster, Kramden and Norton go into the dog racing business -- with the help of Dodge (John Leguizamo, hilarious in this supporting role), a less than up-and-up trainer.

Adding suspense to the comedy here, making lots of money in a hurry has suddenly become extremely important to Kramden and Norton. Why now? Because their wives Alice (Gabrielle Union) and Trixie (Regina Hall) want a duplex that will fall into the hands of an unscrupulous real estate dealer (Eric Stoltz) if they don’t come up with the purchase offer by the deadline date. Naturally, the women have been kept in the dark about their husbands’ financial shenanigans, so some amusing scenes showing the two men trying to hide their activities also contribute to the fun.

Although my favorite Cedric the Entertainer performance was the frustrated boss he played in Serving Sara, his work in The Honeymooners didn’t disappoint me. As far as I’m concerned, he always lives up to his name. He’s so entertaining to watch! Light on his feet and with sparks or sparkle -- depending on the situation -- in his eyes, he never holds back. You know he’s doing his best to give viewers their money’s worth. Epps (The Fighting Temptations) wouldn’t have been my first choice for the Ed Norton role, but he surprised me with his comic timing and sensitivity. Both Cedric and Epps made their characters quite likeable in spite of the stupid things they were doing.      

When I heard that a movie version of The Honeymooners was in the works, I thought, “Yikes, that’s probably a bad idea.” Turns out it wasn’t such a crazy scheme after all.

(Released by Paramount Pictures and rated “PG-13 for some innuendo and rude humor.)