Lidsville | |
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Cover to the Lidsville DVD.
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Created by | Sid and Marty Krofft |
Starring |
Butch Patrick Charles Nelson Reilly Billie Hayes |
Voices of |
Lennie Weinrib Joan Gerber Walker Edmiston |
Country of origin | United States |
No. of episodes | 17 |
Production | |
Producer(s) | Sid and Marty Krofft |
Running time | 0:25 (per episode) |
Release | |
Original network | ABC |
Original release | September 11, 1971 – September 2, 1973 |
Lidsville is Sid and Marty Krofft's third television show following H.R. Pufnstuf (1969) and The Bugaloos (1970). As did its predecessors, the series combined two types of characters: conventional actors in makeup filmed alongside performers in full mascot costumes, whose voices were dubbed in post-production. Seventeen episodes aired on Saturday mornings for two seasons, 1971–1973. The opening was shot at Six Flags Over Texas. Otherwise, the show was shot at Paramount Pictures film studio in Los Angeles.
Lidsville resembles an earlier British series, Hattytown Tales, produced by Hattyland Enterprises & FilmFair Ltd. in 1969, which used an almost identical concept but different characters and was produced in claymation.
Like predecessors H.R. Pufnstuf and The Bugaloos, Lidsville ran for only one season (1971–1972), with reruns airing the following year (1972–1973). Also like H.R. Pufnstuf, Lidsville's title and subject matter were often interpreted as references to drug use: the word "lid" is slang for a hat or cap (as in "flip your lid"), but "lid" is also early-1970s slang for an ounce of cannabis (marijuana).
Like most children's television shows of the era, Lidsville contained a laugh track.
The show involved a teenage boy named Mark (Butch Patrick) who fell into the hat of Merlo the Magician (Charles Nelson Reilly) following his show at Six Flags Over Texas and arrived in Lidsville, a land of living hats. The hats on the show are depicted as having the same characteristics as the humans who would normally wear them. For example, a cowboy hat would act and speak like a cowboy. The characters' houses were also hat-shaped.