The Big Comfy Couch
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The Big Comfy Couch | |
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Alyson Court Portraying Loonette With Her Doll Molly |
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Genre | Children's television series/Educational |
Camera setup | Multi-camera |
Running time | 25 minutes |
Creator(s) | Cheryl Wagner
Robert Mills |
Starring | Alyson Court (1992–2002) Ramona Darling (2006–present) Bob Stutt Fred Stinson Taborah Johnson Robert Mills Jani Lauzon Jackie Harris Grindl Kuchuka Edward Knuckles |
Country of origin | Canada |
Original channel | YTV |
Original run | 1992–present |
No. of episodes | 65 for First Run & 21 Scheduled For Current Run |
Official website |
The Big Comfy Couch is a Canadian children's television series about Loonette the Clown and her friends, produced by Cheryl Wagner and Robert Mills and directed by Wayne Moss and Mills. It premiered on March 2, 1993 in Canada and in 1994 in the USA on Public Broadcasting Service stations across the country.
The shows format revolves around Loonette the Clown, a child clown (portrayed by an adult actress) living with her dolly, Molly, on the eponymous Big Comfy Couch, an oversized couch. She frequently reads stories to Molly, always performs a "Clock rug stretch", and likes to visit her Granny Garbanzo. Auntie Macassar (or more recently, her Uncle Chester) frequently sends Loonette postcards which Major Bedhead delivers on his unicycle (similar to Reba the Mail Lady from Pee-wee's Playhouse). Loonette is gifted in the art of classical dance and runs "Miss Loonette's Dance Academy". Another gift she possesses is the unusual ability to clean just about any mess up in ten seconds, which she calls the "Ten Second Tidy". (In reality, the video's action was sped up during video taping of an episode; the cleaning up actually took longer than 10 seconds). Originally, Loonette was too young to visit Clowntown, but starting in 2006, Loonette makes frequent (adult supervised) trips to Clowntown to visit Granny Garbanzo's "Cabbage Club Cooking School" and Major Bedhead's "Clown Chi Mojo Dojo and Dancing School".
The show was originally produced by Radical Sheep Productions and Owl Television, then Canadian children's television network YTV, with a run of sixty-five episodes. In 2002, thirteen new episodes were produced with Benny Smart, an American children's television production company, Tadpole TV and Treehouse TV, a companion channel of YTV.
Amity Entertainment and Radical Sheep Productions produced twenty-two additional episodes, which debuted on American public television in 2006. This marked the debut of Ramona Gilmour-Darling as Loonette, replacing Alyson Court.
[edit] Main cast
- Ramona Gilmour-Darling — Loonette the Clown (2006– present)
- Alyson Court — Loonette the Clown (1992–2002)
- Bob Stutt — Molly the Doll
- Grindl Kuchirka — Granny Garbanzo
- Bob Stutt — Dust Bunny Fuzzy/Snicklefritz (voice)
- Fred Stinson — Major Bedhead/Andy Foley
- Edward Knuckles — Uncle Chester (2002– present)
- Robert Mills — Dust Bunny Wuzzy (voice)
- Jani Lauzon — Jim Foley
- Jackie Harris — Eileen Foley
- Taborah Johnson — Auntie Macassar (1992–1996)