GoodTimes Entertainment announced that "Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Movie," made its Latin American debut this Christmas on Cinecanal and Sky. This marked Cinecanal's first acquisition of an independently-produced animated feature and was the first time Cinecanal ran two versions of a single animated feature: neutral Spanish dubbed version for children and the original, English-language version with Spanish subtitles for family audiences.
Interactive Television Entertainment has firmed deals with Columbia and Peru for the interactive television show "Hugo, the TV Troll." Hugo premiered in Columbia on Canal Capital in December '98, and in Peru in January '99. The show, which allows the TV audience to respond instantaneously to programming content by using their telephone touchpad, currently airs in over 20 countries.
* Saturday, January 30. Hollywood, California, USA.
The February 1999 Animation World Magazine is focusing on motion-capture and stop-motion. Don't miss out...
* Monday, January 25 - Thursday, January 29, 1999. New Orleans, Louisiana, USA.
*Thursday, January 28. New York City, New York, U.S.A.
The New York City public premiere of Blue Sky's "Bunny" will be held on January 28 at 7:00 P.M. at:
Pace UniversityNYC Schimmel Center for the ArtsOne Pace PlazaNew York, NY
The event costs $7 for general admission and is free to NYC ACM SIGGRAPH members and Pace students & faculty. The screening will be followed by a presentation hosted by director Chris Wedge, digital effects supervisor Dave Walvoord and senior animator Doug Dooley.
Barcelona, Spain-based animation company D'Ocon Films Productions announces the launch of a co-production with Sony Wonder on Myths&Legends, a 13-episode series (with an option of a second set of 13), about two kids who discover a magic cavern which allows them to travel back through history. Their adventures take them to ancient Greece, the shores of Loch Ness and amongst the Knights of the Round Table; in each case making sure that good triumphs over evil.
Among Paris, France-based Salsa Distribution's predominantly science fiction genre programming slate is the animated Tommy and Oscar. Produced by Rainbow s.r.l., Salsa is offering 26 half-hour episodes to Latin territories. Tommy is a young boy who befriends a loveable alien named Oscar, who feeds on music instead of edible foods. Salsa is also overseeing Latin American merchandising on the series.
After nine holiday-themed specials, Encore Enterprises has created 26 new episodes of Chucklewood Critters with educational structures and guidance provided by the UCLA Department of Education. The show has been pre-sold to Ravensburger Film & TV in Germany, BBC in the UK and Daro Film in the rest of the world. Additionally, Encore has two hundred 1-minute fillers of Goofballs, a dialogue-less, gag-driven series featuring two handymen - Tiny the elephant and Jake the lizard. The show is a co-production between Riverstar Entertainment and SPI International.
Catalyst Distribution has a number of shows to offer including The Adventures of Captain Pugwash (13 x 30 minutes or 26 x 10 minutes), James the Cat (52 x 5 minutes), The Raccoons (65 x 30 minutes) and Britt Allcrofts Magic Adventures of Mumfie (39 x 30 minutes). Representatives are located at their U.S. associate company, Gullane Pictures.
Matt Stone and Trey Parker, creators of the phenomenally popular Comedy Central animated series South Park, will speak at NATPE. The informal talk, Coffee With Trey Parker and Matt Stone, takes place Wednesday, January 27, from 7:30 to 8:45 a.m. in Room 245.
Legendary Marvel comic book creator, Stan Lee, has formed a new company, Stan Lee Media, to harness the power and global outreach of the Internet to create a new world of superheros. The first venture of the newly formed company is StanLee.net (http://www.stanlee.net), which is being constructed to attract and accommodate the largest global assemblage of young comic book enthusiasts, who will be engaged in community creation on the Internet with Stan Lee and his new universe of superheros.
Donna L. Freidman has been named Senior Vice President, "Kids WB!," the WB Television Network's children's programming service. In this newly created position, Friedman will creatively oversee "Kids' WB!" on a day-to-day basis, concentrating on current programming and the development of new series - both animated and live-action. Friedman joins the WB from a decade-long stint at Nickelodeon where most recently, she had been Vice President, Marketing/Associate Creative Director, Nickelodeon Latin America.
Beginning in February, Kids WB! Saturday morning line-up will start airing the hit Japanese animated series, "Pokémon," a cartoon which gained infamy in late '97 when hundreds of young Japanese viewers simultaneously suffered seizures while watching an episode that featured a high-contrast flash sequence [AF 12/23/97]. While the series currently completes its first season in first-run syndication, Kids WB! will premiere twelve all new episodes of "Pokémon," which will join the series syndication package of 52 episodes for the completion of the '98-'99 season.
Superfresh Productions (Booth 3331) brings with them "SpaceBuddies!," best described as "The X-Files" from the alien's point of view. The half-hour clay animated sitcom recalls the old serials of the 1950s, only this time the hero, Nanook, is a little chartreuse man from outer space. "SpaceBuddies!" aims to explain Earth's mysteries...from the alien autopsy video to the success of Celine Dion.
Toronto, Canada-based Cambium Releasing has three new products - "Kit and Kaboodle" for the US and Latin American markets, "Littlest Angel's Easter," and "Infosaurus News Flash." "Kit and Kaboodle" (26 x 12 minutes) is from 1985 Academy Award-winning director Jon Minnis (Best Animated Short Film - Charade) and is a co-production between Cambium Film & Video Production and Cinegroup in Montreal. This pre-school series not only entertains, but also teaches children about themselves and how to interact with one another, says Cambium Senior VP Rita Carbone Fleury.
GLC Productions, a New York-based production/post-production company, debuts their maiden series venture at this year's show, The Buddy System, an animated Seinfeld meets The Odd Couple. The show, created by Big Nate syndicated cartoonist Lincoln Peirce, centers on the escapades of Buddy and Howie, a pair of sports-crazy twenty-something bachelors. Projected as a weekly half-hour 3D animated series, GLC has produced a 7-minute segment from the premiere viewable at NATPE.
Cubic Enterprises introduces two new children's programs - KoKo, The Pink Rabbit and Koni and the Starjammers. KoKo, two 45-minute clay animated specials follows KoKo and friends as they discover the value of friendship and the simple treasure of life. Koni is a 2D cel sci-fi action/adventure animated series starring Koni, Yena, Icon and Kobot as they bravely battle to retrieve the Hadron Batteries and ultimately, save the Earth in thirteen half-hour episodes.
This year's Super Bowl footballweekend (January 30-31) is turning out to be a big weekend for animationfans as well. CLICK HERE for a guide to what sort of TV animation you can expectbefore, during and after the big game on Super Sunday!
Over four decades, Zagreb Film produced about 600 animated films that won hundreds of international awards and became world renowned for a unique animation style that became known as "the Zagreb School." For the first time, the studio's library will be offered for international distribution at NATPE through Rembrandt Films. Rembrandt has divided the films into thirteen episodes of 26 minutes each.
Four animated series are making their U.S. debuts at NATPE this year through Paris-based Canal+ Distribution/Canal+ Image International: Fennec (52 x 13 minutes), Blazing Dragons (26 x 13 minutes) created by Monty Pythons Terry Jones, The Pirate Family (26 x 26 minutes) and Tristan & Isolde (26 x 26 minutes). Canal+ is also offering the feature-length version of the animated feature, Trouble with Sophie, based on the famous childrens book by the Countess Segur.
Premiered at MIPCOM, Korean company Samsung Entertainment Group will again offer their newest animated series for adults called Alexander. Peter Chung, creator of Aeon Flux, is designing the characters for the fantasy-adventure show, which is set in 4th Century B.C. Macedonia, and is based on the novel Alexanders War Chronicles by Hiroshi Aramata. The executive producer is Haruki Kadokawa, with Masao Maruyama producing, Rintaro directing and Yoshinori Kanmori supervisor directing. Animation is being produced by Mad House in Japan.
Budapest, Hungary-based Varga Studios has been commissioned to co-produce a series of animated projects: Liza (13 x 6 minutes), Wolves, Witches and Giants (13 x 7.5 minutes), Animated Tales of the World, Percy, the Parkkeeper (13 x 7.5 minutes) and Kipper. In addition, Vargas sister company, VARGA tvc Ltd., premiered their first project, Oi! Get Off Our Train, a half-hour animated special produced by the company in association with BBC Bristol, Miramax Films and ZDF, which made its television debut in the U.K.
Toronto, Canada-based animation studio NELVANA Enterprises (Booth 1910) has reached a deal with cable and satellite channel TELETOON France giving the broadcaster 200 half-hours of animation programming per year from NELVANA.
DIC is introducing three new half-hour series at NATPE: Sabrina: The Animated Series, Sonic Underground and Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century. Sabrina is based off the ABC TV series which was originally based on the Archie comic books. 65 episodes, scheduled to air in the U.S. on UPNs Disney Afternoon and distributed by Buena Vista Television internationally, will feature the voice of Emily Hart as 12-year old Sabrina and Melissa Joan Hart as the voice of Sabrinas two aunts.
