The Krofft Brothers

The Krofft Brothers drove their psychedelic dune buggy right up to the edge of freaky with The Bugaloos in 1970, after toying with televised weirdness with H.R. Pufnstuf the year before. The Kroffts would shift the strangeness into high gear with Land of the Lost four years later. It was almost like my intellectual and creative evolution was being reflected in the shows by these Canadian puppeteers. The Bugs were a mixed band of cheery and playful British human insects who sang tuneful but forgettable songs and battled a whacked out bush named Benita Bizarre -- played by Martha Raye, who never met a scene she couldn't chew to bits. It was all outrageous enough to delight a 12-year-old who had not learned to be annoyed. "Land" was entertaining to a 16-year-old who was constantly finding the everyday world just too "daily" to bear. What was needed was time-travel and parallel universes and nonsensical storylines that replicated an acid trip without the pharmaceuticals. "Land" delivered and negotiated the tight rope well -- neither falling into complete farce nor taking itself too seriously -- at first. It was inevitable that the ridiculousness would spin out of control -- or maybe I just finally grew up.