The Banana Splits:
When Psychedelic Fur Met Saturday Mornings
In the kaleidoscopic haze of 1968, as Woodstock loomed and tie-dye swirled through America’s youth, four furry freaks burst onto NBC’s Saturday morning lineup with a bang—or rather, a "Tra La La." "The Banana Splits Adventure Hourly," debuting on September 7, was no ordinary kids’ show. It was a fever dream of bubblegum pop, slapstick comedy, and Hanna-Barbera zaniness, starring Fleegle the beagle, Bingo the gorilla, Drooper the lion, and Snorky the elephant—a faux rock band in garish costumes that somehow captured the spirit of a generation teetering between innocence and rebellion.
For 31 episodes, until September 5, 1970, these anthropomorphic misfits drove their Banana Buggies through amusement parks, belted out catchy tunes, and introduced cartoons that thrilled a generation of groggy-eyed kids. Yet, beneath the Day-Glo veneer lay a groundbreaking experiment in television, one that bridged the counterculture with cereal-box commercialism and left an indelible, if bizarre, mark on pop culture.
The genesis of "The Banana Splits" was as wild as the show itself. Hanna-Barbera, the animation powerhouse behind "The Flintstones" and "The Jetsons," teamed up with puppeteering mavericks Sid and Marty Krofft to pitch a live-action spectacle to Kellogg’s and NBC. The concept—a rock band of costumed animals hosting a variety hour—was born from a desire to stand out in a sea of cartoon pitches. William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, inspired by the success of "The Monkees" and the frenetic pace of "Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In," enlisted Laugh-In writers Phil Hahn and Jack Hanrahan to infuse the show with rapid-fire gags. The Kroffts, then relatively unknown, crafted the oversized, fleecy costumes—Fleegle’s floppy ears, Bingo’s gorilla girth, Drooper’s shaggy mane, and Snorky’s mute trunk—ushering in a new era of live-action character design. Shot partly at Six Flags Over Texas and later Coney Island, the show’s amusement-park backdrop added a visceral thrill, as if the Splits were pied pipers of a never-ending carnival.
The format was a glorious mishmash. Each hour-long episode opened with the Splits performing "The Tra La La Song (One Banana, Two Banana)," a jingle penned by N.B. Winkless Jr. that wormed its way into viewers’ brains like a sugar-coated earworm. (It even hit #97 on Billboard’s Top 100 in 1969.) Live-action skits followed—Fleegle wrestling a stubborn mailbox, Drooper dodging the Sour Grapes girls’ taunts—interspersed with animated segments like "Arabian Knights" and "The Three Musketeers," and the cliffhanger serial "Danger Island," directed by a young Richard Donner and starring a pre-"Airwolf" Jan-Michael Vincent. The Splits themselves were voiced by legends: Paul Winchell (Fleegle), Daws Butler (Bingo), Allan Melvin (Drooper), and Don Messick (Snorky’s honks), with actors like Terence Winkless and Jeffrey Brock sweating inside the suits. It was chaotic, colorful, and utterly unique—a psychedelic sandbox for kids too young to grasp the Summer of Love but old enough to crave adventure.
Culturally, "The Banana Splits" was a bridge between worlds. Airing amid Vietnam War protests and flower-power anthems, it cloaked the era’s free-spirited ethos in a kid-friendly package. The Splits’ faux rock stardom echoed The Beatles and The Monkees, but their goofy antics—think pratfalls and pie fights—kept it grounded in Hanna-Barbera’s cartoon roots. The show’s sponsor, Kellogg’s, saw it as a vehicle to sell Corn Pops, yet its aesthetic owed more to Haight-Ashbury than Battle Creek. For the Krofft brothers, it was a launchpad: their success here led NBC to greenlight "H.R. Pufnstuf" in 1969, introduced via a Banana Splits-hosted special. Critics were split—some hailed its innovation, others dismissed it as noise—but kids adored it, spawning toys, comics, and an album, "We’re the Banana Splits," featuring contributions from soul icon Barry White and rock veteran Al Kooper.
Yet the show’s second season hinted at trouble. After 18 episodes in Season 1, only 13 aired in 1969-70, with recycled cartoons and a stagnant set design that confused young viewers into thinking they were reruns. Ratings tanked, and NBC pulled the plug. Syndication as "The Banana Splits and Friends Show" kept it alive, chopping episodes into half-hour chunks and mixing in other Hanna-Barbera fare like "Atom Ant." The amusement-park shoots shifted to Coney Island, but the magic waned. Jason Ankeny of AllMusic later blamed the decline on a failure to evolve, noting how the static backgrounds dulled the show’s vibrancy. Still, its afterlife stretched into the 1980s on TBS and beyond, cementing a nostalgic foothold that no one saw coming.
The music, though, was a triumph. Beyond the theme song, the Splits’ album boasted tracks like "Doin’ the Banana Split" (penned by Barry White) and "Soul," sung by Ricky Lancelotti, a future Frank Zappa collaborator. The tunes were bubblegum pop with a twist—think The Archies meets The Turtles, with a dash of 1960s swagger. Released in 1968, the LP didn’t chart big, but its infectious hooks lingered. The Dickies’ 1979 punk cover of "Tra La La" hit #7 in the UK, while Liz Phair’s 1995 rendition for "Saturday Morning Cartoons’ Greatest Hits" gave it Gen X cred. The Banana Buggies—customized Amphicat vehicles—became icons too, zipping through Six Flags and Coney Island like relics of a bygone joyride.
Revivals kept the Splits in orbit. A 1972 TV movie, "The Banana Splits in Hocus Pocus Park," aired on ABC, sending the gang into an animated witch’s lair filmed at Kings Island. Cartoon Network tried a 2008 reboot with new shorts and voices by Keith Scott, but it fizzled. Then came the jaw-dropper: 2019’s "The Banana Splits Movie," an R-rated horror flick from Syfy and Warner Bros. Here, the Splits turned feral, slaughtering a studio audience in a bloody riff on "Five Nights at Freddy’s." Premiering at San Diego Comic-Con, it stunned fans—some cheered the audacity, others recoiled at seeing childhood icons wield axes. Director Danishka Esterhazy leaned into the absurdity, proving the characters’ elasticity stretched from silly to sinister.
Behind the scenes, the show was a logistical beast. The Kroffts’ costumes were sweltering—actors fainted on set—and the amusement-park shoots meant wrangling crowds and rides. Richard Donner’s "Danger Island" segments, with their pirate battles and jungle chases, were ambitious for a kids’ show, hinting at his future as a blockbuster director ("Superman," "Lethal Weapon"). The Sour Grapes girls—five dancers in purple minidresses—added a mod twist, delivering notes with silent sass. Yet preservation woes plague its legacy: Season 2 episodes are largely lost, surviving only in fragments or 16mm prints, a casualty of pre-VCR neglect.
For viewers, "The Banana Splits" was formative. On Reddit, fans recall it as a Saturday ritual, the theme song a Proustian trigger. "It was pure chaos, and I loved it," one user posted in 2022. Another tied it to Chuck E. Cheese’s animatronic vibe, a prescient link to the horror reboot. Nielsen data is scarce, but its 31-episode run and decades of reruns suggest millions tuned in. A 1969 preview special, "Meet the Banana Splits," and a 1970 crossover with "H.R. Pufnstuf" boosted its reach, while Gold Key Comics and park tie-ins fueled the fandom.
The show’s fingerprints linger in odd places. Its mix of live-action and animation prefigured "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," while its variety format echoed "The Muppet Show." The 2017 DC Comics crossover with "Suicide Squad" saw the Splits as anarchic foils, and their "Jellystone!" cameo in 2021 cast them as crooks. Each nod underscores their versatility—a testament to Hanna-Barbera’s gamble paying off. The 2019 horror pivot, though divisive, grossed modest buzz, with Deadline noting its "audacious" twist on a "daft" classic.
What does "The Banana Splits" say about the 1960s? It’s an artifact of a fractured era—optimistic yet anarchic, commercial yet countercultural. It sold cereal to kids while sneaking in a whiff of hippie irreverence, a Trojan horse of weirdness in a conservative medium. Today, it’s a nostalgia bomb for Boomers and a curio for millennials, its DNA in everything from theme-park mascots to slasher tropes. The lost Season 2 episodes only deepen the mystique, a Holy Grail for archivists and fans alike.
Ultimately, "The Banana Splits" endures because it defies categorization. Was it a kids’ show, a rock satire, or a proto-psychedelic trip? Yes, yes, and yes. From Six Flags to a blood-soaked studio, Fleegle and crew have dodged obsolescence with a wink and a honk. As Drooper might drawl, “Tra la la”—it’s the sound of a legacy that won’t quit, a furry footnote turned front-page saga. For a generation raised on its madness, and another discovering its dark encore, the Banana Splits remain one thing: unforgettable, gloriously bananas.