Faerie Tale Theatre

All you want to know about Faerie Tale Theatre

Faerie Tale Theatre
The 6-DVD box set cover by Starmaker II.
Format	Fairytale fantasy
Created by	Shelley Duvall
Starring	Various
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
No. of episodes	27 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Shelley Duvall
Running time	60 min.
Broadcast
Original channel	Showtime
Original run	September 11, 1982 – November 17, 1987
External links
IMDb profile
TV.com summary

Faerie Tale Theatre, fully Shelley Duvall's Faerie Tale Theatre, is a live action children's television series created by Shelley Duvall that ran from 1982 to 1987 retelling popular fairy tales. Shelley Duvall serves as narrator, host and executive producer of the program, and occasionally stars in episodes. The series was followed by another, shorter series called Tall Tales & Legends which followed the same format as Faerie Tale Theatre and focused on classic American folk tales. Both series feature well known actors and directors, and were inspired by the children's television series Shirley Temple Theatre (also known as The Shirley Temple Show and Shirley Temple's Storybook). It later aired as re-runs on the Disney Channel.^{[citation needed]}

1 Background
2 Home video and DVD releases
3 Episodes
4 References
5 See also
6 External links

Background

Shelley Duvall began conception of Faerie Tale Theatre while filming Popeye. She reportedly asked her co-star, Robin Williams, his opinion on "The Frog Prince", a fairytale she was reading during production.^[1] Williams would later star in the pilot episode of the series, The Tale of the Frog Prince.

Home video and DVD releases

Faerie Tale Theatre was released on VHS in the late 1980s through mid 1990s, by Playhouse Video, CBS/Fox, and later Razz Ma Tazz Entertainment/Cabin Fever Entertainment.

Starmaker II held the rights to the series from 2004 to 2006, and at first released 26 episodes (in edited version) as individual discs. This was followed by a double-sided 4-disc box set and then a 6-disc box set, each version containing the same 26 episodes. The "Greatest Moments" episode was not included in this release.

After 2006, Koch Vision held the series' distribution rights, and in November 2006 licensed the rights worldwide (excluding DVDs in North America) to the British company 3DD Entertainment. A new remastered 7-disc box set, including the lost "Greatest Moments" episode, was released by Koch Vision on September 2, 2008.

Episodes

Main article: List of Faerie Tale Theatre episodes

Every episode opens with Shelley Duvall introducing herself and welcoming the viewer to the show, after which she would provide a brief blurb of the story that would follow. All the episodes feature live action twist adaptations of fairy tales in costume by many well-known actors and are directed by such diverse directors as Tim Burton and Francis Ford Coppola. Though Duvall introduced each show, she has starring roles in only two of the episodes: Rumpelstilskin (airing in 1982) and Rapunzel (airing in 1983). Most episodes feature backdrops and settings inspired by artwork by Maxfield Parrish, an American painter and children's book illustrator.