keywords = Foodini Pinhead great puppet tv television CBS ABC Lucky Pup S. Berliner, III's PINHEAD and FOODINI PAGE
Updated:  01 Mar 2008, 22:30  ET
(Created 17 May 2001)
[Ref:  This is foodini.html  (URL http://home.att.net/~Berliner-Ultrasonics/foodini.html )]

S. Berliner, III's

Pinhead and
Foodini Page

Consultant in Ultrasonic Processing
"changing materials with high-intensity sound"
Technical and Historical Writer, Oral Historian
Popularizer of Science and Technology
Rail, Auto, Air, Ordnance, and Model Enthusiast
Light-weight Linguist, Lay Minister, and Putative Philosopher

This site has now been visited times since the counter was installed.

PINHEAD and FOODINI

And here they are, Pinhead and Foodini (ta, ra!):

Pinhead Foodini
(Images from Joanne's club, processed by SB,III for better visibility,
and reproduced by specific permission - all rights reserved to source.)

note-rt.gif Most of the photos are GONE!  Joanne was kind enough to send some again.
[See "problem".

Here's the Boss, at any rate:

Foodini

Did you happen to download them and, if so, are you able to send them back to me?

The links seem to have died, as well!

Rather than risk plagiarism, I'll refer you to YesterdayLand's Lucky Pup page, with a fair writeup on the original CBS-TV Lucky Pup show ca. '48-'51, on which Foodini (a hand puppet) was a bungling "evil" magician with an even-more-inept assistant, Pinhead.

Something doesn't tally there, though, because they give a Release History on CBS as 8/23/48 - 6/23/51 and yet state the Lucky Pup show folded after one season!  They then state that the cast resumed on ABC-TV under the title "Foodini the Great".

That's not what I remember, but as a teen, only the Pinhead and Foodini bit would have meant anything to me.

However, as a public service (to show just how great-hearted I am), here are Doris Brown (sorry; who?) with Lucky Pup (I do remember him after all!) and Jolo, the clown (only marginally familiar):

Doris Brown and Lucky Pup Jolo
(Images from Joanne's club, processed by SB,III for better visibility,
and reproduced by specific permission - all rights reserved to source.)

O. K.  I remember it as the "Pinhead and Foodini Show", with our hero taking second billing purely for euphony.

Actually, it seems that the program was renamed "FOODINI THE GREAT" in 1951 because Foodini became more popular than Lucky Pup (which certainly doesn't surprise me).   new.gif (23 May 03)

Pinhead and Foodini were hand puppets (NOT stringed marionettes) and acted in the grand and ancient Punch and Judy tradition, with lots of screaming, food flinging, and mock (?) violence.

[The commercial marionette available now (as of May 01) doesn't even LOOK like Foodini!]

What I remember best, though, is the Swiftian political satire and adult humor hidden in the childish antics of those two buffoons.  This was back in the days of (and in the style of) Al Capp's Li'l Abner and the great Walt Kelly's Pogo!

YesterdayLand focuses on children's television; I'm more interested in the great art of the writers of Pinhead and Foodini and the characterizations of puppeteers Hope and Morey Bunin, respectively.

Pinhead sang:

Oh, there's nothing he can't do,
Oh, there's nothing he can't do,
Oh, there's nothing he can't do,
He's the one and only Foo---dini!

To which Foodini replied, with his customary modesty:

Let me tell you all about the stars.
Some day I'll even fly to mars.
A man of strength, and brains, and force:
I'm speaking of myself, of course.

So, I'm running this up the flagpole to see who salutes.

Hey, I never thought of this before; Foodini is modeled on Giaffar (Jafar?), the evil Prime Minister in Alexander Korda's 1940 classic, The Thief of Bagdad (with Sabu as the Abu, the thief)!

{Do you remember Abu letting the Djinn/Genie out of the bottle and the Djinn saying,
  "Aha, you worm; now you shall squirm!
    Let the spirits of the earth beware!
    The spirits of the air are freeeeeee!"?

  And then Abu tricks the Djinn into going back into the bottle
  (by pretending he doesn't believe the Djinn fit in the bottle or could get back in)
  so he can get his three wishes!
  Stupidly, his first wish is for sausages and he gets them.}

I had asked for copyright-free photos of the actual Foodini or Pinhead puppets, or permission, and got them; I must thank Joanne for all those above and the one that follows.

Here is a classical image of the wacky pair from Joanne at katmandu2001, from her Yahoo! Foodini club:

Foodini and Pinhead
(Image from Joanne's club, processed by SB,III for better visibility,
and reproduced by specific permission - all rights reserved to source.)

Here it is, again, recreated and reprocessed from another image:

Foodini and Pinhead

Gadzooks!  Joanne was even kind enough to add an image I hadn't seen before:

Foodini 4

Joanne has not only saved my neck (well, my page, at any rate), she has sent even more images of the wacky pair; the first one seems to be Foodini lost in the poppy field in Oz {???} but the second one, which seems to be the two of them either flipping a square flapjack or levitating a potholder or some such, can only have one possible title:

Foodini in Flowers Foodini as Chef

"FOzdini" ("FoodOzzi"?) and "MAGIC CHEF"!
{what else?}

This is a heavily-processed image of a distorted and damaged Foodini rubber novelty item:

Foodini
(Image processed by SB,III)

There was also a comic book; this was sent to me and is dated July (probably 1951) and is the No. 1 (and presumably only) issue:

Foodini and Pinhead Comic

(Could that be Doris Brown?)

Because of my love of pipe organs and Foodini, someone sent me this image, which I at first assumed was the great prestidigitator, himself, but it's some character or other on Sesame Street:

Sesame St organ
(Image processed by SB,III)

Oh, this is too funny!  This page was inadvertently titled "PINHEAD and FODINI" and no one picked up on it;
I spotted this in a search for something else!

If you are into chats and rooms and groups and rings and clubs and such (I'm not), try the Foodini Club on Yahoo!, as noted above.

There are also tapes of 1951 shows available (one as a segment added to a Paul Winchell/Jerry Mahoney show sequence) from MoviesUnlimited.com and eBay, as well as 8x10 glossies.  There were also Foodini comic books, novelties, and games and they are most definitely collectibles now.

Googling "Foodini" images on April 1st, 2008, reminded me that my sister and I shared (fought over?) a game board on which a 4-5" composition figure of Foodini spun magnetically and pointed a stick or wand (toothpick, later) at a fortune (or some such).  Does anyone remember (or have) such a game today?   new.gif (01 Apr 08)

There's a band using the name "Foodini" and a ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat meals line and restaurant chain (from Chevron, of all things! - and which may have folded), etc.

Early kiddy TV shows are featured on TV Party's Lost New York New York City Local Kids Shows.

Here's a question for you, from a 56-year-old who remembers the show, even saw the Bunin Pupets perform live somewhere, and still has a 78 recording of "Foodini's Trip To The Moon", barely playable (and is looking for a clean copy): "What ever became of the puppets?  Do they still exist?  Are they in a museum?"  O.K., Foodini-fan(atic)s; any answers?

See also my so-called Fun Page and my Culture Page, as well as my outdated Pooh Page.

If you are into such, see also the section on my Tractors page re that great series in the '40s Saturday Evening Post about Alexander Botts and the Earthworm Tractor Co..

U.S.Flag U.S.Flag

THUMBS UP!

THUMBS UP!  -  Support your local police, fire, and emergency personnel!

S. Berliner, III

To contact S. Berliner, III, please click here.

© Copyright S. Berliner, III - 2001, 2003, 2004, 2008 - All rights reserved.

Return to Top of Page