Hong Kong Phooey
| Hong Kong Phooey | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genre | Animation |
| Directed by |
Charles A. Nichols Wally Burr (recording director) |
| Voices of |
Scatman Crothers Joe E. Ross Kathy Gori Don Messick |
| Theme music composer | Hoyt Curtin |
| Composer(s) | Hoyt Curtin |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of episodes | 16 (31 sub-episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) |
William Hanna Joseph Barbera |
| Producer(s) | Iwao Takamoto (creative producer) |
| Running time | 30 minutes (approx.) |
| Production company(s) | Hanna-Barbera Productions |
| Distributor |
Taft Broadcasting (original) Worldvision Enterprises (former) Warner Bros. Television Distribution (current) |
| Release | |
| Original network | ABC |
| Original release | September 7 – December 21, 1974 |
Hong Kong Phooey is a 30-minute Saturday morning animated series produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions and broadcast on ABC from September 7, 1974, to December 21, 1974. It was a parody of kung fu shows and movies of the time. The main character, Hong Kong Phooey himself, is the clownishly clumsy secret identity of Penrod "Penry" Pooch, working at a police station as a "mild-mannered" janitor under the glare of Sergeant Flint ("Sarge").
Penry disguises himself as Hong Kong Phooey by jumping into a filing cabinet despite always getting stuck — and unstuck by his striped cat Spot — and once disguised, gets equipped with the "Phooeymobile" vehicle that transforms itself into a boat, a plane, or a telephone booth depending on the circumstances by banging his gong or changes automatically whenever necessary.
He fights crime relying on his copy of The Hong Kong Book of Kung Fu, a correspondence-course martial-arts instruction handbook. However, his successes are only either thanks to Spot, who provides a solution to the challenges, or the direct result of a comically unintended side effect of his conscious efforts. The background was designed by Lorraine Andrina and Richard Khim.
Each episode begins with Rosemary, the telephone operator, getting a call (and routinely saying "Hallo, hallo, police headquarters, this is Rosemary, the lovely lassie with the classy chassis") and explaining the crime to Sergeant Flint. Penry, the janitor, overhears Rosemary and proceeds to transform himself into the crime-fighting canine (whom Rosemary has a crush on) by slipping behind the vending machine, then jumping into the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet, getting stuck, and, with help from Spot, coming out of the top drawer.
After sliding behind an ironing board to the floor below, he bounces off an old sofa, through an open window, into a dumpster outside, and emerges in the Phooeymobile. Even when he crashes into, harms, or otherwise inconveniences a civilian, the passer-by feels honored, as opposed to being annoyed or embarrassed, when they see who did it. One example was when he drove the Phooeymobile through wet cement, splattering the workers: they responded that it was an honor to have a whole day's work ruined by "the great Hong Kong Phooey."
...
Wikipedia