AWN Headline News

Carol Laufer, a 6-year veteran of Blue Sky | VIFX, has been promoted from producer to the position of executive producer at the companys Harrison, New York studio. She replaces Nina Rappaport who left to pursue other interests. Laufer has produced numerous projects at Blue Sky | VIFX including the Rayovac battery campaign featuring Michael Jordan and a three-spot campaign for Target featuring a host of photorealistic animated toys.

The four-day Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend created a healthy box office with DreamWorks The Prince of Egypt continuing to edge its way towards $100 million. The religious epic, which was banned this week in Indian Ocean-located The Maldives for its offensive portrayal of Moses, came in eighth with $6.2M after 32 days of release for a grand total of $82.5M. At its current pace, the film is poised to pass The Rugrats Movie as the highest gross non-Disney animated feature of all-time.

* January 10 - March 14. Los Angeles, California, USA.

Originally intended as a direct-to-video film, Walt Disney Pictures hasannounced that "Doug's 1st Movie," based on the ABC series "Disney's Doug,"will be released to theaters on March 26 in time for the spring break andEaster holidays. Both the TV series and film are produced by New York-basedJumbo Pictures Inc., a subsidiary of Disney acquired in 1996. "Doug's 1stMovie" follows the misadventures of 12-year old Doug Funnie as he findshimself caught between saving the endangered "monster" of Lucky Duck Lake

Funny Farm Studios is a new 2D animation studio starting up in Atlanta, Georgia. The facility is headed by Donna Ervin, former manager and producer for DESIGNefx cel animation, and two animation directors, Jim Peebles and Jeff Fastner. "We have enormous talent, experience and speed to offer," states Ervin. The studio will target the national and regional commercial, interstitial programming and web development markets.

San Francisco-based The Attik has produced and designed 5 seconds of live-action and graphics for the theatrical trailer end card for "Idle Hands," an upcoming Columbia Pictures film. The segment involves a live-action human hand clutching and clawing at the screen. The Attik team blended the live-action with an illustrated graphic of a hand, animated using a technique similar to stop-motion, to give the piece an organic feel while maintaining a scratchy, hand-crafted texture. Simon Dixon was the Creative Director/Director and Monica Perez was Senior Art Director.

Mondo Media, a leading developer of digital content, has received a $2 million investment from venture capital firm, Sofinnova. The investment will fund the development of a line of Mondo Mini Shows - a series of animated and personalized, interactive, web-based cartoons. The shows will mirror the syndication model of newspaper comics where popular properties attract broad audiences on a repeat basis. "The syndication model is novel for the web, a proven success in other media," explains Randy Komisar, Mondo Media's Virtual CEO.

Fox will debut the new mid-season animated sitcom, "The P.J.s," on Sunday, January 10 at 8:30 p.m. following a divisional conference football playoff game. The show will start the following Tuesday in its regular 8:30 p.m. slot following "King of the Hill." The "foamation" series was produced at Will Vinton Studios and is executive produced by comedian/actor Eddie Murphy.

Film Roman Inc, the producer of The Simpsons and King of the Hill, has struck a deal with Launch Media Inc. under which Film Roman will provide content for the Launch CD-ROM - a monthly interactive guide to music and movies that is sold in retail stores and available by subscription. The Launch CD-ROM currently reaches an estimated 1 million users monthly with approximately 300,000 subscribers.