{"id":25946,"date":"2017-08-04T07:44:29","date_gmt":"2017-08-04T11:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=25946"},"modified":"2017-08-04T11:10:31","modified_gmt":"2017-08-04T15:10:31","slug":"bananasplits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2017\/08\/04\/bananasplits\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: The Banana Splits Adventure Hour"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 600:<\/strong> \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d (1968-70 television series).<\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> Bits and pieces can be found on YouTube.<\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> None.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: <\/strong>It is a bit complicated.<\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> Not in its original form.<\/p>\n

Contemporary children\u2019s television is a fairly boring scene that offers little in the way of genuine fun for the young viewers. Indeed, some shows are so lacking in energy and personality that you can\u2019t help but wonder if the programming is designed to narcotize the kiddie audience into a state of numbness.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Things were quite different when I was a kid. My first memory of Saturday morning television involved a wild and wacky NBC-aired program that debuted in 1968 and gave its audience visceral doses of laughter, music and thrills \u2013 I was four years old, and the impact it had on me still resonates. The program is \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour,\u201d and while has not been seen in its original state since going off the air in 1970, there are still enough tantalizing bits and pieces floating about that offer irrefutable evidence of its originality and charm.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d marked the first foray by the animation studio Hanna-Barbera into live-action programming. The idea for the show was a bizarre mix of two popular television shows of the mid-1960s, \u201cThe Monkees\u201d and \u201cRowan and Martin\u2019s Laugh-In.\u201d From \u201cThe Monkees,\u201d the program would follow the antics of a freewheeling rock-and-roll band, complete with musical sequences with the performers running amok in oddball situations. From \u201cRowan and Martin\u2019s Laugh-In,\u201d the show borrowed the set-up of a rapid-fire skein of sight gags and jokes within a psychedelic setting.<\/p>\n

The one original aspect was the cast: four anthropomorphic animals, each with its own zany personality, that made up the group called The Banana Splits. The leader of this squad was a yellow-tan dog named Fleegle, who spoke in an exasperated manner laced with a harsh lisp \u2013 Paul Winchell did the voice performance for Fleegle. Also in the group was a smiling orange ape named Bingo (voiced by Daws Messick), a grungy lion with a slacker vibe named Drooper (voiced by Allan Melvin with a Southern drawl), and a strange looking woolly elephant with polka-dot ears named Snorky (whose communication was achieved in a series of horn honking noises). All four of the animals wore matching red hats and all but Fleegle sported oversized sunglasses. Sid and Marty Krofft designed the animal costumes, but otherwise played no role in the program.<\/p>\n

The Banana Splits congregated in a clubhouse full of surreal nonsense, including an insulting cuckoo clock bird that constantly pointed out the group\u2019s shortcomings and a talking gnu head hanging on the wall that served as doom-and-gloom commentator. The clubhouse d\u00e9cor had a groovy Peter Max-style vibe, but the shenanigans that went on within its walls \u2013 including the driving of dune buggies through the building, an omnivorous garbage can, and slapstick knockabout including the inevitable pie in the face \u2013 was pure vaudeville. Occasionally, The Banana Splits were visited by a rival gang called The Sour Grapes Bunch, which consisted of little girls in purple mini-skirts who terrified the oversized animals with their dancing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d opened with what could arguably be considered the greatest television theme song of all time, \u201cThe Tra La La Song.\u201d This happy, trippy tune promised the viewer \u201clots of fun for everyone\u201d while a montage of The Banana Splits cavorting in an amusement park or acting silly in their clubhouse fills the screen.<\/p>\n

After its great opening, each character is introduced individually, which is followed by Fleegle trying to maintain some degree of order in their clubhouse. The show is peppered with Hanna-Barbera animated sequences \u2013 a pair of light comic adventures, \u201cThe Three Musketeers\u201d and \u201cThe Arabian Knights\u201d \u2013 as well as a live-action cliffhanger serial called \u201cDanger Island,\u201d which focused on the search for lost treasure in the South Seas. A young Jan-Michael Vincent was cast in those episodes as the son the expedition\u2019s leader, and the serial was directed by an up-and-coming filmmaker named Richard Donner.<\/p>\n

But the real surprise with \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d was the show\u2019s musical interludes. The song selection ran a diverse gamut from bubblegum pop (\u201cI Enjoy Being a Boy,\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s a Good Day for a Parade\u201d) to funk (the dance tune \u201cDoin\u2019 the Banana Split,\u201d with Barry White as the lead singer) to show tune-style ditties (\u201cThe Beautiful Calliopa\u201d) to Class-A pop (Gene Pitney\u2019s comic \u201cTwo-Ton Tessie\u201d and the uncommonly mature ballad \u201cWait Till Tomorrow\u201d). The music sequences found The Banana Splits in playful settings \u2013 \u201cWait Till Tomorrow\u201d had them cavorting across San Francisco, \u201cIt\u2019s a Good Day for a Parade\u201d had them disrupt a Confederate (!) military drill exercise in an amusement park \u2013 and sometimes the sequences were highlighted with flashes of psychedelic animation reminiscent of the \u201c2001\u201d trip to Jupiter and beyond. For a kiddie show, this was extraordinarily elaborate.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d was sponsored by Kellogg\u2019s, and the commercial breaks featured the characters hawking the various breakfast cereals produced by the show\u2019s corporate backer. Kellogg\u2019s, in turn, prominently featured The Banana Splits on their cereal boxes and also produced show-inspired merchandising.<\/p>\n

The program was a big hit in its initial 1968-69 season, and Hanna-Barbera turned out a second season. But a few changes were made: the woolly Snorky was replaced with a new character design that more closely resembled an elephant, and \u201cThe Three Musketeers\u201d cartoons were replaced with another Hanna-Barbera work, \u201cThe Hillbilly Bears.\u201d Kellogg\u2019s returned as the show\u2019s sponsor in its second season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d was not continued when the second season ended in 1970. The show was still very popular, but clearly the expense of producing a live-action program with original music proved too costly for Hanna-Barbera, which returned its focus to animation. Ideally, Hanna-Barbera would sell the episodes into syndicated channels, but several problems popped up here. For starters, Kellogg\u2019s ended its sponsorship when the show went off NBC, so all references to the company needed to be removed. Also, syndicated children\u2019s programming was strictly for half-hour time slots, so \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d needed to be cut in half. And music clearance issues for the various songs created for the program also had to be addressed.<\/p>\n

For years, Hanna-Barbera offered a half-hour syndicated \u201cThe Banana Splits and Friends,\u201d which seemed to put more emphasis on the \u201cFriends\u201d (in this case, the studio\u2019s animated cartoons). Only the episodes from the first season were included in the syndicated package, but strangely the opening and closing credits from the second season were used for syndication \u2013 which resulted in the replacement Snorky being seen in the opening and closing but the original woolly Snorky seen in the body of the program. Hanna-Barbera revived the characters for a one-shot animated film, \u201cThe Banana Splits in Hocus Pocus Park,\u201d but then dropped the concept.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, the memory of \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d was maintained by many fans \u2013 including music stars Liz Phair and The Dickies, who recorded covers of The Banana Splits\u2019 tunes. And, most notably, Bob Marley borrowed a riff from \u201cThe Tra La La Song\u201d for his reggae classic \u201cBuffalo Soldier.\u201d Warner Bros. attempted to revive the characters in 2008 for a Cartoon Network series, but it lacked the inventive fun of the original offering and quickly folded.<\/p>\n

Warner Bros. also released a DVD based on the truncated \u201cThe Banana Splits and Friends,\u201d but only on the European Region 2 DVD \u2013 it is not clear why there was no U.S. release. There have also been at least two bootlegged video releases culled from the syndicated version.<\/p>\n

Mercifully, some enterprising Banana Splits fans have managed to rescue long-lost clips from the original series to share on YouTube. If you hunt around, you can find the original opening title sequence from the 1968-69 season, with the woolly Snorky as part of the pack. A few Kellogg\u2019s commercials from the second season are also available, including one with the quartet selling cereal through a \u201cLaugh-In\u201d-style joke wall. There are also several sight-gag and sketch numbers from the elusive second season, as well as a viewer-edited version of the original \u201cTwo-Ton Tessie\u201d musical sequence (the syndicated version of the show chopped the song into two parts).<\/p>\n

The likelihood of a full DVD offering of the complete and original two-season run of \u201cThe Banana Splits Adventure Hour\u201d is scant, which is a major shame because this was (and still is) a highly entertaining show. And going back to my original rant, I would hope that today\u2019s kids find a way to sneak off from the dreary children\u2019s programming that is polluting the airwaves today and get introduced to Fleegle, Bingo, Drooper and Snorky \u2013 they will be so much better off for having the jubilant comedy of The Banana Splits in their young lives.<\/p>\n

P.S.<\/strong>This column marks the 600th entry in The Bootleg Files, which began in 2003 on the original Film Threat site and migrated here to Cinema Crazed in February. I would like to thank Felix Vasquez Jr., the publisher of Cinema Crazed, for having The Bootleg Files back online on this site, and I would especially like to thank the column’s readers for their support and friendship over the past 14 years.
\n
\nIMPORTANT NOTICE: While this weekly column acknowledges the presence of rare film and television productions through the so-called collector-to-collector market, this should not be seen as encouraging or condoning the unauthorized duplication and distribution of copyright-protected material, either through DVDs or Blu-ray discs or through postings on Internet video sites.<\/em><\/p>\n

Listen to \u201cThe Online Movie Show with Phil Hall<\/a>\u201d on SoundCloud, with new episodes beginning on September 11.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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