‘HR Pufnstuf’ Co-Creator Was 96

sid Krofftthe wildly imaginative puppeteer who teamed together with his youthful brother Marty to construct an leisure empire behind such trippy TV reveals like The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, HR Pufnstuf and Land of the Lostyou’ve got died. He was 96.

Kroffteight years older than Marty and the inventive pressure of their enterprise, died Friday in his sleep on the Los Angeles dwelling of pal and enterprise accomplice Kelly Killian. Marty died in November 2023 at age 86.

“I get a dream, and Marty gets it done,” Sid mentioned of their partnership in a 2000 interview for the TV Academy Foundation.

The pair have been well-known theatrical puppeteers in 1968 once they have been recruited to design the costumes for the live-action portion of NBC’s The Banana Splits Adventure Hour. Their furry animal characters (Fleegle,Bingo, Dropper and Snorky), members of a rock band, have been an on the spot hit on the Saturday morning present, which ran from 1968-70 (and in reruns since then).

The subsequent yr, NBC requested them to create a Saturday morning youngsters present, they usually got here up with HR Pufnstufa couple of shipwrecked boy (Jimmy, performed by Jack Wild) who lands on a magical island. The title character, Pufnstufwas a revamp of Luther, a pleasant dragon that that they had created for a present within the 1968 HemisFair in San Antonio.

NBC wished a second season to observe the 17-episode first however provided solely a small improve on the rights charge, already far under what it was costing the brothers to make the present, in order that they declined. Pufnstuf It was canceled in 1970 however lived on in reruns as nicely.

Pufnstuf‘s psychedelic units and costumes have been an enormous hit with school youngsters, and The Beatles requested for a full set of episode tapes to be despatched to them in England. The look of the present prompted many whispers that the brothers took medication (pot for positive, perhaps LSD as nicely?), one thing Marty denied.

“You can’t do a show stoned,” he told The Hollywood Reporter in January 2016 throughout a go to to discover the Krofft archives.

The duo adopted Pufnstuf with The Bugaloos (1970-72), the Claymation collection Lidsville (1971-73), Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973-75) and Land of the Lost (1974-76), which spawned an ill-fated Will Ferrell film adaptation in 2009. Those reveals have been wildly widespread in syndication as nicely.

“We screwed with every kid’s mind,” Marty advised THR. “There’s a Krofft look — the colors. There’s an edge. “Disney doesn’t have an edge.”

Indeed, the Kroffts‘ model was so widespread that McDonald’s copied it to create Mayor McCheese and McDonaldland for an early Seventies promoting marketing campaign. The Kroffts sued, profitable a reported seven-figure settlement in 1977.

A yr earlier, the brothers opened The World of Sid & Marty Krofft theme park in downtown Atlanta’s new Omni Complex (now CNN’s headquarters). Spread over six ranges, it was billed because the world’s first vertical amusement park. About 600,000 guests got here throughout the recession-plagued ’70snevertheless it wasn’t sufficient to cowl the prices and curiosity funds, and the park closed after simply six months.

Long after different smaller youngsters producers like Hanna-Barbera had bought out to conglomerates, the Kroffts have been nonetheless growing reveals because the final of the nice Sixties independents. As late as 2015, that they had successful on Nickelodeon with Mutt & Stuff (one episode even featured a visitor look from Pufnstuf).

The Kroffts additionally developed quite a few live-action selection reveals together with The Brady Bunch Hour, The Donny & Marie Show, The Bay City Rollers Show and Barbara Mandrel and the Mandrel Sisters.

They produced one other youngsters present hosted by Richard Pryor, primarily based on his childhood, and their puppets toured with such acts as Judy Garland, LiberaceThe Mills Brothers, Tony Martin & Cyd Charisse and Frank Sinatra.

Krofft He was born in Montreal on July 30, 1929, and when he was younger, he and his household lived in Maine, Rhode Island and the Bronx. For PR, the brothers favored to say that they got here from an extended line of puppeteers going again many generations. In fact, the story was fabricated. Their father was a clock salesman who emigrated from Greece within the early 1900s.

“The Kroffts have been playing with dolls their whole lives,” Marty joked in regards to the brothers’ boyhood curiosity in puppeteering. By the time he was 15, Sid was already working golf equipment in New York.

(They had two different brothers; Hy died throughout preventing in World War II, and Harry, who died final yr, briefly labored for his or her firm earlier than going into actual property.)

At 20, Sid received employed by the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, and Marty joined his brother full-time in 1958 after an assistant left. They opened Them Poupees from Parisan adults-only burlesque puppet present that was an enormous hit, enjoying to sold-out crowds at a dinner theater within the San Fernando Valley.

“Them Poupees took us from an act, Sid’s act, to a business,” Marty mentioned. Shirley MacLaine was there on opening evening, and Richard Nixon got here throughout his run for president.

Them Poupees took to the highway and performed the world’s festivals in Seattle in 1962, New York in 1964 and San Antonio in 1968. It featured 240 puppets, principally topless girls, and time journal referred to as it a “dirty puppet show.”

After that, it was so widespread, “we couldn’t even get our own best friends in the theater,” Sid mentioned. It drew an estimated 9.5 million viewers in its first decade of performances.

All this led to reveals at Six Flags amusement parks across the US — they employed greater than 100 puppeteers at one level — and appearances on TV, together with a daily gig on The Dean Martin Show (they created a refrain line of engaging woman puppets for the range program earlier than they have been changed by The golddiggers).

Survivors embrace his three nieces (Marty’s daughters), Deanna, Kristina and Kendra. Publicist Adam Fenton mentioned Krofft had surgical procedure in November and his restoration proved “difficult and frustrating.”

Until not too long ago, Krofft and Killian interviewed celebrities for his or her Instagram Live present, Sundays With Sid. At the time of his loss of life, they have been finalizing two books about his life and profession, one from the angle of Krofft as a performer, the opposite from Krofft as an individual behind the scenes.

“I loved Sid with my whole heart. He taught me more than I could ever put into words — about the art of Hollywood, the magic of the stage and the depth and complexity of human nature,” she mentioned. “I didn’t know Sid for his shows — I only knew the man who created them. And that man was extraordinary. I wish so very much that I had more time with him. I will miss his big blue eyes, his cheerful smile with his dimples and the warmth that seemed to follow him he went everywhere.”