Miss Cellany

Earl Kress reports on a great special feature that's being produced for volume 2 of "Animaniacs" (which should be out in November). Literally the entire original writing staff of the show -- twelve writers in all -- has been assembled for interviews, with Maurice LaMarche (the Brain) acting as moderator. (There's a similar "roundtable" interview with the producers of "Superman: The Animated Series" on the new DVD set with the final 18 episodes of that series.)

"Animaniacs" may actually have been the first show where I recognized the styles of individual writers, because I loved the show so much that I watched the credits at the beginning of each cartoon, and noticed that certain writers wrote certain types of cartoons. Paul Rugg wrote genuinely crazy stuff with lots of nods to (and occasional borrowings from) classic comedy like Hellzapoppin. Tom Minton, a true authority on cartoon history, wrote many cartoons with animation-history or generally historical themes (Pinky and the Brain take over for Beany and Cecil; the Warners do a "homefront" cartoon during WWII). Randy Rogel was the lead songwriter, coming up with songs like "Yakko's World" and the song where the Warners explain the five senses and many more ("There are scents you can smell, like Colombe or Chanel"). It was a great writing staff and they did some excellent work. It'll be good to see them in the flesh, or a digitized version thereof.

Kress also mentions that he'll be on an Animaniacs/Pinky & the Brain panel at the San Diego Comic-Con this July, to tie in with the DVD release:

Thursday, July 20

4:00-5:00 PM Pinky & The Brain/Animaniacs – Screening of a special feature from Animaniacs Volume 1 DVD and Pinky & the Brain Volume 1 DVD. Panel and Q&A featuring Maurice La Marche (voice of Brain and Squit), Rob Paulsen (voice of Pinky and Yakko), Jess Harnell (voice of Wakko), Andrea Romano (voice director/casting director for both shows), Earl Kress (writer for both shows), Peter Hastings (writer for both shows) and Gordon Bressack (writer for both shows). Room 6B