Magnus Scheving has turned children’s TV superhero Sportacus into a stage show. He talks to Viv Hardwick about the massive success of LazyTown.

ICELAND isn’t just the home of frozen banking assets, one Reykjavik-born man is spending millions around the world in a quest to make our children more health and food conscious. He’s 44-year-old Magnus Scheving and, since 2004, has captivated children by becoming the mild-mannered superhero Sportacus in a TV series, called LazyTown, shown in 122 countries. Each programme is so colourfully and carefully made that it’s claimed Scheving has spent close to a £1m on each of the episodes.

The former European aerobic gymnastics champion travelled the globe talking to youngsters before creating a small children’s book back in Iceland which pitted airship-residing Sportacus against evil Robbie Rotten who tries to trick LazyTown’s residents into becoming permanent couch potatoes.

Helped by young friend Stephanie, the superhero uses “sportscandy” – that’s fruit and vegetables to you – exercise and song to battle for the sporting souls of children.

It shouldn’t be popular in a fast food and faddy culture like ours, but the writer, producer, entrepreneur and all-action star has gone from novel to tiny stageshow to TV to multi-million merchandising and back to stage show again. He flew into the UK recently to launch his company’s second national theatre tour, which plays Newcastle Theatre Royal July 15-19, and says: “After the book there was a live show, radio and TV and when we returned to live shows I was pleased because children like to participate. It became the most popular show in the UK and now already one million people have bought tickets for this second tour (LazyTown Live and the Pirate Adventure). We don’t compromise on the show because it must have the look of the TV series. I was a little bit afraid when it came to doing this for a travelling show going to 50 cities in the UK.

“The production team really stepped up and, in the end, it was really nice and I came out thinking it was fantastic. Hundreds and hundreds of kids in the audience were dressed up as Sportacus or Stephanie. I really want people to drive home saying ‘that was fun’ but also ‘did we learn anything?’. My challenge was to make my message entertaining so that kids would actually watch it. I did that by travelling to over 50 countries in 11 years and I spoke to as many children as I could. It was really important for me to understand my clients and I found that they loved to move and didn’t want to be talked down to.”

He’s proud that LazyTown is the only TV series dedicated to children’s health and sport. “I think it is that most writers don’t do sport and most sports people aren’t expected to write books. So when I wrote my first book after being voted Sportsman Of The Year in Iceland I was asked ‘who wrote your book?’”

His agenda has always been to try and reduce the number of obese youngsters.

“Obesity is catastrophic, but I think we should be helping kids’ self-esteem which is the best prevention for obesity and, as parents, we should be giving them healthier choices and options to have fun. There’s going to be 700m obese people around the world in seven years time and 155m of them will be kids and I’ve seen a prediction that 90 per cent of the UK will be overweight by 2050,” Scheving says.

The TV series is considered so important by the industry that it is one of the few children’s shows to run on Nick Jr and BBC at the same time.

“These two are fighting over the audience so it was quite amazing that those people looked away from that for a moment and said ‘kids should see this show’. I was really proud of that,” he explains.

Even so, Scheving admits that he’s struggled to find the right commercial sponsors to match the healthy message of LazyTown. His company has signed a deal with supermarket chain Asda to use the blue-and-white uniformed somersaulting star as its Great Stuff good food campaign partner.

Jackie Chan is so impressed with him that he’s asked the father of three and grandfather of one to star in his forthcoming movie, The Spy Next Door.

Unusually, the Icelander is playing a villain called PolDark.

“My mission is to try and move the world.

China has a growing dilemma regarding obesity. Jackie Chan is an icon in China, so I knew it would be great for me to work with him. They asked me to be the villain and I felt that would keep me in balance with my role as a superhero,” Scheving says.

“I’m working on a Lazytown movie, telling the back story of Sportacus. I’m hoping we can finish the film by 2011… and you might even see Jackie Chan in that,” he adds.

“Sportacus is what I call a slightly above average superhero. What’s interesting is that I met a lot of UK kids while I was dressed in my suit and I had to do something like 400 push-ups and I don’t know how many jumps and to walk on my hands. Kids who are as young as two come and show me push-ups... then, because I’m getting older, the next morning, I felt like a tank had driven over me. What’s important is that everyone finds that healthy life balance.

“Maybe I’m just a lunatic, but somehow I’ve kept up this pace for many years. I don’t leave a room until I’ve signed all 1,500 requests for autographs.

I’ve never been bored in my life. So to be pushed to jump around and create stories for children is not the worst thing I could do. I’m the richest man in the world because I’m doing something I love to do.”

■ LazyTown Live, Newcastle Theatre Royal, July 15-19. Box Office: 08448-112- 121 ■ LazyTown or LazyTown Extra, for smaller children, runs most days on CBeebies, Nick Jr and new channel Noggin.