''Funky Squad'' was a short-lived 1995

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series which satirised 1970s-era U.S. police television dramas, such as ''

The Mod Squad ''The Mod Squad'' is an American crime drama series, originally broadcast for five seasons on ABC from September 24, 1968, to March 1, 1973. It starred Michael Cole as Peter "Pete" Cochran, Clarence Williams III as Lincoln "Linc" Hayes, Pegg ...

''. Only seven half-hour episodes were produced, which were broadcast on the

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. Real television commercials from the 1970s were shown during the program's "commercial breaks". The show featured four "funky" undercover detectives: undetectable as police, given their "hipness". The conclusion of each episode was deliberately designed to be incredibly predictable: usually the perpetrator of the crime under investigation could be identified within the first few minutes of the episode. Before the television series, ''Funky Squad'' originally aired as a series of episodes on radio station

Triple M Triple M is an Australian commercial radio network owned and operated by Southern Cross Austereo. The network consists of 45 radio stations with flagship stations broadcasting a mainstream/classic rock music format in Sydney, Melbourne, and B ...

Rob Sitch Robert Ian Sitch (born 17 March 1962) is an Australian filmmaker, actor and comedian. He directed and co-wrote the comedy films '' The Castle'' (1997) and ''The Dish'' (2000); the former of which is often considered one of the greatest Australia ...

, who played Grant, was replaced by

Tim Ferguson Timothy Dorcen Langbene Ferguson (born 16 November 1963) is an Australian comedian, film director, screenwriter, author and screenwriting teacher. Early life and education Timothy Dorcen Langbene Ferguson grew up in Singapore, and later on ...

when the series went to television.

Characters

In a metafictional setting, the characters were played by "actors" whose "names" were displayed in the opening credits of the program. These "real names" were also satirical, poking fun at the names of actors who appeared in American 1970s cop shows.

"Stix": Joey Alvarez

* Played by

Santo Cilauro Santo Luigi Cilauro (born 25 November 1961) is an Australian comedian, television and feature film producer, screenwriter, actor, author and cameraman who is also a co-founder of ''The D-Generation''. Known as the weatherman in ''Frontline (Au ...

* Had a large afro.

"Grant": Blair Steele

* Played by

* The leader of the group; the cool guy.

"Poncho": Harvey Zdalka Jr

* Played by

Tom Gleisner Thomas Edmund Gleisner (born 24 October 1962) is an Australian comedian and producer. Gleisner co-founded production company Working Dog Productions and currently hosts Network 10's ''Have You Been Paying Attention?''. Early life and educati ...

* Mute, as a bullet had hit his tongue. The joke was that this was a ridiculous plot device to get around having accidentally hired an actor with poor English.

"Cassie": Verity Svensön-Hart

* Played by Jane Kennedy * The token female; a stereotypical 1970s feminist.

The Chief: Baldwin Scott

* Played by

Barry Friedlander Barry may refer to: People and fictional characters * Barry (name), including lists of people with the given name, nickname or surname, as well as fictional characters with the given name * Dancing Barry, stage name of Barry Richards (born c. 195 ...

* The tough cop to whom the Funky Squad reported.

Production

The program was created and written by Australian comedians

, Jane Kennedy,

, and

of '' Frontline'' and ''

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'' fame. Cilauro, Kennedy and Gleisner also co-directed the series. Sitch was originally to star but was replaced by Ferguson due to study commitments overseas. The show was given a meagre production budget of A$1,000 per episode, so many of the costumes were acquired by wardrobe director Kitty Stuckey (best known for her work on ''

Kath & Kim ''Kath & Kim'' (also written as ''Kath and Kim'') is an Australian sitcom originally airing in the prime-time slot on ABC Television from 2002 to 2005 and subsequently on the Seven Network in 2007 and 2022. The show was produced by Riley and T ...

'') at local Melburnian

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stores.

Merchandise including video and DVD release

In 1995 ''The Funky Squad Annual'' was published. Unlike many TV show tie-ins this was not a behind-the-scenes work or analysis of the show but was a parody of annuals for TV shows in the 1970s. As such it addressed a child readership and included many pictures, features, puzzles and comic strips. A

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

video containing three episodes of the series ("A Degree in Death", "Wrong Side of the Tracks" and "The Carnival is Over") was released in 1996. A DVD set of all seven episodes of the series was released in Australia on 7 November 2007. The DVDs were marked as Region 4, but appear to be region-free.Review: Funky Squad
''DVD Times'' (UK).

References

External links

*{{IMDb title, id=0111972, title=Funky Squad
Unofficial Episode Guide
1995 Australian television series debuts 1995 Australian television series endings 1990s police comedy television series Australian Broadcasting Corporation original programming 1990s Australian comedy television series Television shows set in Melbourne