TV Reviews : Shelley Duvall Romps Through Mother Goose

“Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow. . . .” But Mary and the lamb grew up. Now, in a seedy mobile home, frowzy Mary drinks coffee while Lou the Lamb smokes his cigar and shadows her every move. They watch game shows--”I coulda been a contestant”--and snipe--”Lou, get your mind outta the meadow.”

Welcome to Shelley Duvall’s celebrity-studded “Mother Goose Rock ‘N Rhyme,” on the Disney Channel tonight at 7, a wonderfully weird, fevered romp through the land of nursery rhymes.

The plot is almost beside the point. Mother Goose (Jean Stapleton) is missing, and her square son Gordon (Dan Gilroy) and ditzy Bo Peep (Duvall) comb Rhymeland to find her. Along the way, they meet bizarre Rhymeland inhabitants against a fun-house backdrop of skewed camera angles and cartoonish, oddly proportioned sets. (Rock video director Jeff Stein guides the action.)

Cyndi Lauper is Mary and Woody Harrelson the Lamb; Jack and Jill (Garry Shandling and Teri Garr) have “thirtysomething” relationship arguments, and Bobby Brown plays all Three Blind Mice.

It’s a wild and wacky treat for all ages.