LITTLE DRACULA

 

LITTLE DRACULA
(FOX, Fox Family, September 3, 1991-October 13, 1999)
 
Steven Hahn Productions, Sachs Family Entertainment, Bandai Entertainment

 

 

MAIN CAST:
Edan Gross – Little Dracula
Joe Flaherty – Big Dracula
Jonathan Winters – Igor, Granny
Kath Soucie – Mrs. Dracula, Millicent, Spirits of the Netherworld Operator
Melvyn Hayes – Deadwood
Joey Camen – Werebunny
Brian Cummings – Garlic Man
Neil Ross – Maggot
Danny Mann – No Eyes, Twin-Beaks

 

Little Dracula is a British series of children’s books that centered on the daily adventures of Dracula’s son, nicknamed Little D. Along with his father, Little D lived in Castle Dracula in Transylvania with his mother, Mrs. Dracula, little sister, Millicent, and his Granny. Other residents included Igor, Dracula’s all-purpose servant who had a removable eye; Slave, a zombie servant that was frequently used and abused by everyone, especially Igor; Handy, a disembodied sentient hand; and their pets, Cat, Batty and later Rover, a werewolf cub. During the day, the nearby villagers were out and about, but at sunset they would retreat to their homes and the night belonged to the Draculas.

One of the series' two-page spreads.

The books were written by Martin Waddell and illustrated by Joseph Wright. They took some inspiration from Charles Addams’ The Addams Family strips and its adaptations by blending macabre imagery with humor and enough silliness to be kid-friendly. For instance: liberal use of blood as beverages or condiments; skulls doubling as bowling or croquet balls; emptying the contents of a severed human head into a frying pan for breakfast; eating a sandwich made from a severed human leg; getting blood delivered like bottles of milk; Little D sawing his sister in half and later gluing her back together; an iron maiden complete with skeletal occupant as a Christmas gift, etc. All of this was conveyed through Wright’s highly-detailed artwork, infusing safe-yet-grotesque sight gags into every picture. Each book would open with a two-page spread of the Dracula castle grounds showcasing the occupants and other beings doing various activities within and without. A number next to some characters would correspond to a list identifying who each character was; including random characters that played no part in the actual story such as a werewolf and Frankenstein’s monster.

The first Little Dracula book.

The first book in the series, Little Dracula’s First Bite, debuted in 1986 and was published by Walker Books. Seven books followed through 1992; however, the Fiendishly Funny Joke Book was done by the different creative team of Alan Durant and Paul Tempest. Candlewick Press would pick up the international rights to the series and release the books in North America, and four of the books would see reissues as late as 2001.

Little D with Igor, Deadwod, Dracula, Millicent, Mrs. Dracula, Werebunny, Batty and Granny.

In the 1990s, it was decided to adapt Little Dracula into an animated series. Produced by Steven Hahn Productions in association with Sachs Family Entertainment, the cartoon took deep inspiration from the books. However, since the books were very short, didn’t have too much depth to their stories, and weren’t many of them, some liberties were taken to flesh them out further in order to fill an entire season of television episodes. Little D (Edan Gross) still lived in the caste with Big Dracula (Joe Flaherty, as a nod to his Count Floyd character from SCTV), Mrs. Dracula (Kath Soucie), Millicent (also Soucie), and his Granny (Jonahtan Winters, sounding fairly close to his Maude Frickert character). On his birthday, Little D was gifted the Scepter of the Draculas, which could create a doorway to anywhere or open any locked door, an amulet that would allow him to communicate with anyone, and a hat that would allow him to go out into the sunlight unharmed. Little D combated his difficulty with flying by designing a flying car, the Dracster (a vampire-themed play on dragster).

Igor presenting the Draculas with his Santa-catching trap.

Igor (also Winters), on top of being Dracula’s servant and Little D’s keeper, was also the live-in mad scientist who cooked up bizarre inventions for the Draculas. That included a special top hat that allowed Little D to go outside in the daytime. Slave was renamed Deadwood (Melvyn Hayes), likely to avoid the controversy of the Draculas being slave-owners. He was often Igor’s guinea pig or tool. He would often make sarcastic comments about situations or predicaments, but nobody ever seemed to hear him clearly. Handy helped out around the castle and was excellent at sleight-of-hand magic. Along with their established pets Battie and Wolfie (renamed from Rover), Cat was replaced by a fuzzy spider.

Little D taking Werebunny for a ride in the Dracster.

Newly-created for the series was Little D’s best friend, Werebunny (Joey Camen); a blue-furred half werewolf, half bunny with a single eye. There was also Twin-Beaks (a play on “Twin Peaks”, voiced by Danny Mann), a two-headed vulture that often hung out in the dead trees by the castle and whose heads tended to bicker with each other. Both attended the same Ghoul School as Little D…in Twin Beaks’ case because their right head was held back for 17 years. As Little D was unable to fly just yet, he turned his car, the Dracster, into a flying car to compensate for it.

The sinister Garlic Man.

Other new characters were antagonists for the show. Dracula’s sworn enemy was Garlic Man (Brian Cummings), who wanted nothing more than to destroy him (since vampires hated garlic, after all). He had a garlic head and a stench to match. Whenever he was defeated, Garlic Man would be reduced to a garlic clove, but be could be resurrected via a ceremony of planting it and reciting a chant. He was served by two lackies: the aptly-named No Eyes (Mann), who also had an interchangeable mechanical hand, and the boil-covered Maggot (Neil Ross).

The Man With No Eyes and Maggot saluting their boss (while dealing with his stench).

Little Dracula debuted on FOX on September 3, 1991 as part of the Fox Kids programming block. The series was written by Pamela Hickey and Dennys McCoy, with Frank Ward and Trish Stewart serving as special consultants. Character and background designs were handled by John Norton, Gary Selvaggio, Craig Clark, Jeff “Swampy” Marsh, Jeff Myers, Debbie A. Silver, Sung-Woo Hong, Emily Schwappach Michels, John Petrovitz and Vadim Sokolov. The series’ music was done by The Music Team, Andrew Dimitroff and Stephen C. Marston, and animation duties were handled by Island Animation, Inc. (now part of Dong Woo Animation).

Little D with his scepter and protective hat.

Little Dracula had an interesting run. It aired from Tuesday through Saturday its debut week, and was then replaced by Beetlejuice on weekdays and Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventures on Saturday. The next episode wouldn’t air until Halloween that year. The remaining seven episodes wouldn’t run until the series was rerun on Fox Family Channel (now Freeform) in 1999. Although it was never seen in North America again, second season of 13 episodes was commissioned overseas by Fance’s M6 network. Co-produced in France and Germany by IDDH and Renaissance-Atlantic Films, it aired exclusively in Europe under the title Draculito, Mon Saigneur.

An equally short-lived toyline was co-produced by DreamWorks, who handled the North American release, and Bandai, who handled other territories. Two versions of Little D, Deadwood, Garlic Man, Igor, Maggot, The Man With No Eyes, Twin Beaks and Werebunny were released, along with the Dracster, the Garlicmobile, the Drac-Moto and the Coffin Car. Additionally, Little D’s scepter and amulet were offered as roleplay toys. Harvey Comics published a 3-issue mini-series seeing Little D on the trail of whoever staked his parents so that they can remove the stakes and bring his parents back to un-death. Like the books, the first issue featured a two-page introduction spread of Dracula’s castle. The comic was done by Michael Gallagher, Dave Manak, Jorge Pacheco, and In Color.

The Harvey Comics version of the two-page introduction spread.

Between 1993-94, Abbey Home Media released episodes of Little Dracula across four VHS collections in PAL regions. Little Dracula’s Fangtastic Video featured “Little ‘D’ Goes Hawaiian”, “Bat Boys” and “Easy Biters”; Little Dracula’s Video Full of Frightfull Suprises featured “Little D’s Surprise”, “Deadwood’s Complaint” and “The Chamber of Unspeakable Terrors”; and Little Dracula’s Video With a Bite had “Little D’s First Bite” and “The Curse of the Ghastly Minimum Wage”. “Little D’s Surprise” was also featured on The Biggest Ever Saturday Morning Heroes Video by Tempo Video, which also included episodes of The Adventures of T-Rex, James Bond Jr., Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Super Mario Bros. Super Show, Captain N: the Game Master, and Transformers. The original FOX-run episodes have been uploaded by viewers to YouTube.

 

 

EPISODE GUIDE:
“The Curse of the Ghastly Minimum Wage” (9/3/91) – Little D unwittingly becomes an employee for a new burger joint in town created solely to get rid of Dracula.
 
“Little D’s First Bite / Ghoul Days” (9/4/91) – It’s Little D’s first day of school, and Garlic Man enrolls Maggot in order to steal the Scepter of the Dracula’s from him.
 
“Little D’s Surprise” (9/5/91) – It’s Little Dracula’s birthday, and he’s finally of age to embrace his heritage—if he can master the flying that he’s neglected practicing.
 
“The Bite Before Christmas” (9/6/91) – While the Draculas anticipate the arrival of Santa, Garlic Man decides to disguise himself as Santa in order to infiltrate their castle.
 
“Little ‘D’ Goes Hawaiian” (9/7/91) – Sick of the Transylvanian weather, Dracula decides to take everyone on a vacation to Hawaii.
 
“Little D’s Halloween” (10/31/91) – The Draculas dress as ordinary people to accompany Little D on his first time trick-or-treating in the village with Garlic Man in hot pursuit.
 
“Bat Boys” (9/12/99) – Little D battles Garlic Man and his minions in a game of baseball with his schoolmates.
 
“Easy Biters” (9/14/99) – Igor changes Little D’s bike into a motorcycle, leading to him and his friends crossing paths with a bad motorcycle gang looking for a challenge.
 
“Deadwood’s Complaint” (9/17/99) – NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
 
“The Chamber of Unspeakable Terror” (9/17/99) – NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
 
“The Bite at the Ghoul Schol Corral” (10/3/99) – NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
 
“Midnight Madness” (10/11/99) – NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.
 
“Deadly Screentest” (10/13/99) – NO SYNOPSIS AVAILABLE.

FUN HOUSE / FOX'S FUN HOUSE

 

FUN HOUSE / FOX’S FUN HOUSE
(Syndication, FOX, September 5, 1988-April 13, 1991)
 
Stone Television/Stone Stanley Productions, Lorimar-Telepictures (season 1), Lorimar Television (season 2-3)

 

MAIN CAST:

J.D. Roth – Host

Jacqueline Forrest – Jackie the Cheerleader

Samantha Forrest – Sammi the Cheerleader

John “Tiny” Hurley – Announcer (season 1-2)

Michael “Boogaloo Shrimp” Chambers – Announcer M.C. Mike (season 3)

Brian Cummings – Announcer (pilot)

 

 

Nickelodeon struck gold when it debuted its kid-centric game show Double Dare in 1986. Double Dare would pit two teams of two kids against each other by having them win money answering trivia questions. If they didn’t know an answer, or thought the other team didn’t, they could pass it over with a “dare” for double the money. But it could be “double dared” back for four times the money, in which case that dared team either had to answer or take a “physical challenge”. These physical challenges often featured deceptively simple and incredibly messy tasks; like building an ice cream sundae on their partner’s head, popping goop-filled balloons with a needle headpiece, plucking cherries out of gelatin with their mouths, etc. Success won them the money; failure gave it to the opposing team. The team with the most money then went on to an even messier obstacle course for a chance to win up to 8 prizes within a minute.

A contestant making soup on top of her partner's head on Double Dare.

In the world of entertainment, a success breeds imitators trying to duplicate that success. One such attempt came in the form of Fun House, created by veteran game show producer Bob Synes. Tasked by Lorimar-Telepictures with coming up with a kid’s show for syndication, Synes presented executive producer Scott Stone with a drawing of carnival midway games leading to a funhouse at the end. Stone scaled down Synes’ ambitions a bit and suggested focusing on just the funhouse aspect of it. Lorimar fronted the money to construct a massive set designed by Phyllis Hofberg, Rick Bluhm, Bill Harris and Anthony Sabatino (for which they won an Emmy), and produce a pilot to sell the series.

The teams and their respective cheerleaders taking their places at the podium.

Like Double Dare, it featured two teams of kids comprised of a boy and a girl either related or friends. These teams were distinguished by red and gold uniforms, rather than the wacky self-made names utilized on Double Dare. Occasionally, young celebrity guests would appear or fill the role of one of the teammates, including Danny Ponce (The Hogan Family); Staci Keanan (My Two Dads, Step by Step); Danny Pintauro (Who’s the Boss?); Soleil Moon Frye (Punky Brewster); Jeremy Miller and Leonardo DiCaprio (Growing Pains); Sara Gilbert and Michael Fishman (Roseanne); Tiffany Brisette (Small Wonder); Josh Saviano (The Wonder Years); Jenny Beck (Paradise); Brian Austin Green and Douglas Emerson (Beverly Hills, 90210); Candace Cameron and Jodie Sweetin (Full House); Alexander Polinsky (Charles in Charge); Jaleel White and Kellie Shanygne Williams (Family Matters); Benji Gregory and Josh Blake (ALF); and Tannis Valley (Head of the Class).

The teams sitting in the "Slop Machine", where they got showered in either slime or candy.

Unlike Double Dare, Fun House placed a greater focus on their “stunts”, which would then segue into a single related toss-up question asked at a colorful podium equipped with buzzers. Three timed stunts were played each episode; either with one player at a time (alternating for each solo challenge) or both teammates together. Stunts could involve using their faces to lift up a pie to find a “win” symbol on the bottom of the tin; bobbing for bagels in chocolate milk; assembling a mixed-up image on giant blocks; batting slimy softballs into the audience; pulling “hair extensions” off a giant model’s head to place on their own while being covered in goop; using their teeth to remove gum from under rows of seats; turning their partner into the world’s largest sandwich; using a giant slingshot to fire water balloons at pictures of the announcer; and more. Synes would come up with a title for the stunt first, and then the crew, overseen by producer Stephen Brown, had to create a stunt to go along with that name. The type of stunts featured were usually related to the overall theme of that week’s batch of episodes in keeping with Stone’s philosophy of everything telling a story. The winning team—or both, in the case of a tie—won 25 points. Answering the question correctly earned them an additional 25 points.

Piloting submarines in the Grand Prix Race.

The fourth and final round was The Grand Prix Race. The teams had to race two laps on a track that circled the studio; switching lanes on the second lap. There were two types of races: one utilizing a vehicle of some kind that was ridden by one teammate and moved by the other, switching between laps, and the other was a footrace with each teammate running a lap. The races all featured a different theme with associated challenges that had to be accomplished. For instance, a toy-themed race saw the contestants riding/pulling little red wagons while picking up various toys placed on the track. Additionally, the teams could snag white and blue tokens from stations around the track for 10 and 25 extra points, respectively. During the second season, a Token Bank was added on the second lap that contained a pre-packaged bundle of tokens worth up to 200 points. The winning team earned 25 points, but the ultimate winner was determined after the acquired tokens were tallied by being dropped into slots at the podium. The team with the most points went on to The Fun House obstacle course, while the losing team left with consolation prizes. Ties were broken with a toss-up question.

One of the many configurations of the Fun House obstacle course.

The titular Fun House stood roughly 3-stories tall and featured several interchangeable “rooms” of varying themes and obstacles. They could include toppling Styrofoam skyscrapers; punching out thinly covered holes in a board; an “ice mountain” climb; crawling through a tunnel full of balloons or one that’s spinning; digging through school lockers; traversing a ball pit; etc. Each room contained 16 oversized price tags either plainly visible or hidden somewhere: 6 red representing different prizes revealed before the course was run, and 10 green ones representing cash amounts ranging from $50 to $300. The contestants had 2 minutes to collect as many tags as possible; grabbing three at a time before switching with their partner. This continued until all tags were collected or time ran out. Additionally, one tag was designated as the “Power Prize” that if collected won them a bonus vacation along with everything else they picked up. For the second season, the Fun House became larger and featured more intricate elements like a swimming pool and shooting water.

Host J.D. Roth kicking off the show while John "Tiny" Hurley covers himself in mud.

Fun House debuted in syndication on September 5, 1988. J.D. Roth served as host for the entire run; becoming the youngest game show host in history at just 19. Aiding Roth on the playfield were identical twin cheerleaders. They escorted the teams to the podium, introduced them, and provided support to them based on what color uniform the teams were assigned: Jackie (Jacqueline Forrest) for the gold team and Sammi (Samantha Forrest) for the red. For the pilot, veteran announcer Brain Cummings was utilized. Cummings had previously announced the first season of the 1984-86 syndicated version of Let’s Make a Deal, which Synes produced. John “Tiny” Hurley took over those duties once the series went into production. Along with announcing, Hurley would appear on camera in wacky costumes, participate in skits, or sometimes in various stunts. Other differences in the pilot included playing for cash instead of points; four stunts played instead of three; The Grand Prix awarding $50 for winning and featuring a third red token worth $10 while blue was worth $50; contestants only being allowed two prize tags at a time in the Fun House, with as many cash tags as they wanted; a “Button Banger” in the Fun House awarding a random cash bonus up to $2000 when hit; and the prize tags being scanned at the podium to reveal the Power Prize, which awarded the contestants every prize in the Fun House. Unlike the $2,000-$3,000 Double Dare or fellow Nickelodeon game show Finders Keepers—which filmed in the same complex as Fun House—paid out in cash in prizes, Fun House offered contestants a potential prize payout in excess of $10,000. Score Productions composed the series’ music along with Matt Ender and Jonathan Firstenberg. Props from the show were used in another Lorimar-Telepictures production, Perfect Strangers, for the episode “Games People Play”. Series stars Mark Linn-Baker and Bronson Pinchot also filmed a promo for Fun House as their characters Larry Appleton and Balki Bartokomous.

The show proved a success, becoming the highest rated syndicated new show upon its debut and surpassing even Double Dare (in response, Double Dare added theme weeks and upped the ante in physical challenges by reinstating a previous limited time rebranding as Super Sloppy Double Dare). In 1989, Fun House gained two spin-offs. In the United States, there was College Mad House. Hosted by Greg Kinnear, it featured two teams of four college students (two men, two women) from rival universities playing it out. Rather than cheerleaders, Kinnear was assisted by referees Donna Wilson and Richard MacGregor, with Beau Weaver announcing. Stunts involved the men or women going against each other, and then all four together. The content of this show skewed a bit more risqué than the original; involving more gross-out humor and lewd body movements. Rather than the Grand Prix, the fourth round was the Finals Round. Each member of the team took turns answering as many toss-up questions as possible within a minute and a half; with the winner hitting their opponent in the face with a pie or whipped cream each time. The Mad House, which featured college-themed rooms, had each teammate getting 30 seconds to grab as many tags as they could in order to “clean house” by getting them all. Getting all the tags awarded them a trip; otherwise, they kept whatever prizes they collected for themselves with any cash (up to $1000) going to their school. College Mad House only lasted a single year, ending in September of 1990.

Over in the United Kingdom, ITV debuted their own version of Fun House produced by Scottish Television. It featured host Pat Sharp, twin cheerleaders Melanie and Martina Grant, and announcer Gary King. Played in much the same way as the original with minor gameplay and naming differences, it actually outlasted its parent program to run a full 11 seasons, ending in 1999. Their own adult-themed spin-off was planned and a pilot produced, but it never went to series.

Playing hockey with pies.

Unfortunately, Fun House was beginning to lose steam as sloppy game shows were wearing out their welcome. They were finding difficulty remaining in syndication, despite their best efforts. Enter: FOX. FOX was about to launch its new kid-focused effort, Fox Kids Network, and the show they wanted to acquire for it was…Double Dare. Previously, FOX was pivotal in the success of Double Dare; having distributed it and aired it regularly on affiliated stations, and even airing a version of the show, Family Double Dare, on their own network on Saturday nights. After attempting to bring the show over to their new line up, FOX ended its direct affiliation with the series over “creative differences” and abruptly cancelled Family shortly before they were set to begin filming a new season. Regular Double Dare continued on, however, and was still shown on FOX affiliates, and Family was eventually revived by Nickelodeon two years later. Looking for a replacement that could be just as popular, FOX turned to Double Dare’s closest competitor: Fun House.

M.C. Mike rapping his intro.

Renamed FOX’s Fun House for its third season, it joined the inaugural Fox Kids Saturday morning line-up on September 8, 1990. It also became the first weekday Fox Kids show, filling in for the delayed Peter Pan and the Pirates by airing a special week’s worth of programs featuring some of the earlier-mentioned celebrity guests. While essentially the same show, several changes were made. Hurley was replaced by Michael Chambers, a.k.a M.C. Mike, best known as “Boogaloo Shrimp” from the Breakin’ films. He opened each episode by showing off his rapping skills before the title sequence. While Jackie and Sammi still escorted players to the podium, introductions were now handled by Mike. Carrying over from College Mad House, the player that answered a question correctly got to slap a pie into the face of their opponent. The entire set also shed its carnival-like aesthetic in favor of more urban flair; with distorted cartoon skyscrapers and riveted pipe theming.

The all-new Fun House.

The Fun House itself was also redesigned to emulate a slice of a city block. Starting at the top rather than the bottom, Roth began the run by turning a large valve to activate the “Whitewater Slide” that let one of the players splash down into a waiting pool and officially start the clock counting down. From there, they could go into the “Hardhat Hallway”, which looked like a scrapyard or garbage-filled empty lot; the “Zippity Zoo Dah”, a zoo full of various stuffed animals, a performer in a creature suit, and bendable cage bars; the “Funky Slop Sewer”, resembling a slimy sewer pipe with fake rats and steamy sewage comprised of green balls in water; the “Recycling Zone”, where pulling a lever dumped trash on the player as well as a prize tag; “Bob’s Mad Mall”, which featured dummies holding shopping bags on rotating doors, one of which held the prize tag; the “Kockeyed Kitchen”, an upside-down kitchen whose cabinets held the tag (and was typically filmed upside-down to make it seem like the player was walking on the ceiling); “Flushing Meadows”, a bathroom-like area with three giant colored toilets that sprayed water up when opened; “Fast Food Fight”, a diner area where the opposing team got to impede the winning team by pelting them with food items; and returning from the original Fun House was the rotating “Tubular Tunnel”. Although cash tags were still in plain sight, the prize tags were now hidden within each area. A large slimy alarm clock called the Crazy Glop Clock was added that gave the team an additional 15 seconds in the Fun House when found.

Celebrity guest Kellie S. Williams receiving a pie to the face for a wrong answer.

Behind the scenes, Lorimar-Telepictures was acquired by Warner Bros. Lorimar-Telepictures served as the distributor during the first season as well as the co-producer, but was replaced by Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution for the remainder. This, along with Tiny Toon Adventures, would begin Warner Bros.’ association with Fox Kids that would prove mutually beneficial for both the studio’s burgeoning animation efforts and the block’s legitimacy as a major player in broadcasting. British Knights was replaced as the primary sponsor by LA Gear, and everyone on stage wore the sponsoring company’s shoes. Synes, sadly, died in 1990. Stone replaced him with David G. Stanley and renamed his production company, Stone Productions, as Stone Stanley Productions (now Stone & Company Entertainment). Each episode of the third season was dedicated to Synes.

A trade ad celebrating Fun House's Emmy win.

FOX’s Fun House only lasted a short time on the network, airing 22 episodes before it was replaced on the schedule by the short-lived Swamp Thing animated series in 1991. Despite being nominated for four additional Emmys, winning one other, and winning a Young Artist Award, the show disappeared from the airwaves….in the United States. The British version has aired reruns and even got a special one-time revival in 2015 as a promotional gimmick by Fayre & Square pubs and associated Wacky Warehouse play areas. The American version only eventually resurfaced in videos of various quality on YouTube, including the pilot as a feature entry of legendary game show host Wink Martindale’s Wink’s Vault series. Roth would go on to acting and hosting a few more game shows before moving into producing them—including Moolah Beach, which would air during the final year of Fox Kids (meaning Roth both opened and closed the block). Stone Stanly Productions continued producing game shows, including Fun House spiritual successors Legends of the Hidden Temple, geared towards kids, and Shop ‘til you Drop, geared towards adults. Both featured stunt-heavy gameplay in an elaborate setting: a Mayan temple for Legends, and a 2-story mall for Shop. The latter also reused some of Fun House’s music. In 2022, YouTube channel Hosts at Home hosted a Fun House reunion with Roth, Sharp, Stone, and Brown to discuss and reminisce about the show.

The Fun House NES game box.

In 1988, Pressman Toy Corp. published a board game version of Fun House. A travel game was made by Tiger Electronics the following year as part of their Klix Pocket Travel Games series, as well as their customary LCD handheld game. Hi-Tech Expressions produced a video game in 1989 for the Commodore 64 and MS-Dos, and in 1990 for the NES. No version fully captured the show, but the computer versions were closer than the NES’ as they featured some semblance of the stunts while the NES involved just throwing balls at targets and avoiding obstacles in a top-down view. The board game, and eventually the video games, were given out as consolation prizes on the show.

Exercising on the Fun House set.

The oddest tie-in merchandise had to have been the workout videos. Stone had been on a flight with Julie LaFond, who ran the Jane Fonda exercise empire. A conversation about fitness in kids led to a collaboration between Fonda and the show. Fonda came to the set to introduce Roth, who then led the exercise routines. Two videos ended up being made for the Fun House Fitness series: The Swamp Stomp for kids 3-7, and The Fun House Funk for kids 7+. They were re-released together onto DVD in 2005 as part of the Jane Fonda Collection compilation series.

FALL SATURDAY MORNING SCHEDULES

The fall is here, and that typically meant: NEW TV SCHEDULES! These are the Saturday morning schedules that kicked off the new season across the decades: