Fractured Flickers

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Fractured Flickers was a syndicated half-hour television comedy show produced by Jay Ward, who otherwise is known for animated cartoons (the most famous of which is Rocky and Bullwinkle). 26 episodes were produced and debuted in the Fall of 1963 as a syndicated program. It continued to be shown for several years.

Host Hans Conried introduced short cartoon-length stories pieced together from (mostly) silent film footage overdubbed with newly written comedic dialog. The voices for these were provided by fellow Ward mainstays Paul Frees, June Foray, and Bill Scott.

The show was at its funniest when desecrating early melodramas with "hip" reinterpretations, such as presenting Rudolph Valentino as an insurance salesman or Lon Chaney, Sr.'s The Hunchback of Notre Dame as a USC cheerleader.

Each episode also featured a celebrity guest whom Conried would interview.

The "postmodernist" show now is as old as many of the films it used were at the time, but the humor frequently holds up well, especially when the show dealt with universal themes. Many prominent figures of the 1960s were lampooned. A segment based on the Kennedy family (and produced long before air time) was excised from all copies of the series when President Kennedy was assassinated so that it was never shown. This segment remains lost to this day.