SOUTH PARK MAKES QUICK WORK OF RENO RAID

Oh, my god! Theyve killed Kenny and possibly made history, producing a South Park episode on the Elian Gonzalez story almost as fast as the raid to seize the boy. In last nights ripped-from-the headlines episode of the raunchy Comedy Central cartoon, South Park producers spoofed the case right up to last weekends

Oh, my god! They’ve killed Kenny – and possibly made history, producing a “South Park” episode on the Elian Gonzalez story almost as fast as the raid to seize the boy.

In last night’s ripped-from-the headlines episode of the raunchy Comedy Central cartoon, “South Park” producers spoofed the case – right up to last weekend’s controversial raid on the Miami home of the boy’s relatives.

The show was done from scratch in four days that included two all-nighters, its producers said yesterday.

The chaotic finale includes two scenes based on the Associated Press photo of the 6-year-old facing an armed INS agent while being held in a closet.

“I think they’ve made history,” said Professor John Canemaker, director of the animation program at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anything like this.”

The episode was the result of a marathon computer-animated production schedule that left the show’s staff exhausted, “South Park” executive producer Anne Garefino told The Post.

“We knew all along that we wanted to parallel the whole Elian thing, but we had no idea how close we were when we started,” Garefino said. “We literally started writing the show on [Thursday] April 20th, and finished about one or two scenes every day.”

The show was completed only hours before the broadcast, Garefino said.

On TV, timely jokes based on current events are typically the domain of late-night talk-show hosts like David Letterman and Jay Leno. Most animated TV shows, such as “The Simpsons,” take months to create.

But using computers similar to those used to animated the dinosaurs in “Jurassic Park,” “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, along with a team of 70 animators, computer engineers and actors, have devised a technique that allows them to build an episode in less than a week.

“South Park” follows the adventures of four foul-mouthed fourth graders (Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman).

In Wednesday’s episode, Romanian quintuplets defect after performing in a visiting French-Canadian circus. Their grandmother dies while the girls are staying at Stan’s house.

When a Fidel Castro-lookalike Romanian leader demands that the girls be returned to Romania, protesters and the media descend on South Park.

Later, Attorney General Janet Reno, clad in a pink Easter Bunny outfit, leaps from an Army helicopter and leads the raid – toting a semiautomatic weapon and tossing tear gas-filled Easter eggs.

Kenny, who dies horribly every episode, is accidentally shot to death – hiding in a closet with his mother – by a cop in another house raid.

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