User Reviews

It never ceases to amaze me that some of the best shows from the "Golden Days of Television" attract so little comment. This is yet another example. Only two of us (so far) have ventured an opinion.

'King Leonardo' is right up there with 'Milton the Monster' as one of my all time favorite TV shows. The animation was very basic but the characters and the comedy were both memorable. It's often overlooked that several of the character voices were, in fact, based on Hollywood movie stars. Biggy Rat was Edward.G.Robinson and Odee Colonee was Ronald Coleman.

One of my favorite moments in the show came when Itchy Brother got dressed up as a mother and Biggy Rat was in a pram dressed as a baby complete with cigar! This unlikely ploy was cooked up in an effort to get past the guards at King Leonardo's palace. Needless to say, the jig was soon uncovered.

A great little show which brings back lots of happy memories.

There are only just so many plots. As for this one, Jacob and Esau or Cain and Able would suffice.

The tradition continues, right down to present day "sophisticated" America. We know our kids are smarter than we were, learn more info faster and earlier in their lives than any previous generation. So why for do they still watch Saturdy Morning Cartoons?

Well, Schultz, we seem to be laboring under a delusion that intelligence level and maturity are the same thing. They are not. Even a bright kid, an extremely bright kid still has the emotional make-up of their child,which they are. Ergo, we should not expect them to behave like a (so called) "grown-up".* So, what I'm trying to tell you is at 14 years of age, this writer still saw many a Saturday Network animated series, some not so hot and having no appeal and some were excellent, with wide and varied age groups being able to enjoy the humor inherent in the 'adventure' story lines.

"KING LEONARDO AND HIS SHORT SUBJECTS"(1960) (aka just "KING LEONARDO") was the name given to the weekly half-hour that was shown on the NBC TV Network, Saturday morn, naturally. Like most of the typical cartoon half-hours, it was divided between 2 or 3 featured series. In the case of this "KING LEONARDO", there were three separate story lines shown of three different series.

Leading off, we would have an opening installment of the serialized "King and Odie". The featured characters King Leonardo, the Sovreign of the mythical Kingdom of Bongo-Congo. He was always being helped out of horrible situations by his Personal Valet, Odie Colognie. Leonardo. being King, is of course a Lion, and his servant with the perfumey sounding name is a Skunk, of course. The King is constantly finding himself the object of the 'Bad Guys', his treacherous, envious sibling, Itchy Brother. He is flea ridden with a scraggly looking Mane, and lacks any real intelligence of his own. He has a sort of 'Prince John to King Richard the Lion Hearted' relationship with his brother.

Itchy constantly and chronically covets his brother's throne as Ruler of Bongo-Congo, but, on his own lacks the drive, initiative and the smarts to hatch a plot and conduct a campaign against the King.

So, it is Itchy's cohort who is the plotter and driving force behind each and every plot against the Crown. His 'partner in crime is Biggy Rat, himself.

The second feature is "THE HUNTER" an Anthropomorphic Canine Detective character with a fondness for sounding a trumpet. The Hunter is a Southern Gentleman in the old tradition, with a deep, rich and somewhat slowly and deliberately elocuted voice. His perennial Arch Enemy is the Master Criminal known as 'The Fox', who, naturally, is one.

The 3rd Cartoon featured TOOTER TURTLE, who is always wanting to try his hand at a different occupation or walk of life. He may even wish for a different life in another age, such as being a Knight in the Middle Ages or at King Arthur's Camelot.

He would start out each adventure by paying a visit to MR. WIZARD, a Lizard who lived "down by the forest by a tall, tall tree", in a box. Mr. Wizard, who spoke with a distinctly Germanic Accent, would caution Tooter, and question the Turtle's desire to be whatever it was that week. After going through a few trials and tribulations, Tooter would always find himself in a very bad position and would call out the usual "HELP, MR. WIZARD!" With the recital of the Lizard's Magic Incantation, "DRIZZLE, DRAZZLE, DRAZZLE, DROME! TIME FOR THIS ONE TO COME HOME!" And Tooter would be magically returned to the wooden box Lizard house. And Mr. Wizard would always remind him that he should be content in being what he is by using some rhyme, which escapes the old memory at this moment.

This 3rd Cartoon would be followed with a second "KING and ODIE" installment of their serialized story.

The Show and the 3 Features in it, were the creation of W. Watts "Buck" Biggers, who would a few years later bring us "UNDER DOG"(1964-). The Companies were Leonardo Productions, Liason Productions and TOTAL Television, with the broadcast venue being NBC TV Network (1960-63).

The Voice Characterizations were done by a fine, crew of real, true Professionals, veterans of "Old Time Radio", all. We had former Narrator/Announcer of the SUPERMAN Radio Show, as well as the voice for Bluto in the Paramount Famous Studios POPEYE Cartoons, Jackson Beck. He provided voices for not only King Leonardo, but also an Edward G.Robinson-like Biggy Rat voice.Kenny Delmar ("Senator Claghorn" on THE FRED ALLEN Radio Show)did 'THE HUNTER'.Sandy Becker & Frank Milano apparently split time with Mr. Wizard the Lizard. Allen Swift gave us Odie Colognie, Itchy Brother and Tooter Turtle, with Ben Stone providing us with the Fox's audio. George S.Irving and Delo Slates gave various other voices.

Very much like the older "CRUSADER RABBIT", "ROCKY & BULLWINKLE" and their own later "UNDER DOG!", the production crew provided us with a half hour that could be enjoyed by the entire family, though on different levels.

And they had one of the funniest theme songs, both in coming on and in signing off. It is in itself a sort of parody of theme songs and really has to be heard to be appreciated. Please,don't ask me to sing it! Please!

NOTE: * In our household, we were blessed with two very bright girls. And when they were say in the 3rd Grade, with reading levels and math skills at a 9th grade levels, they still played with dolls and would play house. Their intelligence should not deprive them of a childhood. ANOTHER good example is our 42nd President of the United States of America. A most likable guy, possessed a very high I.Q.; but was very Immature, indeed.

Before anything else, I have to make a correction to someone else's comment. Jay Ward and Bill Scott had nothing to do with "King Leonardo and His Short Subjects." In fact, it was the first production of Total Television (AKA TTV), the same folks who brought us "Tennessee Tuxedo" and "Underdog." They used the same animators as Jay Ward and had a similar style, not to mention both were sponsored by General Mills, so it is very easy to get confused! At any rate, "King Leonardo and His Short Subjects" may not be as well remembered as "Underdog" or "Tennessee Tuxedo," but it should be. It has the same wit and sense of whimsy about it as TTV's later work. And the voice work, as with any TTV production, is superb.

King Leonardo brings back so many good memories of my childhood - this would have had to have been my all time favourite cartoon. I would love to be able to watch again, but it is never on the Cartoon Network channel and unfortunately I don't see a DVD arriving any time soon, but I would love to re-live the memories once again. My husband would know then about the show that I used to love.

King Leonardo and His Short Subjects must have made quite an impression on me ... I never forgot about this show in 60 years. I remembered all the characters names like Odie O Colognie (my version) Big guy Rat..and their characteristics. I always thought it was ahead of it's time whatever that really means and would love to be able to see them again. I never see them mentioned when questions come up about people"s favorite cartoons from their childhood so I throw in King Leonardo's name to bring it back to people's minds and seek out fellow fans. Nice to read the reviews here ..now I know I didn't imagine them. Now I need to find 65 more words so this review will go through. :-)

A good friend recently gave me a DVD of these very obscure cartoons from the early 1960s, aired as part of the King Leonardo and His Subjects TV series. I can honestly say that I haven't thought about Twinkles for about 60 years. Twinkles the Elephant was an early, somewhat nefarious experiment between advertisers and television to create a brand which was both a TV series and a consumer product, in this case a sugary breakfast cereal along the lines of Super Sugar Crisp. When you bought the cereal at the grocery store, the back of the box expanded to contain a storybook full of puzzles, games and coloring pages. Then, in theory, you went home and ate the cereal and watched the cartoons, which reinforced the brand. When I started to watch these weird little cartoons again, it was like I hadn't skipped a beat in 60 years. The goofy characters, the limited animation, the goofy narrator who also does all the voices, even that odd little theme song - all of it seemed just like yesterday. Yet after watching a few of these episodes, something strange happened - I had the sudden, immediate urge to relieve myself! Afterwards, it came to me in a shock - Twinkles was an early example of cultural programming for baby boomers, and for kids my age, was inextricably connected with that holy rite of passage known as potty training! Yes, I clearly recalled that every time that extremely hypnotic piece of theme music came on, my mind thought of the cereal, and that thought of ingesting food quickly led to thoughts of various bathroom activities. And of course right after breakfast was when most kids took their big dump of the day. Anyways, whoever devised these clever little cartoons, which unspool in a scant 90 seconds (!) really knew what they were doing. There is a complete story told in this short span, including a happy ending coda. (It appears that the soundtracks for at least some of the episodes originally came from kiddie records.) The Twinkles cartoons manage to compress time in a quite uncanny way, and are one of several ways in which these ostensibly innocent stories for children seem somehow ritualistic, even occult. Indeed, every cartoon features Twinkles using his magic chant, "Nose! Nose! Anything Goes!" to transform his trunk into a useful tool to get out of his current jam. The peculiar yet intrinsic connection between Twinkles and bathroom functions even extends to the hero's name, which every kid in the schoolyard of course referred to as "Tinkles." Even odder, this fascinating artifact of early cultural programming and consumer brainwashing, is apparently is still locked deep somewhere in baby boomer brains, ready to trigger the intended response anew. (Imagine hundreds of thousands of American children running to the bathroom upon hearing that weird theme music!) And now, every time I hear that bizarre little theme song banging around in my head, I have to go obey my master's early embedded scatological indoctrination.

This show was the cradle for other Total Television cartoons such as Underdog, Tennessee Tuxedo, Tooter Turtle, The Fox and The Hunter, Go Go Gophers, Klondike Kat, The World of Commander McBragg, and others, yet this particular cartoon has fallen into obscurity compared to the others. And it is not really a shock.

King Leonardo himself was the dense king of Bongo Congo, with his loyal skunk assistant Odio Colognie helping him out of various scrapes, mainly Biggie Rat trying to install Leonardo's even denser sibling Itchy Brother onto the throne, with other villains sometimes helping them out-but of course Odio Colognie saves the day every time.

So why did this fall by the wayside compared to the others? Undoubtedly because each episode had basically the same plot, with relatively little variety. Though Underdog always won the day, he at least had a variety of villains to deal with, and different ways to deal with them, sometimes even by solving their problems rather than simply defeating them. Tennessee Tuxedo had to get help from Mr. Whoopee each episode, but his problems were not the same each time. Even little kids don't like the same story each time, and why certain Total Television cartoons became more popular over the others.

I love this show!! You should see it. It's a classic! Never underestimate the power of the TRUE BLUE ODIE COLOGNIE (and his should-be sidekick, King).

*****/***** (this is even better than Wacky Races!)

This was outstanding! I would admit it's better than Wacky Races. Odie Colognie is cool. If you like old cartoons you should see this. If you like Dudley Do-Right I highly recommend seeing this and possibly buy it if they sold it, or something!!!

My Opinion: *****/*****

King Leonardo and His Short Subjects (aka The King and Odie) was the first show produced by Total Television Productions and it turned out to be a success. Even though the animation was limited and produced by the same company who animated Rocky and Bullwinkle, the plots were pretty much the same as King Leonardo and his valet Odie Cologne consistently foiled the plans of Biggy Rat to put the king's brother Itchy on the throne.

There were also the other segments, including The Hunter and Tooter Turtle, best known for the line from Mr. Wizard the Lizard when things got rough for Tooter "Drizzle drazzle druzzle drone. Time for this one to come home." Another segment was Twinkles the Elephant, based on the General Mills (who sponsored the show) character.

But to me, one of the keys to the show's success was the voice cast, including Jackson Beck as the king and Biggy Rat, Kenny Delmar as The Hunter and New York kids show host Sandy Becker as Mr. Wizard the Lizard.

The real star of the show was Allen Swift, who voiced Odie, Itchy and Tooter. The former host of the New York version of Popeye shows his versatility as a voice actor and it paved the way for roles in Tennessee Tuxedo, Underdog and the last show from Total Television, The Beagles.

Confound it! This review is over.

Even as a child I recognized a political element in the King Leonardo stories. Odie, ostensibly a loyal toady, was the power behind the throne in the constant conflict to maintain the status quo on one hand against the installation of a puppet of the scheming lower class Biggie. Neither of the lion brothers were really more than figureheads. Maybe I was reading too much into it, but then Jay Ward and Bill Scott were pretty subversive guys! I was fortunate enough to get on their mailing list (by claiming to be editor of a humour magazine) and the stuff they sent out free was even better than their cartoons. What stays with me after forty years is the stories were endlessly entertaining and the characters well defined. I can still hear the voices.