About Opentopia
Opentopia Directory Encyclopedia Tools

H.R. Pufnstuf

Encyclopedia : H : HR : HRP : H.R. Pufnstuf

 

H.R. Pufnstuf was a children's television series produced by Sid and Marty Krofft in the United States. There were seventeen episodes of the show, which ran from September 6, 1969 to September 4, 1971, but it was so successful that the NBC kept it on the Saturday morning schedule for a full three seasons. ABC carried repeats of the series for two more seasons from September 16, 1972 to September 1, 1974.

H.R. Pufnstuf introduced the Kroffts' most-used plot scenario, revolving around a boy named Jimmy, played by Jack Wild, who had accidentally found Living Island, a magical place where everything was alive. The Mayor of Living World was a friendly dragon named H.R. Pufnstuf, who was voiced by the show's writer, Lennie Weinrib. Jimmy had been lured to the island with his friend, a talking flute named Freddie, by a magic boat which promised adventures across the sea. The boat was actually owned and controlled by their nemesis, a wicked witch named Witchiepoo, played by Billie Hayes, who rode on a broomstick with a steering wheel called the "VroomBroom". Apart from Witchiepoo, all of the characters on Living Island were realized via large, cumbersome costumes or puppetry. Since everything on Living Island was alive - houses, castles, boats, grandfather clocks, candles, books, trees, mushrooms - virtually any part of the Living Island sets could become a character, usually voiced in a parody of a famous film star, such as Mae West, Edward G. Robinson or most notably John Wayne as "The West Wind".

The show's popularity in the late 1960s and early 1970s led to the release of a movie based on the show, called Pufnstuf, in 1970. The film featured guest appearances by Mama Cass Elliott and Martha Raye. The show and the movie were both notable for bright colors, fast edits, sped-up film, musical segments and pop culture in-jokes, and appealed to young adults almost as much as children.

The seventeen episodes of the TV series are available in a DVD box set. The film has also been offered on VHS, now out of print.

Contents

The show in pop culture

The show was the subject a successful lawsuit brought by the Kroffts against the fast food restaurant McDonald's, whose McDonaldland characters were found to have infringed the show's copyright. (Sid & Marty Krofft Television Productions, Inc. v. McDonald's Corp., 562 F.2d 1157, decided by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.)[link]

Many viewers believe the show contains subtle drug references, for example, the title character's name "Pufnstuf"can be interpreted as a term for smoking marijuana (puffin' stuff). The theme song of the show included the lyric "can't do a little, 'cause you can't do enough" which some people claim refers to the addictive nature of some drugs. Sid and Marty Krofft have both denied that there were any intentional drug references in H.R. Pufnstuf. Lennie Weinrib, the voice of Pufnstuf, has said, "I think fans gave it a kind of mysterious code-like meaning, like ‘Ah, was Pufnstuf puffing stuff? Like grass?’ Was it psychedelic? Was it drug oriented? Not to us, it wasn’t."

One of the most notable parodies of H.R. Pufnstuf was "The Altered State Of Druggachusetts", a segment on the HBO comedy series Mr. Show with Bob and David. The sketch is introduced by a description by "Sam and Criminy Kraffft" (Bob Odenkirk and David Cross), and the show features the characters nervous over the aspect of ordering a pizza, finding a telephone to use to order the pizza, and operating the telephone. The segment climaxes with "Professor Ellis D. Traills" (Tom Kenny) on a bad acid trip, tearing off his clothes, and being taken away to a van by a man in a tie-dyed shirt. The show is laced with other obvious drug puns and references, including the "Letsgit Highway", the "Canni-bus", and "Hallucino-Jenny".

Excerpts from the show can often be seen playing on the TV in the hotel room Earl and his brother share in My Name is Earl.

External links

TV show

Feature film

Other

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

Search Titles
0123456789
ABCDEFGHIJ
KLMNOPQRST
UVWXYZ?

E-mail this article to:

Personal Message: