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The London Daily News. August 25, 2010
Interview with the creator of Lazytown Magnus Scheving and "Stephanie" Julianna Rose Mauriello
If you are one of those parents who does not want to see their child eat themselves to oblivion, or waste precious time playing moronic games on a games console, there are very few choices open to parents. One of them is to watch "Lazytown" the show developed in Iceland by Magnus Scheving promoting "balance" in the lives of children and exercise.
Magnus Scheving aka "Sportacus" speaking to the London Daily News said:
"Health is about balance, after 20 years of doing this, a healthy person is a person with balance. What does this mean? It means kids should have choices, and when I mean choices, kids should be introduced to good books, and bad books, there is a lesson in everything. With food its about balance, you should not eat too much fast food, you must moderate your intake. Kids should not exercise, kids do not need to exercise, they move all the time. Kids from 0-7 years want to be with their parents, and it is very important, with moderation to do activities with your children". Asda have teamed up with the Bafta award winning Magnus Scheving to launch the ‘Go Step Go’ which involves giving away upto 1.4M LazyTown branded pedometers, the Step-O-Meter, with the challenge for kids to add their cumulative steps to an online effort to build one billion steps to get Sportacus to the moon. The campaign will be launched over three days, August 24th, 25th and 26th , with a one off appearance of Stephanie and Sportacus in Mansfield, Nottingham at the Jangos Indoor Play Centre to launch the single.
‘Go Step Go’ encourages children to get up off the sofa and get moving, which is especially important during the summer holidays when sitting at home and playing computer games may seem far more appealing! Written by Mani Svavarsson, LazyTown’s resident hitmaker, the song is an upbeat, infectious tune that has all the potential to be a summer hit single as the Macarena was way back in 1995.
With child obesity levels in London at their highest for many decades Magnus Scheving is conscious of the responsibility of "Lazytown" which is broadcast to over eighty countries worldwide and said: "The Lazytown brand is not on chocolate or fizzy drinks but what we have done is to get involved with Asda in a campaign to promote healthy eating, with sales of fruit and vegetables increasing by 41% in the UK as a result. We have also promoted healthy movement, and we are trying to get kids active through the work we do at Lazytown".
The new Lazytown single is available to download free for 30 days ‘‘Go Step Go’!’ http://www.asda.co.uk/lazytown before going on sale to the general public.
photo credit: London Daily News