Poor Jimmy Roberts. Just 12 years old and he gets flattened by a theme park trolley car! Fortunately, an emergency brain transplant is able to save him. Now, however, Jimmy is walking around with the gray matter of famous cartoonist Milt Appleday knocking around in his noggin. That, of course, means Jimmy's head is constantly filled with a cast of crazy cartoon characters that only he can see, and they, of course, are constantly making his life a living cartoon chaos. Add the weird and wacky humans who surround him, and it's enough to drive a kid right out of his own head!
Out of Jimmy's Head is the new series spin-off from the Cartoon Network's hit feature film, Re-Animated. Like the movie, Jimmy's Head, which just debuted in early October, is also a mix of live action and animation. The animated characters include Golly Gopher, the cartoon ringleader and icon of Appleday Studios; his girlfriend and sidekick, Dolly Gopher; a super speedy penguin with a lisp named Tux who fancies himself a standup comic and has the annoying habit of yelling "Zing!" to punctuate his lame jokes; a brainless alligator burdened with a family name of Crocco; and Pickles & Prickles, a pickle and porcupine comedy duo who tend to always make a mess of things.
On the human end are Jimmy's bossy older sister, Yancy, who also happens to be an alien; his astronaut mother, who should be getting frequent flyer miles from all her time traveling; a father who's a little kid in a grownup's body working as the guidance counselor at Jimmy's school; his best friend, Craig, a somewhat spazzy and self-absorbed kid who is a good buddy nonetheless; Robin, Craig's sister and Jimmy's other best friend (and his secret crush); Sonny Appleday, Milt's son and all-around bad guy who lives in Jimmy's house and is always coming up with nefarious schemes to steal back his father's brain; and Mittens, Sonny's evil partner-in-crime.
According to Michael Ouweleen, senior vice president, development and creative direction for Cartoon Network, "Re-Animated was the first original, non-series, long-form for the network, and also the first combination live action/animation long-form for the network. So, it was the first in a couple ways. It was pretty ambitious, actually."
Indeed! Animation may zip around at lightening speed on the screen, but it takes a long time to create, whether it's a half-hour episode for television or a full-length feature film. Each 22-minute episode of Jimmy's Head takes, on average, four weeks to complete. Ouweleen explains that, "It starts right while we're filming — the animators are there with tablets, and they draw over the scene to sort of stage where the characters are and will be. Each process informs the other, which is really fun, actually. A lot of good ideas come out of that. A lot of accidental things come out, too, while we're in production, which are quite good. Technology helps out a lot nowadays, but it still doesn't take all the work away."
Re-Animated was always intended as a sort of long-form pilot for a potential series. The fact that it did so well (it was Cartoon Network's highest rated program in 2006 and held up well in repeats) helped prove audience interest (the audience being 6-to-11-year-olds) and secure prospects for a series follow-up. However, when the series did get the green light, a few necessary changes were made along the way: a couple of human roles were re-cast for the series, the animated characters were re-designed to allow for more flexibility in how behaved, and, since the format was now episodic, storytelling had to move at a faster pace.
Out of Jimmy's Head began as the brainchild of CN writers Adam Pava and Tim McKeon, who now also serve as executive producers for the series along with Eric Kaplan, David Brookwell, Sean McNamara, and Bruce Hurwit. The show is a Brookwell McNamara Entertainment (That's So Raven) production, but all the animation is produced at Cartoon Network Studios.
"We wanted to be open to new kinds of programming that were all-informed by animation and our animation history, but weren't necessarily fully animated," says Ouweleen. "To start, we wanted to go to people who know our brand really well. There were two young writers (Pava and McKeon) who were working on two of our better shows, and they came back and pitched us this idea. And originally we were going to make a presentation pilot — just sort of a little tiny pilot — to see what we thought of it. Then it occurred to us, 'Why don't we just make it into a long-form? And that way, we get something out of it. We can televise it, and really see what happens.' So, that was that!
"All shows go through a natural development cycle that can take quite a while," he continued. "You get interested in the idea to begin with, and then quickly you have to get off the idea and make sure that there's characters and relationships, and things like that. The production hassles were something to think about, too, but that was never the biggest nut to crack. Making sure the characters were there, and that the cartoon characters were as interesting as some of the crazy human characters, that was the biggest thing. The human characters are so cartoony that the cartoon characters sometimes look normal. So, the real trick — which is ironic for a place called Cartoon Network — was that the cartoon characters were kind of the last to join the party in terms of having personality."
But personality comes from many sources. Obviously it has to be there in the artwork, but finding the right voice for each character is vital as well. Casting, then, plays a significant role in bringing an animated character to life.
Matt Danner is the "overall animation direction guy" for Jimmy's Head, which means he overseas voiceover casting and voiceover directing. Re-Animated was cast by Liz Paulson, and most of the voiceover actors remained — most notably Tom Kenny, of Sponge Bob Squarepants fame, who voices the role of Tux, the fast-talking penguin with the lispy punch lines. One of the roles that was re-cast, however, was that of Golly Gopher, who was originally voiced by Paul Reubens. When Reubens became too busy to make the series commitment, the role was taken over by Carlos Alazraqui (Reno 911's Deputy James Garcia). Both actors also contribute additional voices beyond their primary characters, and when the occasion calls for it they will do on-camera work as well.
Adapting to that sort of situation — stepping into a project originally cast/created by someone else — is, Danner confesses, rather a specialty of his. "I don't want to say I'm a fixer 'cause that implies a negative connotation, but I'm definitely a kind of guy who takes something from concept to series, you know?" Danner explains. " 'Cause a pilot's a pilot, and a movie's a movie, and that (format) has a kind of character arc of what everybody goes through, and it's pretty much one story. Whereas the series is multiple stories, it's slow growth over time, and the characters evolve — and that's what I'm really good at. So, getting in the booth with Tom and Carlos is great 'cause at first they had all their characters down. I was just coming in fresh, but at the same time I'm specifically trying to get something that works for the project."
At the time of this interview, Danner was getting to know his actors and had just wrapped up filming the first episode. "I've worked with Tom and Carlos a million times. Those guys are like a dynamic duo in the booth! They're crazy. They do millions and millions of voices. They're like the Swiss army knives of the group. They're great.
"Brian Posehn (Crocco) I kind of knew, and Ellen Greene (Dolly Gopher) I've never worked with, and I'm just really a big fan. Basically, at this point it's just a matter of, 'Okay, we're at Episode 1, and we're gonna do 20 of these. It's a big order, so we're all gonna be working together for a while.' And so, you know, we all just become a functioning clique of people, and you just encourage them to come up with new stuff, and watch the character grow. It grows in the writing, and also it grows in the actual actor, and how they let loose and how they get comfortable. Eventually, a character becomes something you can do without thinking about it."
If anyone knows how to let loose, it's Kenny, who is well known for his versatility and spontaneity. The actor does a lot of work for Cartoon Network shows, including voicing the roles of Scoutmaster Lumpas and Slinkman on Camp Laszlo, and Jake the monkey on My Gym Partner's a Monkey. For other networks, he also provides the voices of the Penguin for Batman; Pat and Mr. Lopart on the pre-school favorite, Handy Manny; Eduardo on Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends; and, of course, Sponge Bob.
Kenny describes his latest creation, Tux, as a "Vegas Retro Rat Pack era lounge stand-up comedian — the kind of stand-up guy that you don't really see that much anymore. A Buddy Hackett type. You know, 'Nice necktie, sir. Where'd you get that, K-Mart?' He's got a lisp; not a Daffy Duck lisp, but kind of juicy in the side of his mouth. You know, a wise guy. He's the old pro, and he's always giving Jimmy stand-up comedy advice. He's based largely on Buddy Hackett, Joey Bishop, guys like that. And that's the thing with these voices — a lot of them end up being combinations of voices. You just Frankenstein 'em together. You can't go in and just do a straight-up Jack Nicholson, or Ray Romano 'cause those guys already exist. So, you wind-up mixing and matching. I don't know, how about Ray Romano meets George Bush? Or Jack Nicholson meets the Wizard of Oz? You just fool around with different combinations. You know that chamber that Jeff Goldblum goes into in The Fly? You just gotta mix up as much DNA as you can, and hope that what comes out is a voice that is funny and unusual. When you go into an interview, you either want them to say, 'That's exactly what we had in mind. Great!' or "That's not even close to what we were thinking, but we really like it. We hadn't thought of that, keep doing that.' As long as you get one of those two responses, you're doing okay."
Danner keeps an open mind when casting. "You really have different goals depending on the type of character, whether it's like a cartoony show, or it's a character that has classic qualities to them, you generally want to get more of a classic voice actor sensibility, like a Rob Paulphin or a Tom Kenny, or Carlos Alazraqui. Those are the kinds of people who can do multiple voices, and are very very good at just pretending to be a cartoon character. Then there are those who are also on-screen actors, and they do a lot more comedy and stand-up, and things like that. Brian is like that; he's actually a writer, and he does on-camera acting, too. He's been in a ton of stuff.
"You're casting for the voice, you know?" he continued. "You're casting for the specific character that you want. That's how they cast a lot of features, actually. There's someone with a unique voice — it just sounds different and has a different sensibility, and can just really 'take' the role. It's almost like casting for live action. You don't cast a man for a woman, or a short guy for a tall guy. You look for specific qualities that fit the character."
Danner, who also does voiceover work himself, knows how difficult it can be to break into the notoriously small circle of reliable voiceover actors. He is willing to give talented but unagented or untried actors a longed-for chance. Part of the joy of the job lies in finding those diamonds in the rough.
"I've definitely tried to find something new and fresh. You live in LA and you meet a lot of people in the industry, like Eric Bauza. He's someone I met as an artist. We were both clean-up artists — a real entry level-type position — and he was just amazing at voices. Everybody knew it. And he just wanted to make cartoons. But then I just started casting him all the time. He just needed a lot of practice. It was amazing how much his range grew over such a short period of time. Eventually he ended playing Stimpy on the new Ren & Stimpy. After awhile he got into it full-time, and now that's all he does. He does cartoons for fun, but his J.O.B. is voice acting. Crazy, how it works!"
Danner advises actors preparing demo reels to keep them streamlined, and not exceed two minutes. Don't mimic other characters, he says; originality is best. And don't clutter the reel with music and sound effects or other superfluous background support. The voices must be the focus at all times, and each voice must be unique.
"Basically, you're trying to figure out what their character is, and what kind of characters they can play, not necessarily their voice quality" he said. "A wide range is always good. And mix it up: Do a high voice, low voice, a high voice, low voice, but keep it short. You really want to hear something that you've never heard before, and then a range within that. One thing I say to people who are starting off — especially if they do impressions — is that there's this whole process in getting to that voice, and in that process you'll find like fifteen other voices. You're going down a path to find this goal voice, and then all of a sudden you'll kind of veer off a little bit. It's so subtle, but that's kind of the magic of it. A really good voice actor is someone who can inject character into the voice. So now it's not Arnold Schwarzenegger, it's Neil Hamburger."
Like any kind of freelance work, there's a feast-or-famine element to it. But for actors like Kenny, the challenges of the famine times equal the feast time rewards. "It's a weird business," he admits, laughing. "But it's a fun way to make a living."