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Brothers Sid and Marty Krofft first came to fame with their touring puppet show "Les Poupées de Paris" in the 1970s which featured topless puppets, and puppet-on-puppet sex long before Avenue Q or Team America. They later made the move to television with the trippy H.R. Pufnstuf in 1969, which they swear was not drug influenced, nor was the Donny & Marie show, which they created as well. But here at io9, we'll always remember their wacky-ass forays into science fiction. Find out everything you wanted to know about the Krofft scifi shows of yesteryear in today's triviagasm.
- The first attempt by the Kroffts to bring scifi the masses was arguably The Bugaloos. You've got mutant kids with wings, a crazy mad scientist lady named Benita Bizarre who wanted to capture them, and Billy Barty as a humanoid firefly.
- Little known fact: Phil Collins actually auditioned to be a Bugaloo in 1970, before later joining Genesis that year. Who knows what would've happened to all those copies of No Jacket Required if he would've become a mutant.
- While The Bugaloos only lasted one season, the next show with a scifi bent turned out to be Sigmund and the Sea Monsters in 1973. It ran for two seasons, and featured mutant monsters living near the sea. Sigmund was the nice monster, while his family wanted to make a living scaring humans.
- Little known fact: Sigmund was actually Billy Barty. The Kroffts sure loved this guy.
- In season two, Rip Taylor played an extremely effeminate genie named Sheldon who lived in a shell and had a penchant for making bad jokes and throwing confetti. Ouch.
- In 1974, the Kroffts scared thousands of kids by introducing the Sleestaks in Land of the Lost. We've already covered our secret obsession with this show in a triviagasm. In fact, we're waiting on a Pylon to show up any day on Lost.
- 1975's Far Out Space Nuts was the first Krofft show set in outer space, and it featured Bob "Gilligan" Denver and Chuck McCann as two hapless NASA employees who accidentally blast themselves into space when they hit the "launch" button instead of the "lunch" button. Nice button layout, NASA.
- Besides featuring a total ripoff on the Skipper/Gilligan dynamic, the show also starred their alien friend Honk who made honking noises instead of talking.
- Legendary actor John Carradine played an alien on the show, and according to Bob Denver's website his acting ability left Denver speechless.
- The Lost Saucer also first appeared in 1975, and like Far Out Space Nuts it only ran for one season as well. It featured Jim "Gomer Pyle" Nabors and Ruth Buzzi as two dingbat androids named Fum and Fi who land on Earth and invite a young boy and his babysitter aboard. However, as onlookers gather and the crowd starts to panic, the androids take off with Jerry and Alice still aboard. The ship, which can also travel through time, becomes damaged, and the series is all about the bumbling idiot-bots trying to return them home.
- The androids had a pet "dorse" aboard the ship, which was half dog, and half horse.
- Jim Nabors had a bizarre "elbow laser" that he frequently used to... er, comic effect.
- 1976 gave us The Krofft Supershow, which was a Saturday morning kid's variety show. It was made up of other shows and musical acts like Kaptain Kool & The Kongs. It introduced the world to my personal favorite Krofft creation, Dr. Shrinker. Three kids crash-land their plane on a mysterious island, and a creepy mad scientist and his assistant (played by Billy Barty, of course) shrink them down as an insidious experiment. For the rest of the show, the "Shrinkies" try to evade the Doctor and figure out how to re-enlarge themselves.
- Dr. Shrinker wanted to capture the Shrinkies to prove to the world that his shrinking ray worked, because it blew up after he shrunk them down. However, rather than try to repair it, he spent all of his time trying to catch the diminutive teens. What an idiot. As he said himself, "I chase the Shrinkies. I catch the Shrinkies. The Shrinkies escape. It's a vicious cycle and it's driving me mad!"
- The Krofft Supershow also gave us one season of Electra Woman and Dyna Girl, which borrowed heavily from the 1960s Batman television show, as well as Wonder Woman. The show featured two women who were reporters (in their spare time) and who could turn into superheroes with their "Electra-Change". They drove around in an "Electra-Car," had an "Electra-Base," and talked to their scientist buddy Frank via "Electra-Coms." They also had a huge variety of "Electra-Powers", like "Electra-Vision" and "Electra-Beams."
- The show starred Deidre Hall from Days of Our Lives as Electra Woman, and a new pilot for the show was shot in 2001 starring Markie Post as Electra Woman, but it did not get picked up. If the writer's strike would've lasted longer... who knows?
- We can't go without mentioning the bizarre Wonderbug show that was part of the Supershow. Three teenagers fight crime and solve mysteries with the help of their jalopy Schlep who could turn into a magical dune buggy when they honked his magic horn. It's not really science fiction, but it was a talking car long before K.I.T.T. ever was. Plus hey, he could fly. Try doing that with Turbo Boost.
- Sadly, with season two the Krofft Supershow dropped both Dr. Shrinker and Electra Woman and Dyna Girl. Instead, they added Magic Mongo, about a wacky genie, and Bigfoot and Wildboy, which was all about a boy orphaned in the Pacific Northwest who was raised by Bigfoot. Together they fight people who would do harm to the regions forest.
- Bigfoot and Wildboy actually got picked up as a standalone show for ABC, and they would edited two 15 minute shows together into one episode. The show featured a lot of 70s style slow-motion, to show how strong Bigfoot was. Kind of like The Six Million Dollar Man. Remember when Bigfoot was on that show? Look for more on that later.
- Probably the most bizarre thing the Kroffts ever produced (besides Lidsville) was The Krofft Superstar Hour in 1978. It was a reworking of The Krofft Supershow, and they dropped Kaptain Kool & The Kongs, and replaced them with the real life band The Bay City Rollers. They added two skit segments to the show called Horror Hotel, featuring Witchiepoo from Pufnstuf as a bitchy hotel owner, and The Lost Island, which is where things truly went wonky.
- The Lost Island featured cameo appearances by Enik the Sleestak, H.R. Pufnstuf, Sigmund the Sea Monster, and Dr. Shrinker, now called Dr. Deathray. They'd have bizarre interactions with the Bay City Rollers, and then there'd be a musical scene. True bizarreness. Check out Part One and Part Two of this mindmelting segment.
Comments
You've ruined the oh-so-hysterical "launch"/"lunch" pun.
Also, Dyna Girl = Debra Winger.
@Evil Tortie's Mom: Actually, a lot of people make that mistake, but Debra Winger was Wonder Girl from Wonder Woman, not Dyna Girl.
[www.imdb.com]
You know I've never really watched any of these programs, but it sure is nice just to comment nonetheless.
@Evil Tortie's Mom: Actually, "Dyna Girl was played by "Judy Strangis"
Holy shit, I haven't thought about these shows in years. It's like I'm having an acid flashback.
Which show was it that had a talking flute?
@Garrison Dean: My man, you don't know what you're missing.
The Kroffts laid such a strange template in my young brain, as I'm sure it has to others. Being so young in the 70's, and having these glimpses of half-memories...
Utter strangeness and impressionability, and emotions that have no name.
@extracrispy: That would be H.R. Pufnstuf. The Kroffts also said the the flute (Freddie) was the first openly gay character on television. Impressive.
@gods-n-clods: IT all looks pretty cool, but I came just a hair after all of this and by that point giant friendly puppets wouldnt' have been able to compete with Jedis and Transforming robots.
I would just like to top you all and say I've been to Sid Krofft's house.
And yes, it's just like you would expect.
Let's not forget the mall theme park, lasted a whole six months.
[en.wikipedia.org]
It's good to see this again - if anybody wants to have a look at the Saturday Morning line-up that same year, I've got it here;
[flickr.com]
Which is as good a time as any to tell you to have a look around io9 (the amount of space-themed shows in the 70s and 80s was high) and ask that if anybody has any comics with line-up ads, not found in my set, contact me. I want a copy!
I watched every single one of these when I was a kid but instead of warm feelings, I'm just appalled at my young self for liking this crap. I remember most of the comic line-ups posted by castewar as well, being a comic book nut.
Phil Collins? Have you ever seen Peter Gabriel's flower outfit? Genesis had already filled their one Bugaloo per band limit.
@Kevin Kelly: Well at least I can spell "lunch"!!!
Where did the Banana Splits come into all this?
@Evil Tortie's Mom: I think the Banana Splits were another franchise.
I always wondered about that kid's obsession with his flute on HR Puffnstuf.
However, if you ignored Holly, Land of the Lost was giddy fun, had sleestak, pylons, skylons, and that guy in the glittery keyed-out suit. It was weirdly moody partially because of the eerie low light video technology of the era.
Oh, I must say, the segment of Lost Island is totally psychotic. It's almost like Ed Wood got ahold of Sid and Marty Krofft's outtakes and wrote a movie around them.
Bob Denver's dead, and yet he maintains a web site?
This is truly a strange, bizarre world we live in.
Electra Woman always made me feel funny in the pants. Far Out Space Nuts was a favorite of mine, among the others. I really have to tip my hat to the Kroffts, they were one wacked out drug jobs, and maybe the best things I can take from the 70s. Well, maybe after Lynda Carter.
This list describes my entire childhood years (minus Evil Knievel). These are the shows I try to describe to other people and they jsut stare back at me blankly. I know I didn't make this *#&$ up!
"Dr. Shrinker, Dr. Shrinker. He's an evil man with and evil mind...."
I still remember what Wonderbugs horns sounded like too.
@castewar: Awesome.
@darcymcgee: And it's really creepy! That woman's voice telling me about his legacy? The 1990s layout. It's straight out of Sid and Marty Krofft!
The ones above I did watch as a kid were such brilliant shows. The one's I didn't see I'm bummed I missed.
Especially Lost Island. That is incredible! (Although I will still take Speed Buggy over Wonderbug.)
Most awesome, however, is the music.
/Runs off to search for a Sid and Marty Krofft soundtrack.
I still love all these shows for purely sentimental reasons. I remember in elementary school we used to sing:
Dr. Stinker
Dr. Stinker
He's the man with the smelly behind.
Ah, youth...
Wonderbug rocked! That was one of my fave live action Saturday shows as a kid, even though I thought something wasn't quite right about the green screen flying. And this is before I knew how they made green screen effects.
One other trivia tidbit: Richard Kiel, aka "Jaws" from the James Bond movies was a Sleestak.
Wow! I had completely forgotten these shows, but I watched most of them. Ah, the memories.
Yep. Count me in as having watched all of these religiously.
There were the Captain Marvel / Isis live action shows as well. Good stuff.
Valley of the Dinosaurs was a Saturday morning cartoon around the same time that was arguably a pre-cursor to Land of The Lost; some similar plot points and situations. I loved that one.
Also extra props to Banana Splits, but that was an after-school watching thing, not a Saturday morning watching thing. I loved Danger Island in particular ("Uhoh, Chango!").
1) Electra Woman and Dyna Girl -- mmmmmmmm.
2) You need to give proper acknowledgment to Land of the Lost. It had writers like Larry Niven, Theodore Sturgeon, Ben Bova, as well as a bunch of Star Trek refugees like D.C. Fontana, Walter Koenig, and David Gerrold. That's more sci-fi cred than any show out now.
I remember watching some of those shows. No wonder I turned out kind of strange.
Sid & Marty Kroft are almost certainly the strangest people outside of institutions in the world. I mean, they make Zoltan the sexbot guy from a few days ago seem utterly mainstream. I'm continually amazed that they ever got one of their shows on the air, much less the dozen or so that actually aired. They must have enormous blackmail files, or something.
@edosan:
Yes, it is more sci-fi cred than anything on the air today. And yet, it was still horrible.
-Kle.
Me too.
Wow. I loved Schlep-car. They used to show Wonderbug during "Kids Are People Too" with Bob McAllistair and then late with Michael Young.
I never did get much in S&MK's Super Hour, but I did usually catch Bigfoot and Wildboy. Oh, and Korg and Valley of the Dinosaurs.
I loved Land of the Lost. Grumpy used to give me nightmares... Far Out Space was great when you are eight!
But let's also give some love for Shazam/Captain Marvel and Isis... Now Isis, she made my pants-area feel all wierd..!
The Banana Splits were not a Krofft show. The Kroffts did design the Splits costumes though.
For more Krofft, check out KROFFT.NET or the Krofft Fact Sheet.
Yep, Zoltan's tame compared to Sid and Marty. Heck, one of them lives in a house without a roof and eats only raw vegetables.
I'm lucky, because I can watch these shows whenever I want to. Back in the 90s Columbia House released a series of VHS tapes of these shows, and I got 'em all. There's nothing like sitting down with a bowl of Cocoa Puffs in front of an episode of Lidsville. Except I'm older now. And I don't fit in my Wildboy Underoos anymore.
Oh, and be sure to read Pufnstuf & Other Stuff: The Weird and Wonderful World of Sid & Marty Krofft if you're into this stuff. It's quite the page turner.
@Evil Tortie's Mom: Hey, at least I can spell "launch"... twice!
The Banana Splits weren't a Krofft creation, they just designed the costumes for the characters, sadly.
@darcymcgee: I think his wife runs it now... it's got some good stuff on it!
@ttrentham: I think that was "Chongo", but man you just blew my mind. I freaking LOVED Danger Island as a kid.
@edosan: Check out our Land of the Lost triviagasm for proper cred!
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