THE BRADY KIDS

'''The Brady Kids''' was an animated television series, produced by Filmation and seen on ABC from 1972 to 1974. It was an animated spinoff of ABC's sitcom, ''The Brady Bunch''.

Contents

Overview

Characters and voices

The Bradys

Other characters

Opening

Trivia

External links

Overview

In 1972, Filmation Associates and ''The Brady Bunch'' executive producer Sherwood Schwartz adapted the popular live action TV show to animation, resulting in this ABC Saturday morning (and later syndicated) show. The original show's children voiced their animated counterparts (in the first season); however, as the series' name implies, the parents and Alice the housekeeper were left off the show. The six kids were often seen in their tree house; it was never shown whether they lived in an actual house or not.
The animated series also added some animal characters. 'Marlon' was an intelligent, brown talking mynah bird and also a wizard (complete with stereotypical wizard's cap) who used his magic to help the kids out of jams. Marlon was also notable for his method of flight: He spun his tailfeathers like a helicopter rotor rather than using his wings, which were instead used as hands, often for grand gestures as he cast spells.
The Brady's dog from the live-action series, Tiger, was replaced by a dog named 'Mop Top' (whose thoughts were voiced by Larry Storch). There were also twin panda cubs, 'Ping' and 'Pong' (named after the game ping-pong).
Also, there were two human characters created for this show: 'Chuck White' was a boastful, self-absorbed teenager (about Greg's age) who wasn't above cheating to get whatever he wanted, and 'Fleetwood' was his easygoing sidekick. The two of them went to the same school as the Bradys, and Chuck was sometimes central to the plot as an antagonist.
Originally aired as a one-hour segment on ''The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie''[1], the pilot episode was split into two half-hour segments on ''The Brady Kids''. A total of 22 episodes were produced.[2]
Presumably, the rights to this series rest with CBS Paramount Television, however there are no plans for a DVD release at this time.

Characters and voices

The Bradys

★ 'Greg Brady': Barry Williams (season 1), Lane Scheimer (season 2)

★ 'Peter Brady': Christopher Knight (season 1), David E. Smith (season 2)

★ 'Bobby Brady': Mike Lookinland

★ 'Marcia Brady': Maureen McCormick (season 1), Erika Scheimer (season 2)

★ 'Jan Brady': Eve Plumb

★ 'Cindy Brady': Susan Olsen

Other characters

★ 'Marlon': Larry Storch

★ 'Ping and Pong': Jane Webb

★ 'Mop Top': Larry Storch

★ 'Chuck White': Larry Storch

★ 'Fleetwood': Larry Storch

★ 'Babs': Jane Webb

Opening

The opening sequence featured the "grid" familiar to ''Brady Bunch'' viewers, but with the center column normally occupied by the elder Bradys and Alice removed; as the theme song (new lyrics set to the original ''Brady Bunch'' theme with similar music & and upbeat tempo) plays, Marlon flies up and down the center, "magically transforming" the live-action children into their animated counterparts.

Trivia

★ The animated cartoon '', which starred the pop singer Rick Springfield, was the spin off of this series.

★ The episode "It's All Greek To Me" [3] is notable for the first television appearance of Wonder Woman, a character owned by Time Warner through its DC Comics subsidiary. [4] Because of this, a potential DVD release may be complicated because of licensing issues.

External links

★

★ The Brady Kids site A fansite with information about The Brady Kids cartoon and music