Alice in Wonderland or What's a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This?

Despite the widely held opinion that the material is unfilmable, Lewis Carroll's fantasy/nonsense classics Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There (1871) have frequently been dramatized for films and television. While few of these productions have successfully translated Carroll's verbal and intellectual experimentation into cinema, several are of superior quality and hold an under-appreciated place in the history of the fantastic film.

Alice's Adventures in Videoland have been uneven in quality; there has been a tendency toward parody and experimentation, and several fine productions have been broadcast.

Walt Disney's animated feature Alice in Wonderland (1951) has been criticized as unfaithful and disrespectful to the Carroll classic. Even less for the purist is Hanna-Barbera's prime-time television special Alice in Wonderland or What's a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This? (1966). This hour-long animated musical is a good-natured burlesque whose colorful visuals, wacky script by comic Bill Dana (aka "Jose Jiminez"), and pleasant, tuneful score by Charles Strouse (of "Annie," "Applause" and "Bye Bye Birdie") result in a happy light entertainment.

Alice, a typical mid-1960's suburban American teenager (in hip-boots and mini-skirt), bumps her head while doing a book report on "Alice in Wonderland". She thereafter chases her dog, Fluff, into her TV set, falling into an astonishingly vulgar Wonderland.

Highlights include a guest appearance by cartoon characters Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble as a two-headed Caterpillar, doing the vaudeville-style "They'll Never Split Us Apart"; a Mad Tea Party with the Mad Hatter's wife, Hedda Hatter (voiced by Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper); Bill Dana's diminutive White Knight; Zsa Zsa Gabor's Queen of Hearts ("Off viss zerr heads, dahlink"); and a zany croquet game which degenerates into a frantic amalgam including football, cricket, surfing and Monopoly.

Most memorable is Sammy Davis, Jr.'s performance (as the beatnik Cheshire Cat) of the terrific theme song, "What's a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This?", which was a hit novelty single in 1966.

The show is a superior example of the Hanna-Barbera studio's limited animation (not to mention limited imagination) during the heyday of "Yogi Bear", "The Jetsons" and "Jonny Quest", and as such is recommended to all cartoon fans and to those students of Lewis Carroll's "Alice" books who can take a little irreverent spoofing of the classic icon.

For years I had been asking people if they remembered a cartoon of Alice in Wonderland where Alice went through her TV set, fell down a "computerized" shaft on the other side, and met the white rabbit. They all politely told me I was nuts. Then, a couple of days ago, I happened to catch this on CN's Boomerang channel, and did a Snoopydance out of sheer vindication. I really *did* see this when I was a kid!

Admittedly, there's nothing that stands out about this typical Hanna-Barbara fare -- the most interesting bits (to a child of the time) would have been seeing Fred and Barney as the Caterpillar, and Alice having the same voice as Josie (of Pussycat fame). Still, the framework story is different: our Alice is assigned to read the book "Alice in Wonderland," then falls, hits her head, and dreams up this whole adventure through the TV set. In that sense, it's more like "The Wizard of Oz" than AIW.

Today's children would probably be bored by this show, since it hasn't aged particularly well, and runs for an entire hour. Also, the title song has a line about "watering down the beer" that wouldn't be used today. If you're in the mood for nostalgia, though, see if you can catch it on a Boomerang rerun.

And has since March 1966. This sounds like a Hanna-Barbera version of Alice, not only Janet Waldo as Alice, making her sound like Josie, b ut even Fred and Barney as the Caterpillar, and it is HB. BTW regarding a poster..I don't think Alice had boots, but otherwise neither here nor there. We all know how the classic Lewis Carroll story goes: Bumps her head, finds her way into the television set and therefor Wonderland..well, in H-B's world.

ALso there are both almost all the stock players of HB and some surprises like Hedda hopper...Bill Dana....Zsa Zsa Gabor..and esp.that cheshire cat Sammy Davis Jr.

Worth watching.

"What's a nice girl like you

Doing in a place like this?

What's a nice girl like you

Doing in a place like this?

Oh, I've got a feeling,

You won't like it here.

The potato chips are soggy

And they water the beer.

So what's a nice girl like you

Doing in a place like this?"

Hanna-Barbera's TV special "Alice in Wonderland, or What's a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This?" doesn't promote fidelity to the source material; having to do a book report on "Alice in Wonderland," Alice falls through her TV set after her dog Fluff leaps into it and finds herself you know where, meeting several of Lewis Carroll's best-known characters while trying to find her pet.

It's less boring than the Disney version, but concerns about some dated trappings aside (will any children watching this today know who Hedda Hopper was?), Bill Dana's adaptation isn't as funny as it wants to be; Alice's trial for stealing the tarts - I told you it wasn't loyal to the book - is particularly tiresome. It also drags a bit when the focus is purely on Alice, and when she has to sing as well...

But all is forgiven when the cards are playing the game, when Fred and Barney's caterpillar come on, or when the Sammy Davis Jr-voiced Cheshire Cat is on screen. The latter isn't on for long, but he makes this worth tuning in for.

"I've gotta split..."