TV Reviews : ‘Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle’ Is Just the Cure

Chalk another one up for Shelley Duvall. The creator of “Faerie Tale Theatre,” “Shelley Duvall’s Bedtime Stories” and other children’s TV shows, tapes and computer software has expanded her ambitious entertainment empire with “Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle,” a new series on the Showtime cable channel.

It gets off to a shaky start tonight, but watch for future episodes. They’re almost as good as Duvall’s press material claims.

Based on decades-old moral lesson books by Betty MacDonald, the series is about an eccentric (Jean Stapleton, in clashing stripes and precarious hair) who lives in an upside-down house and has special “cures” for such childhood maladies as lying, whining, backtalk and sloth.

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle shares her home--oddly proportioned, wildly colorful and reminiscent of “Pee-wee’s Playhouse”--with a talking “hat tree” (Francis Bell), a parrot and a pot-bellied pig. Her sometimes-seen pirate husband is played with obvious relish by James Whitmore, and the general troublemaker is Norbert Wainright (Paul Minifie), the “chief inspections officer of playground standards and children’s practices.”

Tonight’s episode, “The Not Truthful Cure,” about a little boy who learns just how heavy, literally, “a pack of lies” can be, trips all over itself, too eager to please. It trots out characters--including Christopher Lloyd as the boy’s yarn-spinning grandfather--scene changes, puns, long words and alliterative dialogue in a rushed jumble and takes half the show to get a grip.

When the pace eases up, the show’s strengths have time to sink in: quirky imagination, gentle character lessons, a celebration of language and Stapleton’s unforced appeal.

Two other episodes screened are immediately and enjoyably accessible: “The Snooty Snippety Answer Backer Cure” and, particularly, the inspired wackiness of “The Radish Cure,” with Ed Begley Jr. and Joan Cusack as the parents of a little girl so grimy she sprouts radishes.

* “Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle” airs Tuesdays at 7:30 p.m. on Showtime, with repeats Thursdays at 7:30 a.m. and Sundays at 8 a.m.