''Le Manège enchanté'' (British English: "The Magic Roundabout", American English: "The Magic Carousel") is a popular French animated children's television series of hundreds of episodes each five minutes long, which premiered on October 5, 1963, on the first channel of the ORTF.

Serge Danot Serge Danot (7 February 1931 – 23 December 1990) was a French animator and former advertising executive. He is best known for creating the animated series, ''Le Manège enchanté'' in 1964, which became known in its 1965 English-language ver ...

created the series. The series features characters in the make-believe land of ''Bois-Joli'': Père Pivoine, the owner of the roundabout; Zébulon, a jack-in-the-box; Pollux the British dog; Azalée the cow; Ambroise the snail; Flappy the Spanish rabbit; Margote, a girl; and Jouvence Pio, a gardener who starts every sentence with "Hep Hep Hep". The footage was used by the BBC to produce an English-language version, ''

The Magic Roundabout ''The Magic Roundabout'' is an English-language children's television programme that ran from 1965 to 1977. It used the footage of the French stop motion animation show ''Le Manège enchanté'' but with completely different scripts and characte ...

'', using scripts that bore little relation to the original story lines.

Production

The programmes were created by stop motion animation with puppets used for the characters. The first season consisted of about 39 episodes. The initial episodes were filmed in black and white. After Danot's departure in 1967, a second series of 100 episodes was broadcast in 1971. In 1989 another 250 episodes were produced by

AB Groupe Mediawan Thematics (formerly known as AB Groupe) is a French business group in the field of broadcasting. It was founded in 1977 by Jean-Luc Azoulay and Claude Berda as a music production company, and in 1987 went into the world of television ...

for the ''

La Cinq La Cinq () was France's first privately owned free-to-air television network. Created by politician Jérôme Seydoux and Italian media mogul Silvio Berlusconi, the network broadcast from 1985 to 1992. The contract for France's fifth terrest ...

'' channel.Agnès Moreau, ''De Nounours à Casimir, du petit écran au coffre à jouets'', éditions Massin, 1997,

Voices

* Jacques Bodoin : Pollux / Flappy / Ambroise / Zébulon (1963–1966) * Bernard Haller : Pollux (1966) * Christian Riehl: Pollux (1966–1990) *

Micheline Dax Micheline Dax (3 March 1924 – 27 April 2014) was a French film and stage actress and singer. She did the voice to Ursula in the French dub in Disney's "The Little Mermaid". The Paris-born actress was born Micheline Josette Renée Etevenon. Sh ...

: Azalée (1963–1966) * Pascaline Priou: Azalée (1966–?) * Patricia Danot: Margote (1963–1990) * Serge Danot: Ambroise (1966–?)

Films and revival

* ''

Dougal and the Blue Cat ''Dougal and the Blue Cat'' (french: Pollux et le Chat Bleu) is a 1970 British-French animated film based on the stop motion children's television '' The Magic Roundabout'' directed by Serge Danot. It was released in France in December 1970 an ...

'', French animated film directed by Serge Danot in 1972 * ''

'', Franco-British animated film, released in 2005 The series was revived using computer animation. 52 episodes aired from September 2006 on

Disney Junior Disney Junior is an American pay television network owned by the Walt Disney Television (part of Disney General Entertainment Content) unit of The Walt Disney Company through Disney Branded Television. Aimed mainly at children two to seven y ...

and from 2 April 2006 on M6.

References

External links

Production

Voices

Films and revival

See also

References

External links