‘Roundhouse’ Stands Out as a ‘Laugh-In’ for Kids : Television: The Nickelodeon show has won cable ACE awards and accolades from its fans but has not been a big ratings success.

Hundreds of floodlights in white, blue, red, yellow and green swirl around the stage. Smoke fills the air. A live band cranks up the volume. A bunch of hip-hop dancers groove on the floor. Singers start to wail. It could almost be a Janet Jackson concert.

But “it’s snot,” as they like to say on this stage. It’s “Roundhouse,” a TV show--and not only that, a TV show for kids made each week on a basic cable network on a kid-sized budget. Still, Nickelodeon’s “Roundhouse,” airing Saturdays at 8:30 p.m. and repeated Sundays at 7:30 p.m., really does take the word show seriously.

“It’s very much like a concert,” said co-executive producer Benny Hester, who is responsible for the music. “If you come to the show, it’s loud and raucous and you’re going to get jolted out of your seat.”

Mostly, though, “Roundhouse” is about jokes. It’s kind of a “Laugh-In” for children, skewering targets such as television commercials, rock stars and obnoxious physical education teachers the way “Laugh-In” once lampooned politicians and current events.

And for all the spectacle the producers put into it, the show is done without costume changes, without elaborate sets, without special video effects of any kind. Each sketch blends seamlessly into the next as the actors walk, skip or dance from one skit into another. In a way, it looks like a production that kids would put on for their friends in the garage. When, for example, the show endeavors to poke fun at something on television, an actor will stand behind a cardboard rectangle. When a scene calls for a subtitle, the actors will hold up a sign with the words scribbled on it.

“There is no pretense here,” said Buddy Sheffield, another executive producer and co-creator of the show with his ex-wife, Rita Sheffield. “We’re obviously doing a show. We’re not trying to get you to think this is reality. And the reason is that, for me, it puts the focus on the people. It’s not about the lights or the sets, it’s about the people out there doing funny stuff with an attitude and kind of tongue in cheek. And it lets the audience watching it on TV enjoy it right along with them.”

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Each week’s episode focuses on a theme that can be as broad as television or sports or as specific as self-esteem, divorce or gang violence. The writers create more than 20 quick comic bits or sketches and then Sheffield creates a story line that carries the sketches from beginning to end.

“In some ways we have a great deal of freedom because kids are exposed to so much and are so aware of trends,” said Rita Sheffield. “But in other ways the network is hard on us because it is for kids and they draw the line. But we are on right before ‘Ren and Stimpy,’ and we just say, ‘They do much worse stuff.’ ”

As far as topics they have to avoid simply because Nickelodeon’s target audience is young--ages 6 to 11--the producers said they shy away only from sex and drugs. “But we do do lots of rock ‘n’ roll,” Hester said.

“Roundhouse” is accomplished on a budget of under $300,000 an episode, or about half the cost of many network sitcoms with far less to them.

“When we first sold the show, we had no idea if we could actually do this,” said Buddy Sheffield, who also is a producer on Fox’s sketch comedy show “In Living Color.” “It’s almost like doing a Broadway musical every week. There are so many elements to it and it moves so fast and the cast doesn’t use cue cards or anything. We really didn’t know if we could pull it off.”

But nearing the end of their order for 39 episodes, the producers, band, cast and crew have it down to a hectic science. Buddy Sheffield gives Rita Sheffield--the two of them produced children’s theater in this same vein for nearly 15 years before selling the show to television--a script on the weekend, which often includes such notations as “song to come.” She then assigns the parts to her 13 cast members, most in their 20s, who all double or triple as actors, singers and dancers, and begins to map out the production in her head.

On Monday, the cast reads through the script--notes from the network and rewrites are incorporated--and Hester and his musicians begin to compose the music for the songs and the dance numbers. Rough tapes of the music are then given to choreographer Barry Lather so he can create five or six short original dances. Over the next two days, the cast learns and rehearses the sketches, dances and songs.

Wednesday evenings, they do a full run-through of the show in an effort to get the staging down. Thursday is reserved for blocking the cameras and technical details. Friday afternoon, they run through the show two or three times, then at 6 p.m. begin taping it in front of a live audience.

All that work has paid off in cable ACE awards, accolades from parent groups and hundreds of letters from fans--many from high school and college kids who don’t generally tune in to Nickelodeon’s cartoon-heavy lineup. Still, the future of the show is up in the air because it has not been a big ratings success like some of Nick’s other premiere programs.

“It is a good performer, and if it weren’t performing, it wouldn’t be in that prime-time block,” said Herb Scannell, Nickelodeon’s senior vice president for programming. “But it is a very different thing from weekly sitcoms, where the audience comes to see the same characters every week. The comedy-variety format hasn’t been in the top-10 since ‘Laugh-In,’ I think. But I like the show. It’s amazing what they put out there every week.”

Scannell said Nickelodeon will decide in January whether to renew “Roundhouse.” Whether it continues in its current form or not, the producers said they are planning a live concert tour and a release of records containing full versions of the program’s best songs.