Jabberwocky is an American daily children's television program designed for 5–10 year-olds that went into national syndication. The original series ran Monday through Friday for over two seasons, from 1972 to 1974, on WCVB-TV in Boston. Starting in 1974, the nationally syndicated version ran weekly and was rerun in the early hours of Saturday mornings by many television stations up until the 1990s.
Synopsis and history
Created and videotaped by WCVB-TV Channel 5 Boston, Jabberwocky featured real actors and puppets and various interstitial cartoons. The "show within a show" concept featured actress JoBeth Williams—in one of her earliest roles—and actor Tucker Smallwood as the "lead performer" and "director" respectively of a children's show. The actress and director were played by Joanne Sopko and Carl Thoma in the first season. Harvard professor and psychologist Jerome Kagan was an advisor to the program.
The friendly antagonist in most episodes was puppet character Dirty Frank, who popped up from whatever packing crate was convenient. As a representative alter-ego for children, Dirty Frank's inquisitive nature and his sloppy behavior drove the plot of most episodes.