Kukla, Fran, and dear old Ollie

Isn't it Cuckoo, Fran & Ollie?

OP, What do you mean by "gay subtext" aside from Burr Tillstrom being gay.

Lambchop really pinged for me.

I never thought Kukla, Fran and Ollie was a very interesting show. Not funny, seemed very home-made, with ugly puppets. Sherri Lewis and Lambchop were so much better when her show was developed. Gay subtext? How were children supposed to notice that?

Overall, I was a Tom Terrific and Mighty Mouse fan when I was a little kid.

3 Little Maids

Talk about hand jobs...

Lambchop was a huge bottom. Big fisting fan

Thanks for asking, [R2]. I guess I'm thinking of the relationship between Kukla and Ollie, which seems fairly charged and tender. During the show's run there were a bunch of plot arcs in which Kukla seemed to be on the verge of "getting married," which always threw Ollie into fits of anger/misery/betrayal. (In one episode, Ollie finds out that Kukla isn't getting married after all and says, “Oh, I’m so happy! Not that I have anything against marriage, or anything, but I didn’t want you to do it without me.")

I've also interviewed a few older gay fans, and the show definitely pinged for them. I'm just curious as to how widespread that feeling was.

If I recall correctly, Fran the human was always in beween Kukla and Ollie, so they were well-chaperoned. That's about all I can remember. I always loved the name Kukla. Wonder where it came from.

Kukla was an insatiable bottom. That's all I got.

I loved the name Kukla, too, and although I was very young when I watched the show, I remember liking it a lot but being confused about Kukla’s gender. He was bald, he didn’t look like a woman, but my very young self read him as feminine. I haven’t thought of them in years and just realized now that my confusion means he probably pinged for me.

When I was a grad student in Evanston in the late 70s, my partner was a second-string theatre critic and was assigned to review the live Kukla and Ollie show Burr Tillstrom was doing in the old Goodman Studio Theatre (no Fran, but there was a pianist who did some occasional patter with the puppets). The show was an evening one and the audience was a mix of families and your usual adults. The "camp" element of the enterprise was more evident than from my vague memories of the show (I only saw the occasional rerun)--I remember Madame Oglepuss throwing gentle shade at a child in the audience who was not attending as politely as desired. But it was also charming, especially when Kukla sang a folk song. My partner was friends with the stage manager, a hot, handsome, and very friendly guy named Tom Biscotto, who would become one of the first well-known fatalities of the AIDS epidemic in about 1984. I told Tommy that I thought Kukla and Ollie should do a production of "Waiting for Godot"-- I STILL think it was a good idea.

I think of Kukla and Ollie as best friends, like Bert and Ernie were for a later generation, or Frg and Toad, or the animals in "The Wind in the Willows." I think there is an element of romantic feeling in all of those pairings (Mole and Badger as Twink and Daddy?), but I don't know that I get an erotic sense from them, if that distinction makes any sense. Your project sounds fascinating--make it well-written and not just a trotting out of jargon. And I don't mean that queer theory can be used humanly--I believe it can. But don't lose what made Tillstrom's world funny, enchanting, and emotionally powerful --I'd read THAT book!

Kukla is Russian for either doll or puppet. in current slang, it can be used to describe a cute woman, the way it's used in the title "Guys and Dolls."

R4 I adored Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop. I have a Lambchop puppet in a tutu and another in her typical tuxedo--I want to do a production of either "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane" or "Johnny Guitar" with them.

It could happen.

[quote]I think of Kukla and Ollie as best friends, like Bert and Ernie were for a later generation

Bert and Ernie were one bathtub shy of an OnlyFans account. Everyone knows that.

They're posting all the old episodes on YouTube, btw.

R8, Kukla is the Greek word for doll.

Sorry, meant R9

True 70s camp!

Small world, R12. I grew up in Evanston, and recall the live show. Good times. I was so spoiled by theater in Chicago- I saw so many now movie/tv stars get their starts the Goodman, the Organic, and so many tiny hole in the walls. Thanks for warm memories from a long ago era. I miss that world.

I'm sure you can find some postmodernist subtext to their corny banter,

Snagglepuss was the first gay cartoon character--now there is a thesis waiting to happen. A pink lion.

In the summer of 1984 I worked at OxBox, a summer art school in Saugatuck, MI. Burr spent his summers there and in fact is where he first created Kukla and Ollie. He was so sweet, and would do Kukla and Ollie shows for us with this little fold up theater he had. I remember glancing into the back of the theater once, and he had Kukla and Ollie haning upside down on hooks, like he'd shot them. It was, to say the least, jarring.