The Holiday Music Fest

Well, as long as I've been posting less-known holiday songs and also videos of Kukla, Fran and Ollie...why not put the two together!  Here's Fran singing to Kukla and Ollie.  And what I like about this clip is something that occured often in the show -- Kukla just flopping on Ollie's head and laying there in adoring friendship.

And as a holiday bonus, here's a medley of Christmas songs that the Kuklapolitans sing.  (With a little help from Burr Tillstrom, of course...)  Most of this is not TV footage, but comes from an album they put out, but it's wonderfully edited with appropriate photos.  And then it does end with color footage of them that comes from a Carpenters Holiday Special.

This last footage is the special treat, since the song they sing is what I was specifically looking for.  It's their version of "Deck the Halls."  (Deck the halls with boughs of holly.  Hang the mistletoe for Ollie..)  And of course you get to see them in color.  (They did do the last few years of the show in color, by the way.  I just haven't shown any of that footage.)

But why it's a particular joy for me is that the sequence includes a rare appearance by my favorite Kuklapolitan (who I talked about in the original article), Cecil Bill -- pronounced Sess-uhl.  He's the one third from the left.  Cecil Bill is a bit lunatic and speaks in a language unknown to man, but which the others all understand perfectly, merely different incarnations of "toi ta toi toi toi."  And yes, as a results, it's perfect that he's the one who gets to sing the fa-la-las...