Famous Classic Tales, Kenner Toys, and Ice Bird Treats

The holiday TV tradition of FAMOUS CLASSIC TALES specials by Hanna-Barbera, API, and Ruby-Spears from Kenner Toys is explored with author/historian MICHAEL LYONS.

Episode Transcript

(00:52):
Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, we love Hanna
Barbera. Welcome to the fantastic world
of Hanna and Barbera, a celebration of Bill, Hannah,

(01:14):
Joe, Barbera and the thousands of people, past and present who
have shared in their entertainment tradition.
And now your host, Greg Garbar. Thank you, Chris Anthony,
welcome to our podcast. And we're welcoming back a very,
very dear friend and excellent author and a remarkable

(01:36):
historian who has talked to someof the best and brightest in the
industry and is very, as my grandmother would say, erudite
talking about these subjects in depth, detail and insightfully.
First, I want to introduce my good friend Michael Lyons.
Thank you for having me back Greg.
I am very honored and the word erudite and myself never go

(01:58):
together. So now the pressure is on.
But great to be back. I'm excited that we get to talk
about this subject that includedus an episode.
Yeah. This is an area that the reason
we put it under the Hanna Barbera banner is because of the
transition from one company to another company to another
company. Gosh, that never happens
anymore. Right, right.

(02:20):
And because this group of shows is very unique, I don't think
they could ever repeat how they did this.
It was sort of a a fall, winter experience.
And because of Kenner sponsoringit, it was like getting the
Sears catalog because it showed toys that kids wanted to have.

(02:42):
We're talking about the famous Classic Tales anthology series
that ran erratically, mostly on CBS as far as I can tell.
I just remember CBS, and the reason I remember that is
because they would put it on later in the afternoon on Sunday
afternoons. And as my friend Scott and I

(03:02):
always say, there was something special about seeing animation
outside of Saturday morning. Like when television would show
a special at night or at other times on a weekend afternoon, it
always seemed there was something truly special about
it. And I can also remember with the
famous classic tales, the frustration of they would either

(03:23):
get preempted by football because the game would run over,
or they would join the show in progress and you'd be frustrated
that you were 20 minutes into it.
But you're absolutely right. I I love that we're talking
about this in November because these remind me of this time of
year when they were sponsored byKenner and Kenner was trying to

(03:43):
get all the kids watching at home excited about the toys for
Christmas. Here's what you can do.
Here's what you can do A surprise spins out for you with
Spirograph. There are 1,000,000 fun things
you can do with Spirograph, so everything can be different
every time you do it. Hey, here's what you can do.

(04:05):
Here's what you can do A surprise spins out for you with
Spirograph. Spirograph from Kenner.
So watching them around this time of year again and talking
about them brings back a lot of memories.
Yeah, we have certain favorites and we have certain ones that

(04:26):
were OK, but there were more like what I like to call leave
on shows, shows that you leave on because they feel like the
holidays are coming or they justfeel special and kind of, as you
often say, comforting to have onin the background.
It was always nice that these were on while you went about
your business or you sat down towatch them.

(04:48):
The soundtracks were always verystrong, and they remind me in
particular because the theme of the series was action,
adventure, epic literature. It was not fantasy as much.
They were not light stories. They didn't do fairy tales
except towards the end. Beauty and the Beast was one.

(05:10):
It was more in the Jules Verne, Robert Louis Stevenson vein,
kind of what Walt Disney was doing in the late 50s, early 60s
and Irwin Allen also a little bit.
Yeah, they almost could have just been done in live action.
Like when you watch them, there was nothing that the magical
world of animation needed to be involved with.

(05:31):
Some of them, yes, you know, they had elements in them,
whether it was visual effects ora setting.
But when you watch a lot of them, they could have just been
a plain live action hour long special.
Yeah, and they personally reminded me a lot of the United
Artist Tailspinner Record seriesof the early 60s.
Even though they did fairy tales, almost all of these were

(05:52):
done on LP's by what they call the famous theater company.
Actually, it was on Atlas Records in London originally.
They did kind of Monte Cristo and a lot of these same kind of
stories. And so watching them as sort of,
to me, having grown up with those records, it was like
seeing them kind of being animated.

(06:12):
Yeah, definitely. I always got a kick out of that
as a kid watching animation, trying to bring a live action
world to life, you know? Yeah, and in a way it started
with Johnny Quest, because Johnny Quest proved that with
limited animation and ingenuity,you could animate a live action
type show and still have action sequences without having to have

(06:34):
fluid animation or elaborate effects.
You could still carry it off. Very true.
And Hanna Barbera sort of dippedtheir toe in the water earlier,
because these shows started November 1st, 1970, and two
years earlier, The Banana Splitsfeatured serious adventure
shows, not Danger Island so much, that was pretty campy.

(06:56):
But The Arabian Nights and The Three Musketeers we're also kind
of like this, even though Hanna Barbera had not yet ventured
into Australian animation. That's kind of why we're doing
this, folks, is the strange journey that famous classic
tales exemplified as all of thisother stuff was going on in the

(07:18):
background. Yeah, in many ways, one of the
many I think lost corners of animation history or Hanna
Barbera slash these other studios history in a way.
Yeah, I'd love to see these on acomplete series.
It would be good for the educational market too.
Or as a kid I read A ConnecticutYankee because of this series.

(07:42):
Oh wow. Became one of my favorite.
But first of all it all began with Kenner in Cincinnati and
their advertising marketing people coming up with the idea
and it started. Also, even though this isn't the
1st special that apparently is on record as the first one, it
was the Australian version of A Christmas Carol.

(08:04):
They had two minutes of that I think animated as kind of a
sample and I don't know if it sold Kenner or it sold the
producers on doing this, if I remember correctly.
Yes, Yeah. So it started with Kenner doing
this and Cincinnati, OH not far from where Kings Island was at
around the same time. They called it Kenner Family

(08:26):
Classics but I remember the announcer saying another famous
classic tale from Kenner. And.
I think that's where they title sort of unofficially became the
title of the series. They didn't really say it in any
of the series shows themselves, and there was no theme song or
anything like that. The first one was Tales of

(08:49):
Washington Irving. That's two stories and one, The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle.
And very much like records, a lot of records have those
stories on side one and side two.
One of the first ones was my particular favorite, Connecticut
Yankee, which I mentioned, and that was the only one where a

(09:12):
celebrity was featured and it was noted in TV Guide and things
like that. It was Orson Bean, and I think
it's a really good version of it.
It was an extended episode. It was not an hour, it was about
90 minutes. What is that?
That's the fairest castle in AllEngland.
England, of course. And where am I being taken?

(09:35):
Why, to King Arthur's court. You mean the?
That's Camelot. And who are you?
My name is Clarence. I'm a page.
A page? Why, you're no more than a
paragraph. And it had some real unique
touches. First of all, Connecticut Yankee
is a very strange book because it goes from being very light to

(09:56):
being very dark. Twain's life was transitioning
and he became kind of bitter andsad at the end.
So the book becomes very violentand depressing towards the end
and as I recall the lead character goes kind of crazy and
and so of course Bing Crosby didthe hey Boo Boo Boo.

(10:17):
He did the light hearted WilliamBendix 1.
Right, right. It's.
Quite a nice movie, but it's basically Boo Boo Boo Boo, you
know, Bing Crosby, happy go lucky kind of movie.
I'm going to blow out the sun. Oh boy.
But this one was done with a bitof tongue in cheek.
It had some humor in it. It also because it was made in

(10:38):
the early 70s, he brought 20th century, mid century.
You know, the Knights were riding around on chopper
motorcycles and it didn't end sad.
It ended with did I really go ornot because he finds this photo
in a book of I guess King Arthuron a chopper or something like

(10:59):
that. It was fun and it's very
rewatchable. I particularly like that one.
And then you particularly like The Christmas Carol.
Right, I did. I'm a big fan of Christmas
Carol. Just the story itself, the
history behind the story, how Charles Dickens wrote this book
that did so much to bring Christmas itself into our world,

(11:21):
basically, and just what it's meant to so many people.
But what's really fascinating tome, being so familiar with the
story of Christmas Carol as we all are, whether you've read the
book or seen movies, how each version or adaptation of
Christmas Carol is their own spin on it.
And that was the same here. Like this begins with Scrooge

(11:42):
walking past the cemetery at thebeginning and seeing Marley's
gravestone and having a flashback to Marley's funeral in
burial, which never happens in the books or in other
adaptations. Well, it was a cheap enough
funeral, I'll allow Mr. Scrooge,and rightly so.
Of what use his findery to JacobMarley now.

(12:06):
But he was your partner and friend was, Sir, Was and I?
I expect you'll be wanting payment too, Sir.
It's not too much, is it? I have changed.
Ah, yes. Ebenezer Scrooge drove a hard

(12:27):
bargain at his only friend's funeral.
But hard bargains is his stock in trade, and he has become
colder and harder still over theseven years that have passed
between the funeral and this Christmas Eve.
They also had a really interesting way of letting the
audience and letting kids know just what type of person

(12:48):
Ebenezer Scrooge was. Every once in a while they cut
to the shopkeepers and the people in the neighborhood
talking to each other about whata terrible person, what a
terrible miser Ebenezer Scrooge is.
Almost like this Greek chorus, just to kind of inform the kids.
It also has some really scary moments.
They just had very unique takes on the ghosts as well, like

(13:11):
Christmas Past is Father Time and I thought that was something
unique to do. And it has it's very limited
animation, obviously, but just the look of it has the look of
something that Rankin basted in a lot of their 2D Christmas
specials. It has the look of a Christmas
card in many ways. And the backgrounds, backgrounds

(13:31):
in a lot of these are stunning. But this one in particular, so
much so that I looked at the ending credits, a woman named
Anne Williams did the backgrounds here that are
beautiful. So it was a really solid version
of A Christmas Carol and one that I will guarantee you many
people, even Christmas Carol fans, probably have never seen.
So I really enjoyed it. Yeah, these looked like there

(13:54):
was a sort of etching feeling tothe background, a very intricate
panic look to the cityscapes andthings like that.
And then the countrysides were looser, it was more watercolors,
almost the impression of things.And yes, the animation was low
budget, but looking at them now,they feel so handmade.

(14:16):
They totally do, yeah. They feel so illustrative.
They're very much like books forthe pictures move.
Yes, there is a consistency and yet there isn't because while
these were being made, well, let's go back a little bit to
the 60s, there was a company called Air Programs
International in Australia run by a gentleman named Walter

(14:37):
Hucker. The information that I had was
pretty sketchy, so I checked with Keith Scott because if you
heard the earlier podcast with Keith, he spent a lot of time
with Bill Hannah because he's Australian.
When Bill Hannah was down in Australia to start his studio,
while API, as it was called, existed in the 60s and they had
two shows that were fairly successful in the US.

(15:00):
The first one was made from 66 to 68 and it came to the States.
I didn't see it. It didn't come where I was
living, but I did see it later and it's a real cute cartoon
called Arthur and the Square Knights of the Round Table.
One of the voice actors in it was Rod Hull, who was better
known as Rod Hull and his Emu. Oh, yes, yeah, yeah.

(15:24):
On various talk shows and. I think he was on the Hudson
Brothers razzle Dazzle show, yeah.
He was and he would, the emu wasa puppet and he had the fake
hand around the emu, yes, Yeah. And the emu would eventually
just attack him at the end of the yeah, it was different.
And so he's in the series. API seemed to have two styles.

(15:47):
And this style was a very cartoony, a little bit of Jay
Ward. I would say it's close to me.
It's closest to The Beatles cartoon animation.
Oh yeah. And the Cool Mccool King
features that kind of humor, that kind of silliness, and that

(16:07):
has kind of a groovy theme song,sort of a showbiz theme song.
He likes to just a lot and he really makes the king a swing.

(16:30):
Dragons run, come up and run andthe Black Knight has a chance.
If you're in trouble. Send the cable to the hero on a
table with a Tucker a Camelot. He took the sword from a stone,
laid a table. Run.
Put the bravest Knights and set them around and all the Camelot
you didn't really have. King Charity Hook the juice on

(16:51):
you and he'll bring. That's what the maidens call
whenever they lost or in distress.
He does rescues on the hour. It's a cute cartoon.

(17:13):
I didn't really know about it till only a few years ago
because I was interested in whatAPI did.
The one I really remember well and I really liked was in 1972.
That was on NBC and it was Around the World in 80 days.
So Phileas Park, you want to marry beneath Belinda?
Yes Lord Naz, then prove yourself worthy.

(17:34):
Travel around the world in 80 days and possibly we shall join
and make sure 20,000 lbs of carbs kicks off it around the
world in 80 days. Hospital stop Bob from
travelling around the world in 80 days.

(17:55):
I must win that. Oh Phileas, do be careful.
My uncle is sending this man named 6 to suck you.
Don't you worry Manziel, watch out.
Promise you pig around the worldin 80 days so far.

(18:20):
And that was cool because General Mills sponsored it and
Chet Stover wrote it, and he worked for Total Television.
They wrote underdogs. So the feel was kind of Total
Television, but not quite. Each episode had a strict format
to it I found very, very amusing.
And excuse me very much, but Mr.Fix talked to himself, You know,

(18:43):
How about this Mr. Fix? Yes.
And I don't know if Andy Serkis saw this show.
When, when he was a kid and the whole Gollum thing and rings.
But I immediately thought that'sMr. Fix he's doing.
I I thought it was a delightful cartoon and there's only a
handful of episodes. And yes, that was issued on DVD

(19:05):
here. And this was already early 70s.
So Bill Hannah was already in Australia.
He worked with API on Funky Phantom because that was a Co
production and in the Funky Phantom theme, just like in the
around the world 90 days, you can heal the Australian male
chorus singing themes. It's sort of an accent to them.

(19:26):
And there's a look to to Funky Phantom that seems very
reminiscent, now that you say it, of something like this
version of A Christmas Carol. Yes, yes, yeah.
So this is where the overlappingstarted.
What Hanna Barbera did was eventually open a studio there
and key people went over there. Now that is something we'll talk

(19:48):
with more hopefully in a future episode with Keith, because it's
a controversial thing. There's always an up and a down
with this sort of thing because it gave an enormous amount of
work to people in the industry, artists and thing like that.
But on the other hand. API was this smaller company,
you know, and Walter Hucker certainly wasn't thrilled.
And you'll start seeing the names, what Hanna Barbera does

(20:12):
spilling over either by staff orby freelance, the musical
director Richard Bowden. And you'll see his name in API
Things, but his name is also on.Wait Till Your Father Gets Home.
Oh, interesting. And that had a very different
look. Yes.
And that was the Marty Murphy look, which is really cool to
look at now and is sort of prototypical.

(20:34):
The look of wait till your father gets home is like A1
frame cartoon come to life. Must really appeal to Joe
Barbera because that's what he did.
That's what he wanted to do whenhe was starting out, was the
sell cartoons to magazines and stuff.
So that was when Hanna Barbera started their Pty company and
suddenly you noticed a strange difference.

(20:56):
Like Josie and the Pussycats in outer space Scooby-doo movies.
Yeah. Some of the animation was fine,
some of it was not quite there yet.
Yeah, and kind of a total shift.When you look at the original,
you just brought up Josie and the Pussycats in outer space.
When you compare that to the original Josie and the
Pussycats, it's almost like two different studios made it.

(21:18):
Yeah, and they also did the Lostin Space pilot that was on the
Saturday Superstar movie. Yeah, yeah.
The other passenger aboard the Jupiter 2 is Doctor Zachary
Smith, a professor of biology onhis sabbatical from Earth
University. Well, my dear boy, bear in mind
that Miss Carmichael is a geologist, a field which is

(21:39):
known for the tunnel vision of its practitioners.
You and I, my boy, permit our minds to expand.
We are not bound by the pragmatic.
Our imagination and courage leapunrestrained.
Danger, danger, danger. One of the things that I find
very fascinating, and I don't know if they were intending us

(22:01):
to be a feature or they just marketed it overseas like Disney
did as a feature, but there was a two-part Saturday superstar
movie called Oliver and the Artful Dodger.
Oh, yes, yeah. And that was Panna Barbera Pty.
What's interesting about it is Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera wrote
the songs with the pen names of Dan Williams and Joseph Rowland.

(22:24):
How they also credit themselves on the Josie thing.
And when you listen to the background, it sounds like a
famous classic tale until they start to sing.
And these are all Hollywood actors doing the voices, Michael
Bell, Janet Waldo, Pamelin, Ferdin.
But the songs all of a sudden have this like Pepe Hoyt curtain
kind of feel to them. There's two elements sonically

(22:48):
going on in there. Now is the shining example of
law and order you see before younow.
Oh no. Oh listen up.
Love picking pocket ceiling lockets, drinking aisle.
Lots of times I find myself, I'll show you.
You see, I started very young, when I was eight.

(23:09):
Couldn't keep me up for long. I sell the prison cake Until I
saw the light. Now you're one of us.
A little bit. A wife, a stray, a ragged little

(23:29):
orphan. Well, maybe you ain't idiot rich
like me, old pal Oliver Twist. But you're safe now.
And that was not a famous classic tale, but it was almost
1. So then let's move on to.
Kind of an adjacent. Yeah, I think a lot of people
were adjacent because suddenly they were doing after school

(23:49):
specials like Cyrano and Last ofthe Curlews that were much more
serious. Yeah, some were animated here
and some were animated there, but the tone was kind of
changing. You know, the were an area of
transition and widening the variety of the kind of cartoons
they could do. Yeah.

(24:11):
And Famous Classic Tales epitomizes that.
Yeah. Let's move on to another one
that's a favorite of yours. That would be the legend of
Robin Hood. First off, it's so very 70's.
The opening with all of the split screen images against the
color background. I just love how they tried to
bring a little kind of a contemporary feel into it.

(24:32):
I think they did a really nice job of setting up the story of
Robin Hood in this and how he isseen as a traitor to Prince John
when he's trying to help the poor.
They also bring in SER Guy. You never ever hear of the
character of SER Guy. He seems to be left out of every
single Robin Hood adaptation. Marion, now that I've taken over

(24:54):
the Loxley estate and several smaller holdings, I've become a
man with great power and influence.
I'm not impressed, Sir Guy. It's a cursive Robin of Loxley,
isn't it? You are still waiting for him.
I am also a personal friend of Prince John.
Speak plainly, Sir Guy. I want to ask for your hand in

(25:17):
Marion. I don't care how rich and
powerful you are, Sir Guy. I don't love you and I won't
marry you. There's no use waiting for Robin
of Locksley, my dear. The Sheriff's men will hunt him
down as soon as he sets foot in Nottingham.
The Sheriff's men are no match for Robin.
Then I'll do the job myself. They also made it look a little

(25:40):
more realistic than their other stories in terms of the action,
But they were very smart with what they did in the action
because obviously there's a lot of riding on horses and shooting
arrows. A lot of it's done in
silhouette, which was very smartbecause it's still very dramatic
and it gives you the feeling of an action scene.
But it didn't obviously cost as much because they didn't have to

(26:02):
put any detail into the characters and the backgrounds
here the person did the backgrounds was someone named
Richard Zaloudek. ZALOUDEK.
Very stylized backgrounds. They didn't try to make it look
realistic. They just went very stylized,
like the characters against the painting.

(26:24):
I love Disney's Robin Hood and Ijust love the different versions
of Robin Hood down through the years.
So this one was a lot of fun to watch.
And and like all of these, they do a really solid job on telling
the story. And I think it's really good for
kids because to your point, it'skind of that gateway into the
story and maybe kids will then go and watch more of the Robin

(26:44):
Hood movies or read the books. So I really enjoyed it.
Another name, I think it's ZoranJean Jac pronouncing.
I saw his name quite a bit, yeah.
And then when you see the Hanna Barbera stuff that's done in
Australia, you'll see his name as well.
And that's sort of the clue thatthis was made there.
But after 72, it's others Leaf Graham and Chris Cuttington and

(27:07):
Richard slaps in ski is the directors.
But then all of a sudden we transition completely.
And this must have been when Hanna Barbera is Pty really
kicked in because by the kind ofMonte Cristo, which was really
good. And keep in mind too, you know,
three networks, no cable PBS is still in its infancy, you know,

(27:29):
with Sesame Street and Electric Company.
This to a lot of kids was their first exposure to these classic
stories. Yeah, I mentioned Connecticut
Yankee. This may have been the first
Prince and the pauper I ever saw.
And it was definitely my first exposure to kind of Monte
Cristo. And that's a cool story.
It's a much imitated story, you know, about these horrendously

(27:50):
horrible people who do terrible things to this gentleman.
He goes into prison, he seeks anescape, finds riches, comes back
as a different character and sets about to get revenge and
ultimately finds that it's kind of an empty revenge.
My fierce Maximilian and Valentine to you I give all my
worldly possessions for the exception of my beloved sailing

(28:13):
vessel, Les Prans. I have used my wealth badly in
the name of revenge, and revengebecomes a bitter, bitter
medicine to taste. Make this island your home.
Use its treasures wisely and well.
I shall begin my life anew, not as the vengeance racked Count of

(28:35):
Monte Cristo, but as myself, Edmund Dantes.
I chose the name Les Balance forthis ship in memory of a dear
old friend I knew long, long agoin the Chateau De.
This belongs. Means.
Hope. May it be a guide for all our

(28:56):
lives. I know it will be for mine.
That kind of human experience isnot usually conveyed in your
average TV cartoon, at least notin in those days.
Yeah. And this was the first one that
had Hanna Barbera's name on it. So this is the first one where

(29:18):
you're starting to hear background music by Hoyt Curtain
and Ted Nichols. You know, you're going, oh,
that's Johnny Quest and, oh, Adventures of Huck Finn.
And I think I heard that on Josie.
And I think Scooby and Shaggy ran away to this music.
And so that's the first clue to the duality of these specials

(29:39):
because Tana Barbera and API were trading off who made
specials for Kenner and CBS because they both continued to
make these all the way through the end in 1984.
So I wanted to point out that one then also 20,000 Leagues
Under the Sea, one of my favorites, and I remember TV

(30:00):
Guide saying an excellent Hanna Barbera version of the Jules
Verne tale. I thought, well that was nice of
TV Guide. Yeah, yeah.
And it was, if you've seen the Disney one, it's interesting to
see because it's probably more like the book.
Yeah, doesn't have the Peter Laurie character and the happy
seal and all that. I thought Ned Land had that

(30:21):
great white sweater and I wanteda white sweater like that.
And I remember getting the whitesword.
I said this is my Ned Land sweater.
And since then I I can't fit into that sweater, I have to
admit, But I thought that's a cool looking sweater.
And his character is nothing like Kirk Douglas because Kirk

(30:42):
Douglas is sort of being Kirk Douglas in a very sort of
effusive, kind of a little bit goofy way.
Yeah. This Ned Land, he reminds me,
and this is where the HB look and probably their character
designer started to get to work on these.
He looks like he was just unmasked.
You know, yes, yeah, would have.Gotten away with it without the.

(31:05):
Medal, right, Right. Yes, it's Ned Land, then The
Three Musketeers, also HB. Nicely done.
And so therefore, what would youwant to pick up from that?
Black Beauty was another one that just really appreciated how

(31:25):
they took the animated possibilities of that.
They had the horses talk to one another.
There's a scene at the beginningthat's heartbreaking where Black
Beauty is purchased and taken away from his mother, and his
mother is saying goodbye and she's like, this is a day that
all mothers dread when their sons are purchased and taken
away to another farm or something like that.

(31:46):
Keep your head high and proud. Grow up gentle and good, lift
your feet up well when you trot,and never bite or kick, even in
play. You'll be leaving the Meadow
soon. I don't want to leave the
Meadow. Leave you, but you must.
The Squire's taken a fancy to you.
As well He should, my handsome one, and it's been arranged.

(32:09):
Remember what your father alwayssaid, and carry it with you when
you go. Do your best and leave the rest.
Twill all come right someday or night, my son, but he's coming
to take me away. I know, and there's no Saturday
for a mother. But I'm also proud that you've
grown so well. It's time for you to leave, and

(32:31):
you will leave with your head held high like the champion you
are. That reminded me of that movie
Babe about the pig. I mean, that's a really heavy
thing to put in a story for kids.
You know, I think it was a giventhat there have been several
different movies like this, likeNational Velvet and The Black
Stallion. I thought this was a really

(32:53):
interesting take on this famous story about the horse.
Plus it was an Alan Young tacular.
Yes, it was. That's right.
Yeah. He must have played 567 roles in
it. Yeah.
And if you know Alan Young's voice, you can kind of tell.
But it's also a testament to howversatile he was that he
narrates as Black Beauty. It is beautifully done in that

(33:15):
the relationship with the bitterhorse Ginger and what ends up
happening, it is very, very nicely done.
Probably the most emotionally powerful ones.
Yeah. That they did the strangest 1.
I purchased a stream of this because I could not find it
anywhere. Based on Gilbert and Sullivan's
Mikado. It's called the Gentleman of

(33:37):
Titi Poo, not. Taika not watching it.
Isn't Taika Waititi, It's Titi Poo and it is a one hour musical
that updates the Gilbert and Sullivan music and makes it very
groovy and it's done in the style of Arthur and their square
nights. It is very wildly cartoony and

(33:57):
silly and crazy. The Empress here tell Coco
there's a very good reason why the Mikado wants to greet us.
It's the cherry blossom season. The prettiest bound to beat us
all. The Billy Dell they say this is.

(34:19):
So hurry on down to the Bay. This is Timmy Foods greatest
day. See the Emperor of Japan.
So here we are, premiere and farfrom me, me, me and me and me.
Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome.

(34:40):
Welcome to Army Cargo to the Emperor of Japan.

(35:01):
It's an operetta so you kind of wonder.
Wow how was this received on Cbsi?
Don't remember seeing it. Yeah.
It is nothing like the other famous classic tales.
And then moving along to the Mysterious Island, which was
kind of a sequel because CaptainNemo is in that one too.

(35:22):
Oh, wow. You know, so there's a lot of
those fun things. Master of the World, from the
Earth to the moon, Journey to the center of the Earth.
Gulliver's Travels I thought waskind of interesting because
Hanna Barbera produced that in Australia, but they also had the
Gulliver's series. Yeah, that's right.
In the late 60s, and this is notthat, but it's still kind of

(35:43):
connects to it in in a way. There were actors also.
I think Ross Martin did voices in some of these and from Wild
Wild West And then Daniel Boone.Daniel Boone was played by
Richard Carrena. Wow.
Yeah, and realize that. Well, it doesn't really sound
like him, but then Richard Carrena was in radio for a long

(36:04):
time, so yeah, he could double other voices as well.
One of the last ones, this is where Ruby Spears, which started
out, these guys built their career at Hanna Barbera, opened
their own studio, but then suddenly got bought by Taft and
suddenly they were sister studios.
Beauty and the Beast was produced at Ruby Spears and it
has not so much the different look as a different sound.

(36:27):
And then the very last one was an API, so it went full circle.
But it was The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and it sounds
to me like Australian actors doing Hannibal MO voices.
No, no, not terribly, you know, but pretty well actually.
But it is not a Hollywood cast and there it is, so 31 different

(36:48):
episodes. That's quite a number of
episodes and they didn't run year round, correct.
It would just run, I think you mentioned just in the fall.
It would run from like October to like early December,
obviously to because of the sponsor, Kenner wanting to get
word out there about the toys for the holiday season.
Yeah, most of them were October,November, a few in December, and

(37:09):
a very few of them spilled over into January.
OK, I don't know why. Maybe if you took the toys back
or you got a credit at the store, it's like you can still
get this Kenner toy or something.
Right. Yeah.
And Speaking of Kenner, these were overflowing with inner
magic and enchantment if you didn't have a sit and spin,

(37:31):
because Lord knows I wouldn't beable to sit and spin, but
millions of kids did. I thought it was kind of a dopey
toy. Yeah, but it was around a long
time. I remember seeing that
commercial with the Jingle, which was a very catchy earworm
of a of a Jingle. Sit and spin from Kenner.

(38:15):
And seeing these kids taking this sit and spin out to their
backyard or in the living room and sitting down and holding on
to that wheel, that top with thebig psychedelic design on it and
just spinning around it. I remember saying that looks so
cool. And then one year, I think for
Christmas, one of my friends gotit and I was over his house and
he said do you want to try it? And I did.

(38:35):
And it was good for about maybe a minute and 1/2, and then you
were done. And I realized afterwards like,
wow, that's kind of a really dull toy, you know, after all of
that. Because to your point, all you
did was sit and spin around, andthen you could sit and spin
around some more. I guess if you like being dizzy,

(38:57):
you know, right? Exactly.
I used to have those things thatturned around in the playground,
and those did not please me. I learned early that I don't
like spinning around. And maybe that's what this was
to like, give the kids the feeling of being at the
playground at home, you know? Yeah.
And then there was the ice bird.Yeah.

(39:17):
Ice bird, Ice bird, You're such a nice bird.
Let's make an ice bird treat. Scrape in the ice to fill the
cup, then add the flavor. Read it up.
Yum Yum Yum Yum. How about another one?
Iceberg. You're a lot of fun.

(39:38):
Iceberg with five flavor packets.
Iceberg new from Kenner. It was like the Frosty Snowman,
except instead of putting the ice in the bottom, you froze a
great big chunk of ice. There was a blade underneath the
iceberg, so you put the cup upside down.
You scrape your teeth. Must have been.

(39:59):
In the commercial the hadn't seen it in ages.
It reminded me of the episode ofHappy Days where Potsie had no
money and he was making a ketchup freeze in his glass with
the ice because. The little girl had this like
red goop that she was putting into the ice and then of course
they dissolved to a few seconds later and it's this beautiful

(40:19):
icy looking snack. Yeah.
Oh, yeah, yeah. And another one that they ran.
Some of these ran a long time, and some of them only a year or
two. One that ran a long time was the
Snoopy toothbrush. Good grief.
It's time to brush your teeth. Your teeth with your Snoopy
toothbrush with your Snoopy toothbrush.

(40:46):
Snoopy makes you want to brush your teeth.
It's fun to brush your teeth. Snoopy Happiness is a battery
operated Snoopy toothbrush by Kenner.
Yeah, I forgot all about that and how great the little snoopy
doghouse holder for everything was too.
That was great. One that I did get, I'm proud to

(41:08):
say, was the Snoopy Drive in theater.
When the game's called off in your feeling sad, the Snoopy
drive in movie can make you feelglad. 3D type batteries not
included. Lookout Snoopy.
I can even make it go backwards watching Snoopy's Fun to do.

(41:32):
You can get a groovy Snoopy movie viewer, too.
Kenner's new Snoopy drive in movie and movie viewers sold
separately, each with one cassette.
That looked like so much fun. I did not have that.
I had the action viewer which was something similar where you
cranked the side of the camera. Watched it, but just seeing that
in the commercial. I love the look of the Snoopy
drive in. The Action viewer became a

(41:54):
Fisher Price cartridge viewer, the Snoopy drive in, and the
Kenner viewer, which was the first way you could see Star
Wars clips. Wow.
Had some of those and there werethere were 8mm films in this
cartridge. Almost like an 8 track cartridge
that fed continuously. You could look at them in the

(42:15):
viewer or you could look at themin the Snoopy drive in the
Snoopy drive in was really a rear projection screen and it
was a little snoopy watching themovie and you cranked it.
I wanted that so bad. And I watched these waiting for
the commercial and it was in theSears catalog and I circled it
and dog eared the page. I did get it for Christmas and

(42:35):
many years of fun and enjoyment buying those cartridges because
you could send to Kenner for replacement bulbs and for
replacement they call them shows.
Watch the show, you know right? Even though it was like 2
minutes, that was a show. Sure, yeah.
Yeah, and before that Kenner made the cassette movie
projector featuring the Flintstones.

(42:55):
You could buy different cassettes and the whole thing
including the show and tell which was another long lasting
thing which was looked like ATV but it was a record player with
a slide projector under it. Oh yes, I do remember that,
Yeah. There was another one called
Pocket Flicks where you got the episode of Star Trek where
people turned into cubes. Yeah, yeah.

(43:16):
And credits of Laverne and Shirley and Happy Days and all
of that completely flew away with the advent of VHS.
Yeah. Because I can remember the
thrill. Yeah, the one that really took
me back was the $6 million Man and Bionic Woman Play DoH sets
where you could form Steve Austin and Jamie Summers, like,

(43:40):
make little play DoH action figures of them and then put
them into these different vehicles.
It's Kenner's new $6 million Manplay DoH set.
You can go see Boston Mascotron too.
Lots of play DoH adventure for you.
This is the new Bionic Woman Play DoH set with all terrain
vehicle with Jamie Summers, Oscar and friends.

(44:03):
You can go down over and over again.
The $6 million Man Play DoH set and the Bionic Woman Play DoH
set each sold separately new from Kenner.
You know, of course, the kids inthe commercial can line up the
perfect color play dough for Steve Austin's head and his
clothes and then the black for his shoes.

(44:24):
And even as a kid, I remember watching and saying I'd never be
able to do that. It would come out so bad if I
did it. And theirs looked so perfect.
So that was a tremendous time capsule.
Just seeing that again. Oh yeah, that was a part of the
perfection of how the kids couldappear to do all of these toys.
Florida State, Oh yeah, was a a miracle of television because

(44:45):
having worked in the commercial business and work with food
stylists that can style a bowl of corn flakes by choosing
through thousands of boxes and picking the perfect flakes, we
did one and they took kitchen bouquet on a raw hamburger.
As long as they're not selling the item, you see, they can make
it look good. The item has to be real.

(45:07):
But if in the background you have ice cream and you're
selling the syrup, the ice creamcan be.
At the time it was mashed potatoes.
The people in the commercial were never eating it because the
stuff was not edible. Wow.
It's the same thing with these toys.
You had technicians that were doing their darndest to make
probably hundreds of these. Jamie Summers and.

(45:28):
I've no doubt. Steve Austin.
I want to see the bloopers. Yeah, I'll tell you one thing I
learned. We did a Disney commercial and
the announcer was the guy from the Folgers Crystals
commercials. In Los Angeles, the film capital
where fine dining takes a starring role, we're at world
famous Perino's restaurant. Tonight.

(45:49):
We're secretly replacing the fine coffee they usually serve
with dark, sparkling Folgers crystals.
Will it be rich enough for our special guest?
It tastes like excellent coffee that I would expect of Parino.
'S. It's nice and rich.
It's really good coffee. It's Folgers crystals.
You're kidding you. Mean the instant coffee?
Well, it's delicious. Folgers Crystals Coffee rich
enough to be served in America'sfinest restaurants.

(46:12):
I asked him was that true and hesaid yes, they were getting the
restaurant coffee and they were getting Folgers crystals.
Now let me tell you what was going on in the kitchen.
They had scientists back there that were brewing and creating a
cup of folders, crystals, coffeethat probably without heavy
research and development, you probably couldn't make wow

(46:35):
exactly the same way. They made the coffee so good.
Of course it tasted good becausethey knew exactly probably to
the crystal because it was a cupof coffee made with foliage
crystals. How they made it was a whole
different story. Interesting.
They may have had beakers and test tubes and right pressure
machines and who knows what. Send them to my house in the

(46:57):
morning. I want the.
Yeah, you are Mr. Mug. You are the.
Yes I do. I do like my coffee.
So we have extolled the virtues of the famous classic tales to
the very NTH degree. And if everybody else has
favorites, you know, we have this here podcast page and I
cleverly named it the Fantastic World of Hannah and Barbara

(47:19):
podcast page. So if you want to indicate the
ones you like, you can find a lot of these in various places.
I still think it would be wonderful to see good prints of
these with the artwork the way it was supposed to be seen.
Yeah. Oliver in the Artful Dodger is
on Warner Archive. And so you can get that.
You can get Last of the curlers,you can get Robin Hood, Nick,

(47:42):
you can get some of them. But those aren't the famous
classic tales to this point. Hanna Barbera story book
classics. I think we're Gulliver and Black
Beauty and one other one. And I don't think that was Hanna
Barbera home video. I think that was also a third
party. Oh wow.
So I mean, wherever I could findthese, I'd get them.
Yeah. I just love to see the be a nice

(48:05):
thing, a nice kind of introduction to the classics.
Agreed. Yeah.
It's a nice little introduction.And they got a lot into those 40
some odd minutes too. Yes, they sure did.
So once again, tip of the hat and a nice bird treat to you
with your choice of syrup. Michael Lyons for being with us
on our little show. Thank you.

(48:25):
I I know what I'm asking Santa for this year.
I want the $6 million man Plato set, but I wanted to come pre
assembled so that I don't have to do any of the work.
But thank you for having me on as always Greg.
This was great and and a great flashback for me as well
personally. So thank you.
And Speaking of Christmas, do your elevator speech on your

(48:47):
books and where you can be found.
Yes, absolutely. So for anything and everything
that is me, you can head over tomy website, wordsfromlions.com.
Lyons dot com You can read my articles that I write for
Cartoon Research, many of them on Hanna Barbera, so the
audience out there might enjoy those.
You can read my blog. You can hear episodes of the two

(49:09):
podcasts I Co host disorder every Disney film and from
Pencils to Pixels, the AnimationCelebration podcast, which Mr.
Greg Airbar was a guest on this past summer.
So that was a lot of fun. And you can also learn about my
two books, Drawn to Greatness, Disney's Animation Renaissance
and Magic Moments, Stories, Lessons and Memories from a 20

(49:29):
year career at Walt Disney World.
Both of those are published by Theme Park Press.
And if you're interested in purchasing signed and
personalized copies of those, you can get those over words
from lions.com. So thank you again.
Thank you, Mike, and thank you all for listening.
Good grief, I got to go brush myteeth.
So until then, bye bye. We hope you enjoyed the

(49:52):
fantastic world of Hannah and Barbera with Greg Airborne.
Please join us again and Many thanks for listening.