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One of the promotional fliers for the syndicated show
Flier showing the Banana Splits costumes
The Banana Splits was a television show produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions about a fictional band called the Banana Splits. The characters are Fleegle (a dog), Bingo (a gorilla), Drooper (a lion) and Snorky, (an elephant). The characters were portrayed by live-action actors in costumes; the costumes were designed by Sid and Marty Krofft. The Banana Splits Adventure Hour ran for 31 hour-long episodes from (1968 to 1970). The show featured live action and animated segments.
Dan Winkless, the actor inside the Drooper costume, told Mike Rutherford: "At some point it becomes obvious that the old stuff costs more to store than it would cost to remake (especially sets -- flats are easy to paint). I suppose the costumes still exist somewhere. In 1968, I was impressed that the costumes cost $40,000.00 to build. That sounded like a lot of money to me. But it's a drop in the bucket for today's production costs." [1]
Another group of characters from the show was The Sour Grapes Bunch, A "rival" club of the Banana Splits. In each episode one of the Sour Grapes would give a note to one of the Splits (usually Drooper) and challenge them to something. None of the Sour Grapes were ever shown talking.
Other members of the cast include Banana Vac who hangs over the door and somewhat resembles a mounted moose head, Cuckoo, pops out of the cuckoo clock and Goofy Gopher who pops up from a flower pot. There was also Mildred the Robot, a reburished Robby the Robot from the movie "Forbidden Planet"
The series of Banana Splits comic books were somewhat different than the actual show. The comics took the splits out of their "Banana Pad" And portrayed them as a group of good-natured bunglers that could never seem to avoid trouble. The stories centered around the Splits either trying to find work as musicians or getting caught up in wild adventures on the road between gigs.The supporting characters (Cuckoo, Banana Vac, Goofy Gopher) were never used in the books though the Sour Grapes and Mildred the Robot did make appearances in issue #1.The artist for the books (except most of #1) was Jack Manning, who did layout art for many Hanna-Barbera series as well as actual promotional material for the show itself. Each of the Splits had their own buggy they drove that also was seen in the television show. These comics are very rare and expensive to purchase.
Cast[]
Recurring Segments[]
Locations[]
Only a handful of locations in the series were shown. The primary location is the Banana Splits clubhouse. In the opening segment the splits are shown entering the clubhouse and in some episodes they are all announced by Allan Melvin. The amusement parks shown in the show were Six Flags Over Texas in the first season of the show and Coney Island in Cincinnati, Ohio in the final season.
Merchandise[]
A large amount of Banana Splits merchandise was produced such as plushes, comic books, cereal boxes and model kits. For a list of merchandise visit the List of Banana Splits Merchandise main article.
Episodes[]
See: List of Banana Splits Episodes
Rebirth of The Banana Splits[]
In 2008, Warner Brothers Consumer Products announced a rebirth of The Banana Splits after nearly a two decade hiatus. Included are new segments on Cartoon Network and a revival of their original series on Boomerang, a new Banana Splits-themed kids area at Hard Rock Park, a rock-and-roll themed amusement park in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, as well as a web site and record album - check that - CD release with Universal Records.
Rebirth of The Banana Splits (again)[]
In 2019, Warner Brothers decided to make a movie of The Banana Splits for SYFY, It's not for kids It has blood and gore and MA Rated. No one knows why they decided to make a movie of this show instead of any other show or a kids show made for the movie. This movie is about Harley and his family plus his classmate (Zoey) where he goes to the banana splits because he's a huge fan of the show but the president of programming is going to cancel the show because he wanted to do something cool and edgy not boring and stupid but the show is still a huge hit, The splits get a faulty update because they are robots not puppets but it wasn't meant to happen says they're own engineer, There's a Co-Worker Of the Banana Splits called Stevie which no ones likes, After the Show 7 people met the Splits but it doesn't go as planned and a pushy dad who wants her daughter to be in the show and two Instagram couples then when they heard they're show got cancelled they got angry and started killing people and kidnapping kids to they're basement to continue the show. Stevie died because he got choked by a Lollipop, Thadd died because got cut in Half by a Cut in Half Magic trick, Jonathan got his head on Fire But survived until sloppy time, Sloppy time used to be the banana splits show (not really) Rebecca and Jonathan went on the course Jonathan got stabbed by a key and Rebecca got hit by a Hammer and Mitch (the dad) got ran over by Snorky because he was a Jerk to his family, Poppy (Thadd's Girlfriend) found out there was going to be a female Split and she killed the engineer, Beth (the mom) and Austin (Harley's older Brother) and Paige (Austin's Girlfriend) were destroying the Drooper and Fleegle for good, Snorky and Bingo had a Fight and both of them died, At the end Poppy killed Mitch by the Banana Buggie with the Banana Splits in them and at the credits there was a remastered version of the theme.
Trivia[]
- They were originally called the Banana Bunch later changed to the Banana Splits because of Copyright issues. [2]
- Three of the four actors inside the costumes of the Splits were brothers (Jeffrey, Terrence and Daniel Winkless). Their last names were changed in the credits to avoid confusion. Additionally, they were the sons of N.B. Winkless, who was the uncredited writer of the "Tra La La" theme song. Under contractual agreements, the songwriting was credited to Ritchie Adams and Mark Barkan.