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Wild & Crazy Kids facts for kids
| Wild & Crazy Kids | |
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| Presented by |
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| Theme music composer |
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| Composer(s) | Alan Ett |
| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of episodes | 75 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Woody Fraser |
| Producer(s) | Noah Edelson |
| Running time | 22 Minutes |
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| Release | |
| Original network | Nickelodeon (USA) YTV (Canada) |
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Wild & Crazy Kids was a super fun American TV game show on Nickelodeon. It featured big teams of kids competing in exciting physical challenges. The show first ran for three seasons, from 1990 to 1992, with 65 episodes.
The original show had three teenage hosts: Omar Gooding and Donnie Jeffcoat were there for all three seasons. Annette Chavez joined them in season 1, and Jessica Gaynes took over for seasons 2 and 3.
In 2002, Wild & Crazy Kids came back for a short time. This new version had ten episodes and aired from July to October 2002. It was hosted by Mati Moralejo, who was also known from Nick GAS.
Contents
Awesome Games and Challenges
Every episode of Wild & Crazy Kids had three different games. Each game was led by one of the hosts. Teams were easy to tell apart by the color of their shirts.
The games were all sorts of fun! Many were like giant versions of playground games, or sports with really silly rules. Some games even involved messy stuff like pies or green "blap" (which was like slime!).
Most of the time, the show was filmed outdoors at parks and beaches around Los Angeles. Sometimes, they even had special episodes at cool theme parks like Raging Waters or Six Flags Magic Mountain. Unlike many other game shows, kids didn't win prizes on Wild & Crazy Kids. It was all about the fun and the challenge!
Sports with a Twist
Many games on the show took classic sports and added a wild twist!
- Dizzy Bat Home Run Derby: This game was so popular it was played every season! Two teams, one of kids and one of adults, would play three innings. Kids tried to hit home runs. When it was the adults' turn, they had to spin around their bat three times before hitting the ball from a tee! Donnie Jeffcoat hosted this game every time.
- Three-Legged Soccer: Imagine playing soccer while tied to a teammate at the ankle, just like in a three-legged race!
- Splash Football: Famous quarterback Rodney Peete would throw footballs to kids who were jumping off a diving board into a pool. Splash!
- Bumper Boat Lacrosse: This was lacrosse played while riding around in bumper boats.
- Donkey Basketball: Yes, you read that right! Kids played basketball while riding on donkeys.
Giant Playground Fun
Some games were super-sized versions of games you might play with your friends.
- A giant game of Simon Says was more like a comedy show with the leader, Brian Seeman.
- Red Pie/Green Pie: This was a messy version of Red light/Green light. If you moved when it was "red light," you had to hit yourself with a pie! But if you made it to the goal, you got to pie one of your parents!
- Cops and Robbers: This classic game was played on the actual set of the Miami Vice Spectacular at Universal Studios Hollywood.
- A huge Tug of War where three professional wrestlers tried to pull against a team of kids. The number of kids grew each round, starting with just one and going up to fifty!
Other Wild and Messy Games
Wild & Crazy Kids was famous for its messy and unique challenges.
- Gunk in the Sky Challenge: Similar to a game from What Would You Do?, but with slime instead of pies! Players sat under a big bucket of slop. If they flinched, their opponent got to dump the slime on them.
- Human Battleship: Kids were "ships" on a giant board. When a space was picked, a huge bucket of navy beans would be dumped from a crane onto anyone in that spot!
- Mustard-Ketchup Quickdraw: Teammates would "shoot" each other with ketchup and mustard bottles. The winner got lots of points, and the loser would fall dramatically into a pool of pie filling.
- Pass the Bucket: A twist on "Steal the Bacon." Teams tried to grab a bucket of a mystery substance. If you lost a round, the bucket's contents were dumped on your head!
- Slime by Numbers: Kids sat above their parents, holding numbered buckets of slime. Parents picked a number, and the kid with that number got to pour slime on the parent below! The last parent not slimed moved on. Then, kids and parents switched places. In the final round, the last two players sat under two giant buckets (one with green slime, one with confetti). The loser got slimed!
- Slime Dump-Off: Teams sat across from each other with a big bucket of slime between them. The winning team got to dump the slime on the losers.
- Sloppy Word Find: Players raced to find a hidden word (like "baked beans" or "dog food") on a crossword puzzle board. The winner got to dump a bucket of that word's substance on the loser!
- Smelly Slip 'n' Slide: A race on a Slip 'n' Slide. The losing team got buckets of stewed tomatoes dumped on them at the finish line.
- Other games included a huge game of Twister, Human Space Invaders, Bleacher Pass Relay, and Spiderweb Stickup.
The First Try: Pilot Episode
Before the show officially started, a test episode (called a pilot) was filmed in 1989. It was hosted by Matt Brown (who also hosted Don't Just Sit There on Nickelodeon), Leslie Hibbard, and Cory Tyler.
Special Guests and Celebrities
Throughout the show's run, some famous faces appeared!
- In the first two seasons, adult celebrities sometimes joined in. One special episode in Season 2 was a celebrity slide competition at Raging Waters to raise money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.
- Every episode in the third season (1992) featured at least one kid celebrity guest. Some famous guests included:
* Actor and former bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger * Lark Voorhies from Saved by the Bell * Jonathan Taylor Thomas from Home Improvement * Ashley Johnson from Growing Pains * Michael Fishman from Roseanne * A young Tobey Maguire (before he was super famous!) appeared to promote his show Great Scott!.
- Marc Summers from Double Dare and What Would You Do? appeared in a special episode called "Double Dare vs. Wild & Crazy Kids." When Team Double Dare won, Marc tricked the Wild & Crazy Kids hosts into getting slimed green! He also came back another year for "Dizzy Bat Home Run Derby: The Sequel."
- Baseball pitchers Scott Bailes (from the California Angels) and Bruce Hurst (from the San Diego Padres) pitched in the "Dizzy Bat Home Run Derby" games.
- Detroit Lions quarterback Rodney Peete appeared in the very first episode, throwing footballs to kids jumping into a pool.
- Michael Bower, Venus DeMilo, and Danny Cooksey from the Nickelodeon show Salute Your Shorts appeared in one of the final episodes of the original series. Their team competed against the Wild & Crazy Kids hosts' team in an all-day showdown.
- Olympic skier Bode Miller appeared on the 2002 revival.
- Brandon Call was on in season 2. As a prank, he took Donnie's shirt, Omar's shorts, and Jessica's shoes and threw them into the "Goo Pool," with the hosts chasing him!
- Daryl Sabara and Alexa Vega from the Spy Kids movies appeared on the 2002 revival.