Square One TV: The Further Adventures of Zook and Alison

The Childrens Television Network (CTW, now Sesame Workshop) was the natural avenue for Buzzco's commitment to creating fun educational films for kids. One of my favorite projects was The Further Adventures of Zook and Alison series (four 7-minute pieces) created for Square One Television, which ran in its final year and scored consistently high with the viewers.

When Jeffrey Nelson (senior producer), Jeff Thurman (writer) and Yvonne Hill Ogunkoya (producer) at Square One TV (Children's Television Workshop's math program) decided that they wanted a series of new sequences to explain mathematical principles, they were inclined to use animation because it can be such a clear teaching device. But their audience, kids 8 to 12 years old, see themselves too sophisticated for cartoons that are made for "little kids".

Then someone remembered seeing our 8-minute short, "Snowie and the Seven Dorps - A Passive/Aggressive Fable for the '90's" - an irreverent look at pop-psychology. It was animation - but in an eye-catching style of bright neon colors against black. And its fast pace and wise-cracking humor seemed to fit the pre-adolescent bill nicely.

Jeff Thurman wrote the scripts: Zook and Alison are siblings living on Planet Neon (not to be confused with Krypton). Their uncle. Wilt Cudlipp, is determined to spend as much time as possible on Earth, running away from his responsibilities on Neon. It is left up to his niece and nephew to locate him by subtly using math (geometry, logic, set theory and algebra) and terrible puns.

It was a challenge! To create a half-hour's worth of programming (four 7+ minute pieces) that's interesting to look at... funny... mathematically accurate... and not boring. And add to that the fact that we had about 6 months to complete them with CTW's normally limited budgets-- cel animation shot on film and processed in a lab!

It was lucky that the folks at Square One liked the look of 'Snowie' - because Vinny and I originally developed that style for our independent films since it was a faster technique for us than traditional cel animation. Because the scripts allowed for more interesting backgrounds and props we added the element of collage-- the Venice scenes were particularly interesting. Everyone was delighted with the endeavor!

One of my favorite memories (in retrospect...) was at the midpoint of the production. In the middle of the summer I was playing softball in Central Park, and on the way to the celebratory brunch, I fell off my bike (holding baseball equipment in my left hand with a sprained ankle on the right side) and onto my elbow. When I couldn't lock up my bike, the coach realized that I had broken my arm and they took me to the ER. I had broken the head of my radius bone and needed an operation. They bandaged me up and sent me home and scheduled the operation in a couple of days later. I could then go to Buzzco in the morning and give the crew their assignments for the week.

We were finishing the animation and ink and paint on the first 2 pieces and I had just finished the storyboards for the last 2. We were scheduled to have a production meeting with CTW on Wednesday when I would be staying overnight at the hospital post-op. I called Jeff Thurman and told him we could still go over the boards at the hospital-- which was even closer to his office! He declined and we rescheduled for the following week. I always said I could work with one hand tied behind my back!