A proposed revival of "The Flintstones"...

I came across a story earlier this morning while reading some posts in an on-line classic TV community I belong to on Facebook. The article came from Variety magazine and it's about a revival of "The Flintstones" as a weekly animated series. The franchise began back in 1960 and ran in prime-time on ABC-TV for six seasons. It was originally meant to be an animated take-off on Jackie Gleason's series, "The Honeymooners". The producers, Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera, were legends in the animation industry and this was television's first attempt at programming an animated series in a time slot reserved for adults. The show was a hit...and it spawned numerous sequels and incarnations over the decades...all of those sequels came and went but yet the original 1960-1966 series continues airing in syndication almost 60 years later. Sheer longevity alone enables "The Flintstones" to rank along side "Tom and Jerry", "Scooby Doo", and "The Smurfs" when it comes to Hanna-Barbera's greatest franchises. I'm somewhat willing to take a look at revivals of animated cartoons but the sub-par voice acting turns me off. I'm not into reboots and I don't care for C.G.I. and so I rarely watch most modern-day "cartoons". However, once this proposed revival of "The Flintstones" becomes something of a reality and I read more about it I'll more than likely have my mind made up ahead of time based on the information that becomes available. I didn't see the word 'reboot' or the dreaded acronym 'C.G.I.' in the Variety article, though...so that right there is a good start for me.

The original voice cast has long since passed away. Alan Reed as Fred Flintstone, Jean Vander Pyl as Wilma Flintstone, Mel Blanc as both Dino and Barney Rubble, Bea Benaderet as Betty Rubble, and John Stephenson as Mr. Slate. Along the way there were replacement vocal performers. Bea, a familiar face on sitcoms who had been a familiar voice on radio, became the focal point of the CBS sitcom, "Petticoat Junction", and the increased workload caused her to step away from voicing Betty following the 1963-1964 season. She was replaced by Gerry Johnson. Alan Reed had also been a very familiar voice on radio and he returned to voice Fred Flintstone in some of the early 1970s revivals but after his death Henry Corden became the new voice of Fred starting in 1977. Henry would continue voicing Fred in numerous television specials and commercials until shortly before his own death in 2005. Gerry Johnson had been replaced as Betty in 1971 with Gay Autterson and she would remain the voice in the various television specials and limited series until 1981. She would be replaced with Julie Dees when the character resurfaced in 1986. Jean Vander Pyl voiced Wilma Flintstone starting in 1960 and she remained the official voice of Wilma until her death in 1999. Tress MacNeille took over the character's voice in 2000.

Mel Blanc voiced Barney Rubble from the series 1960 debut and remained the voice of the character through all the television specials, revivals, and television commercials until his death in 1989. Frank Welker as well as Jeff Bergman, depending on the whim of the production company, alternated as Barney Rubble for roughly the same amount of time (1990-2006 for Welker; 1990-2009 for Bergman). Kevin Michael Richardson is considered the official voice of Barney (his tenure began in 2001...so it over-lapped with productions that utilized the vocals of Frank Welker and Jeff Bergman). Mel was also credited with the yelping and barking of Dino for nearly 30 years (1960-1987) although Frank Welker provided some yelps and growls and barks in specific productions of the franchise during a 20 year period (1981-2001). There were a lot of secondary characters that shown up in the franchise and most of those recurring or one-shot characters were voiced by the principal voice actors already starring on the show. Don Messick was heard as Bamm-Bamm Rubble as well as newspaper boy Arnold...plus an assortment of incidental characters. John Stephenson voiced Mr. Slate as well as countless other incidental characters. John continued to provide the voice of the short-tempered Mr. Slate, whenever needed, well into the mid 2000s. Internet sites state that his final performance as the character arrived in 2004 for an episode of "Johnny Bravo" titled 'A Page Right Out of History'. You can see that animated short on YouTube. He passed away in 2015.

Click HERE to read the Variety article on the proposed revival of "The Flintstones".

The Flintstones Comedy Show: 1980-1984...

Over the course of this year there have been several uploads on YouTube shining the spotlight on the half hour syndicated series, Flintstone Frolics. The title of this blog entry encompasses the years that The Flintstone Comedy Show happened to be on network television under a variety of titles.

The series debut on NBC on November 22, 1980. The reason for the late start-up date is because 1980 happened to be a strike year for television writers and the 1980-1981 season didn't get underway until November (instead of the usual month of September). This particular series expanded on the concept of several Flintstones programs that had aired in the years preceding the debut of this 90 minute, Saturday morning series. During the 1979-1980 season NBC aired a half hour cartoon series titled The New Fred and Barney Show. In one of the episodes, titled "Fred and Barney Meet the Frankenstones", the ghoulish family is introduced. This happened during a September 1979 air-date. Episodes of The New Fred and Barney Show aired from February to October 1979 on NBC's Saturday morning line-up.

The Flintstone Comedy Show consisted of six segments per episode. The main segment titled The Flintstone Family Adventures contained adventures/stories similar to the 1960's episodes of The Flintstones focusing on Fred, Wilma, Barney, and Betty. Bedrock Cops is a segment that features Fred and Barney as patrolmen on prehistoric motorbikes...perhaps a spoof of the live-action series, CHiPs. In the segment Fred and Barney are aided by Shmoo, a shape-shifting glob of alien species. Their boss is Sgt. Boulder. The Pebbles, Bamm-Bamm, and Dino segment revolved around Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm solving mysteries in which Dino acted as comic relief. The segment often come across like Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm's previous series of adventures in the early '70s on The Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm Show including appearances from Moonrock, Penny, and Wiggy.

A fourth segment, titled Captain Caveman, told the adventures of Captain Caveman's years in Bedrock before being frozen in ice and discovered millions of years later by Dee-Dee, Taffy, and Brenda in the Captain Caveman and Teen Angels series. In the 1980 series Captain Caveman is the alter-ego of Chester, a mild-mannered copy boy at The Daily Granite. Chester turns into his alter-ego, Captain Caveman, during times of crisis and danger...and is often cheered on by both Betty and Wilma (co-workers of Chester's at the paper) even though he's just as klutzy and clumsy as ever. Their boss is Lou Granite. In this series Chester's facial area is clean-shaven but after he transforms into Captain Caveman he looks as he should...covered completely in hair. This segment keeps with The Flintstones tradition of taking modern-day culture and events and placing them in a prehistoric setting. A fifth segment of the 90 minute series centered around The Frankenstones. In this segment Frank Frankenstone's been transformed from a lovable, easy-going monster into a devious and short-tempered agitator. In previous incarnations of the Frankenstone character the depictions had been more or less similar to Boris Karloff's legendary performance as The Frankenstein Monster in the Universal Studios horror movies. Ted Cassidy, and later, John Stephenson, voiced Frankenstone prior to this 1980 series. Charles Nelson Reilly became the new voice of the character and therefore the character's personality changed to match the vain, prissy, and easily annoyed characterization that Reilly was noted for. A sixth segment of the 1980 series centered on Dino...the segments having been called Dino and Cavemouse. In the segment (2 per episode) Dino and a character named Cavemouse battle one another in Tom and Jerry/Road Runner and Coyote-style adventures.

Syndicated internationally The Flintstone Comedy Show received a different title in the form of The Flintstone Frolics. Under this title the original 6 segments from the 90 minute version that were airing in America became repackaged in 30 minute installments. This meant that each half hour broadcast of the Frolics featured 2 segments chosen at random. One episode may feature The Frankenstones and Bedrock Cops, another may feature Bedrock Cops and The Flintstone Family Adventures, another may contain a Captain Caveman adventure along side a Flintstone Family Adventures segment, etc. etc. There happened to be 11 individual episodes produced for 5 of the 6 segments during the ninety minute 1980-1981 season. As mentioned previously the Dino and Cavemouse segments had 2 chase adventures per episode for a total of 22 installments. An additional 7 ninety minute episodes aired during the 1981-1982 season. In total 5 of the 6 segments added up to 18 episodes each. Dino and Cavemouse enjoyed a total of 44 segments during that same period. The Flintstone Comedy Show series, in America, left the NBC Saturday morning line-up on September 11, 1982 but the segments continued to air...

As international audiences seen the program as The Flintstone Frolics a different re-packaged, half hour series aired in America beginning on September 18, 1982 on NBC under the title of The Flintstone Funnies.

As you can see from the title card the series spotlighted the segments originally seen on the 90 minute series. Like the Frolics incarnation overseas, the domestic Flintstone Funnies randomly aired segments of the 90 minute series out of sequential order in a 30 minute time-slot on NBC. This meant that segments produced in 1980 and 1981 aired back-to-back in most half hour installments. This Saturday morning re-packaged series aired on NBC until September 8, 1984. It would be the last time The Flintstones and The Rubbles appeared on network television as adults...ABC aired The Flintstone Kids (1986-1988)...and that series marked the last time The Flintstones and it's related characters appeared on network television in a series (moving to reruns on cable-TV over the next 25+ years). The characters of Fred and Barney continued to air on network TV in the form of commercials for Pebbles cereal throughout much of the 1990s.

The voice cast for the original 90 minute series is rather large as you could imagine. Henry Corden starred as the voice of Fred Flintstone; Mel Blanc also starred as Barney Rubble, Dino, and Captain Caveman; Jean Vanderpyl starred as Wilma Flintstone; Gay Autterson starred as Betty Rubble and Wiggy; Russi Taylor voiced Pebbles Flintstone and Cavemouse; Michael Sheehan voiced Bamm-Bamm Rubble; John Stephenson voiced numerous characters but his main one happened to be Mr. Slate. Also in the cast...Don Messick as Bad Luck Schleprock. Frank Welker as Shmoo and Rockjaw. Lennie Weinrib as Moonrock and Sgt. Boulder. Charles Nelson Reilly as Frank Frankenstone, Ruta Lee as Hidea Frankenstone, Zelda Rubenstein as Atrocia Frankenstone, Paul Reubens as Freaky Frankenstone, Kenneth Mars as Lou Granite, and Mitzi McCall as Penny.

30 minute episodes of the repackaged 90 minute series are on YouTube at the moment. Unfortunately the person that uploaded the episodes has the wrong titles posted for whatever reason. For example there's an upload called "The Ghost Sitters Sands of Saharastone" (which isn't even a title of any of the segment episodes!) but the 2 segments that appear on that upload are "A Night on the Town" (a Frankenstones segment) and "Monster Madness" (a Pebbles, Bamm-Bamm, and Dino segment). You can see that episode HERE. Count Rockula, in that episode, is voiced by Don Messick. I uploaded that one because it's got the best audio, so far, of the other uploads available.