Nelvana
Encyclopedia
Nelvana Limited is a Canadian entertainment company founded in 1971 known for its work in children's animation
. It was named by founders Michael Hirsh
, Patrick Loubert and Clive A. Smith after a Canadian comic book superheroine
created by Adrian Dingle
in the 1940s. Corus Entertainment
, a spin-off from Shaw Communications
, has owned the company since September 2000.
Most of its films, shows and specials are based on licensed properties, mainly children's literature, but original programming is also part of its roster. It ventured into the world of live action
from its establishment up until the late 1990s.
Well-known franchises include Care Bears
, Mythic Warriors: Guardians of the Legend
, Babar
, Tintin
, JumpStart Superheroes, Maggie and the Ferocious Beast
, Rupert
, Fievel's American Tails
, Little Bear
, Eek! The Cat
, The Terrible Thunderlizards
, Franklin
, Elliot Moose
and 6teen
, along with the North American dubs of the anime
series Beyblade
, Cardcaptor Sakura
, Medabots
, and Bakugan. The company has also tried miniseries
, like Rotting Hills.
Nelvana also distributes Nicktoons
such as Oh Yeah! Cartoons
, The Backyardigans
, The Fairly OddParents
, Chalkzone
and Danny Phantom
, and the Cartoon Network
original series My Gym Partner's a Monkey
, Disney Channel
original series Handy Manny
, Webkinz Jr., Webkinz
, Club Penguin
, Line Rider
, and My Friend Rabbit
outside the United States. , its library comprises more than 1,650 cumulative half-hours of original programming. The company has international offices in France, Ireland and Japan.
Nelvana started in 1971 when two graduates of York University
, Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert, teamed up with a Vitaphone animator-designer Clive A. Smith in Toronto
, Ontario
. Hirsh and Loubert, who had a passion for underground film
making, had founded a small company called Laff Arts in the late 1960s. Smith, whose interest was in rock n' roll music, had previously been among the crew for the Beatles
' animated series and their 1968 film, Yellow Submarine. Hirsh has commented on the background of Nelvana's founding:
Soon after they discovered a collection of local comic book
s from the 1940s and acquired the ownership rights. In turn, they made a half-hour television documentary for the CBC
focusing on Canadian comics. Their two-year traveling tour of the art from the National Gallery of Canada
, "Comic Art Traditions in Canada, 1941-45", gave locals a chance to revisit the country's past heritage in that field. Meanwhile, Hirsh and Loubert collaborated on a related primer from Peter Martin and Associates, The Great Canadian Comic Books
. Amid all this success, Hirsh, Loubert and Smith named their new enterprise Nelvana—after a Canadian comic book superheroine from World War II
, Nelvana of the Northern Lights
, who was one of the characters in the Canadian Whites canon.
A derelict apartment in downtown Toronto served as the company's first building, and a homemade wooden stand mounted over a toilet was among its first camera equipment. "To create zooms," Hirsh recalled of his early experience with this machine, "we would pile up phone books under the art work." During their first year and a half, the trio lived off a superfluous Chargex credit card that Loubert received at university, spending up to C$7,500 on it before they reclaimed double that cost as their first ever transaction. Under those conditions, Nelvana was involved in the production of documentaries and live-action films. In the area of part-time animation work, they made ten C$1,500 filler
s for the CBC.
Among the studio's first productions was a low-budget CBC short subject
series, Small Star Cinema
, which combined live-action and animation to tell stories of ordinary life from a child's point of view. It was followed by 1974's Christmas Two Step
, a similarly-styled special in which a girl tries to be a lead dancer at a Christmas pageant.
Nelvana worked on their first television specials: A Cosmic Christmas
(1977), The Devil and Daniel Mouse
(1978), Please Don't Eat the Planet (better known by its subtitle, Intergalactic Thanksgiving
) (1979), Romie-0 and Julie-8
(1979), Easter Fever
(1980) and Take Me Up to the Ball Game
(1980). During that time, George Lucas
, an aficionado of their work, commissioned the company to work on a 10-minute sequence for the CBS
TV film, The Star Wars Holiday Special
. This short scene, officially entitled "The Faithful Wookiee", would introduce audiences to the villainous bounty hunter Boba Fett
, who would make his first theatrical appearance in 1980
's The Empire Strikes Back
.
, an animated anthology of science fiction stories that studios in Canada and other countries were working on. Nelvana declined this opportunity, instead going on to concentrate on the production of its first feature film, Rock & Rule
.
Based heavily on the earlier special The Devil and Daniel Mouse, and originally titled Drats!, the film was produced for five years using all of the studio's resources, totalling $8 million. Upon its release by MGM/UA in 1983
, it received little promotion in the United States and quickly disappeared at the box office.
The financial demise of Rock & Rule would have ended Nelvana's operations altogether, had the company not saved themselves from debt by working full-time on children's television series. On its agenda at that time were its first three live-action franchises, The Edison Twins
, 20 Minute Workout and Mr. Microchip
. With DiC Entertainment
, Nelvana worked on the first season of Inspector Gadget
, and animated the pilot episode of The Get-Along Gang
.
Early in the decade, the company worked on four television specials based on American Greetings
properties. They were The Magic of Herself the Elf
, based on Mattel
's toy line
; Strawberry Shortcake's Housewarming Surprise; Strawberry Shortcake and the Baby Without a Name
; and Strawberry Shortcake Meets the Berrykins
, the last three of which featured the eponymous doll
. There were two shows from Nelvana based on the AmToy
properties, Madballs
and My Pet Monster
.
But perhaps its greatest success at the time came in the form of the Care Bears
, thanks to its acquisition of the character rights from American Greetings, the franchise owners. In early 1985
, the first movie based on the toy line
turned the company's fortunes around, grossing $
23 million in the U.S., and another $
1.5 million in its native Canada. Its tremendous success gave way to two more big-screen movies, A New Generation
and Adventure in Wonderland
, as well as a television series
.
In the area of science fiction, Nelvana produced Droids
and Ewoks
, two Saturday-morning series based on Star Wars
. At one point, there was talk of an animated CBS show from the studio, based on the BBC
's Doctor Who
; the plan never came to fruition, but concept art was created by Ted Bastien.
For Orion Pictures
' 1986 live-action western comedy
, ¡Three Amigos!
, the company made use of animatronics
in one scene with a talking turtle. In 1987
, Michael Hirsh produced Nelvana's first self-made film of this calibre, the Whoopi Goldberg
comedy Burglar
.
In 1988, Nelvana and Scholastic Corporation produced a video series of Clifford the Big Red Dog
based on the 1962 book. It was also distributed by Family Home Entertainment
on the video releases.
The company's fourth live-action series, T. and T.
, premiered in 1988 on Canada's Global network. The show's title duo was Mr. T
of A-Team
fame, playing a former boxer named T.S. Turner, and Canadian actress Kristina Nicoll as an East Coast lawyer by the name of Terri Taler. Nelvana faced bankruptcy for the second time when the show's original American distributor was going out of business; in six weeks, they were saved when they found a replacement. Also that year, Nelvana established BearSpots, a facility for producing television commercials that lasted until 1993.
As the decade came to a close, the revived Nelvana had its next big success with a movie
and an HBO television show
based on Jean de Brunhoff
's Babar book series. This franchise, its first international co-production
, won many ACE Awards
in the United States and Geminis
in Canada. In September 1989, ABC began to air one of the company's products: an animated series
based on Tim Burton
's Beetlejuice
.
From 1984, Nelvana produced the Thames Television
's UK animated show based on Thames TV programme, We Love Father voiced by Patrick Cargill (Father Dear Father), and late from 1989, this Sky Television
of launched and Nelvana produced the faster science game-show in UK from the contestant and studios in Canada, The Face Time which broadcast on Sky Channel from February 6, 1989 until June 29, 1989 before Sky One, and Sky One launched from flagship Sky Channel which premier back from August 1, 1989 until March 14, 2009.
Following Babar' s success, the studio acquired the rights to animated series based on Hergé
's The Adventures of Tintin
, Maurice Sendak
's Little Bear
, Joanna Cole
's The Magic School Bus
and the British comic strip Rupert the Bear. Nelvana had self-made successes of its own during the 1990s, such as Eek! The Cat, Dog City
(with Jim Henson Productions) and Ned's Newt
. Less successful was its animated series for children, Little Rosie
featuring the voice of Roseanne Barr
for the American Broadcasting Company
, which was cancelled in 1991, after its first season.
In autumn 1993, Nelvana signed a multi-year project to produce five feature films for Paramount Pictures
, with Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall producing; the first two began production the following summer, at a cost of over US$20 million each. Three of the projects were based on books by E.B. White (The Trumpet of the Swan
), Clive Barker
(The Thief of Always
) and Graeme Base
(The Sign of the Seahorse
); an original production called Mask Vision was also in the works.
However, none of those films ever made it past the finishing stage. During the 1990s, another set of features from Nelvana was distributed by different companies. A 1993
live-action thriller called Malice
came out under the Columbia Pictures
banner; 1997
saw the studio's retelling of Pippi Longstocking
from Legacy Releasing
; and Babar: King of the Elephants
was released in Canada by Alliance Atlantis
in 1999. Among them, only Malice would go on to achieve box-office success in North America. Its US$46 million gross was the highest ever attained by a Nelvana production, doubling what the first Care Bears Movie received during its original release.
In September 1996, Golden Books Family Entertainment was in talks to acquire the company for US$102 million,
just after having purchased the family video library of Broadway Video Entertainment, a subsidiary of Broadway Video
.
Many of the company's staff members, including Smith and Loubert, expressed interest in the proposition. But Hirsh went up against it, arguing with then COO
Eleanor Olmsted about its possible effects on his institution. Two months later Golden Books withdrew from the deal stating that they would concentrate more on children's entertainment.
In 1997, a small computer animation
company called Windlight Studios
was absorbed into Nelvana's assets. Its co-founder, Scott Dyer, became Nelvana's senior vice president in charge of production in late 2001.
In late 1997, Nelvana and Britain's Channel 4
began work on Bob and Margaret
, the company's first animated franchise for adults since Rock & Rule. It was based on the National Film Board of Canada
's Bob's Birthday
, an Academy Award winner for Best Short
, which Channel 4 also produced.
In August 1998, Nelvana acquired Kids Can Press
, publishers of the Franklin
and Elliot Moose
children's books upon which the Franklin (TV series)
and Elliot Moose (TV series)
were based. This turned them into an "integrated company" in which Kids Can's subsequent publications would begin with Nelvana's franchising of those works.
The company's first two computer-animated shows, Donkey Kong Country
and Rolie Polie Olie
(with Paris-based Sparx*) premiered on American TV in 1998. That same year, it held a monopoly on CBS' Saturday-morning schedule; the deal included Franklin, Flying Rhino Junior High
, Anatole
, Birdz
and Mythic Warriors
as part of the package. In January 1999, Franklin (on the CBS line-up) and Rupert (a part of Nick Jr.
since 1995) swapped networks.
In August 1999, Nelvana made a US$40 million deal with the Public Broadcasting Service
to produce its first ever Saturday morning shows, all of them based on popular children's books. The six series—Timothy Goes to School
, Seven Little Monsters
, Corduroy
, Marvin the Tap-Dancing Horse
, George Shrinks
and Elliot Moose
—were launched the following September as part of the Bookworm Bunch line-up. That same month, it acquired the North American rights to its first anime property, Clamp
's Cardcaptor Sakura
(in Korea Cardcaptor Cherry
). The resulting English dub was broadcast on in the U.S. market, Teletoon
in Canada, ITV
in the UK and SBS in Korea.
-based children's book publisher Klutz in a US$74 million deal—at that time, its largest buyout ever— and integrated it into its Branded Consumer Products division. The company, founded in 1977, was best known for its children's series, Books Plus. Nelvana's separate subsidiary, Kids Can, started taking advantage of the acquisition by making its output available through Klutz merchandise.
On September 29, 2000, after almost two weeks of negotiation, Corus Entertainment acquired Nelvana's operations for C$554 million.
A year after Corus' purchase, co-founders and co-CEOs
Loubert and Smith left the studio. Loubert voluntarily left in November after Corus eliminated 50 positions from the staff, saying "The time has come that Corus will stop acquiring for a while and start operating. John Cassaday has made that clear, but this makes my job less rather than more".
In 2001, the studio began to work on computer-animated feature films aimed at young audiences. So far, only one of them
, based on the Rescue Heroes
Committed
toy line and TV show, has seen the light of day in U.S. cinemas. The rest of them, based on Rolie Polie Olie and the Care Bears, have been released directly to DVD
.
In 2001, Nelvana acquired the rights to the English-language version of yet another anime series, Medabots. The following January, Beyblade (in association with Hasbro
and Mitsubishi
) became its third such property.
In October 2002, Corus announced Hirsh's resignation; the following month, Paul Robertson
, former president of Corus Television and head of YTV, became leader of the studio's senior management. With Hirsh's departure, Corus announced a C$200 million writedown for the company; by next August, it planned to reduce the staff down to 200. Hirsh has also taken an advisory role in the studio.
The following September, Corus launched their home entertainment division. Texas-based FUNimation, along with British company Maverick, has distributed titles from the studio with this label, including Redwall
, Pecola
, Tales from the Cryptkeeper
, Timothy Goes to School and the Disney Channel TV special The Santa Claus Brothers. Nelvana's newer titles have been distributed by MGM, Lionsgate
and ADV Films, which have no involvement with the label. Since 2007, Shout! Factory
releases Nelvana's shows on DVD.
In May 2006, Nelvana joined forces with ion Media Networks
(owners of TV network ion), NBC Universal
and Scholastic Books
, along with Classic Media
and its Big Idea
Productions unit, to launch qubo
, a new children's entertainment endeavour spread across all medium platforms, including video-on-demand on digital cable. The new project will feature new and library programming from the partners, each one producing a new show every year. The NBC
network, along with Spanish-speaking sister station Telemundo
, first aired the block on September 9; ion began carrying it six days later.
In September 2006, Nelvana was integrated into Corus' children's television division. A spin-off unit, Nelvana Enterprises, was created in the process; it will focus on international distribution of the company's shows. Scott Dyer, the studio's executive vice president of production and development, became the overseer of the division, which includes Treehouse TV
, Discovery Kids Canada, and YTV. Doug Murphy, another former EVP at Nelvana, became president of the new distribution unit.
In 2007, Nelvana acquired the rights to its fourth anime series, Bakugan Battle Brawlers
. The series was aired on Teletoon
and became a quick success. In 2008, merchandising rights were sold by Nelvana to Cartoon Network
in the US, and the series began airing on CN in February 2008.
and comic books
; examples include Anatole
, Babar, The Berenstain Bears, Franklin, Jane and the Dragon, Little Bear, The Magic School Bus, Pippi Longstocking
, Redwall
, Rupert, Tintin, Wayside School and the shows of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch
block
.
Nelvana has also had considerable success with animated fare based on toys; American Greetings' Care Bears has been the most familiar example of this. Also, there have been series and specials based on Strawberry Shortcake (also from American Greetings), Madballs and My Pet Monster (from AmToy) and Rescue Heroes (from Fisher-Price
).
It has also translated big-screen franchises to televised properties, such as Star Wars (Droids and Ewoks), Beetlejuice, An American Tail
(Fievel's American Tails
), Free Willy
and The Neverending Story
. It has even ventured into the video game world with a show based on Nintendo
's Donkey Kong in Donkey Kong Country
, as well as Kirby in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!
, which is also based on a Nintendo video game series
.
In the field of anime, the company holds the North American rights to Clamp/Kodansha
's Cardcaptor Sakura series. Also, it holds international licensing rights to Beyblade and Medabots.
As with many other animation studios, Nelvana had it's fair share of established original series and characters within it's roster. 6teen
, Clone High
, Mission Hill
, and Eek! The Cat
among others, are some of Nelvana's cartoon series that were not based on any other source material.
, the studio has made close to 25 feature films for theatrical, home entertainment, and television distribution. Well-known releases include Rock & Rule, the first five Care Bears movies, two Babar films and 1997's Pippi Longstocking.
Live-action has been a part of its mainstay from its early years. The company has had Burglar and Malice as its own feature projects in that area, and has contributed as such to The Star Wars Holiday Special and ¡Three Amigos!. On television, Nelvana has made live-action shows such as The Edison Twins, T and T, :20 Minute Workout, Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys.
, Disney Channel, Showtime, Cartoon Network
, Adult Swim
, and ABC (FOX) Family
and MTV. In Canada, they can be seen on Teletoon
, YTV, CBC Television
, the Family Channel and Treehouse TV
. Elsewhere, they have aired on the Boomerang
channel (in Latin America); on the BBC
, ITV
, Sky One
, Channel 4
, TCC
, Five, Disney Channel (UK), Nick Jr.
, POP, Tiny Pop
, Pop Girl
, Kix!, Nicktoons (UK) and CITV
, KidsCo
(in the United Kingdom); on RTÉ (in the Republic of Ireland); on France 2
and France 3
; and on ABC Television
, KidsCo
(in Australia). Nelvana's franchises have been shown on over 360 television stations in more 180 countries, in approximately 50 languages.
The Fairly OddParents
, created by animator Butch Hartman
, is distributed by Nelvana outside the United States. This show has been in the top of the ratings for Nickelodeon, YTV and the BBC, and has also been successful among viewers in several European markets, Latin America and Australia, Canada.
, John Halfpenny
, Peter Hudecki
, Vincenzo Natali
, Arna Selznick
, Laura Shepherd, Susan Snooks and John van Bruggen. Voice & acting work from the company's past and present includes, but is not limited to, Charlie Adler, Kathleen Barr
, Roseanne Barr
, Melleny Brown
, Arthur Burghardt
, Jackie Burroughs
, Len Carlson
, Dan Castellaneta
, Michael Cera
, Cam Clarke
, Ted Cole
, Steve Coogan
, Alyson Court
, Amos Crawley, Jim Cummings
, Anthony Daniels
, Harry Dean Stanton
, Dom DeLuise
, Brian Drummond
, James Earl Jones
, Don Francks
, Corey Feldman
, Colin Fox
, Brad Garrett
, Brian George
, Whoopi Goldberg
, Bobcat Goldthwait
, John Goodman
, Graham Halley, Mark Hamill
, Elizabeth Hanna
, Dan Hennessey
, Jim Henshaw
, Tony Jay
, John Kassir
, Hadley Kay
, David Kaye
, Keith Knight
, Bill Kopp
, Nathan Lane
, Martin Lavut
, Julie Lemieux
, Christopher Lloyd
, Billie Mae Richards
, Danny Mann
, Scott McCord
, Colin Murdock
, Richard Newman
, Neil Ross
, Stephen Ouimette
, Gary Owens
, Ron Pardo
, Wayne Robson
, Susan Roman
, Mickey Rooney
, Lia Sargent
, John Stocker, Stuart Stone, Tara Strong
, Allen Stewart-Coates, Colin Mochrie
, Cree Summer
, Colin O'Meara
, Brent Titcomb
, Louise Vallance
, Frank Welker
, Chris Wiggins
and Harland Williams
.
Eight former Nelvana employees, Roger Allers
, Charles Bonifacio
, David Brewster
, Anne Marie Bardwell, Tom Sito
, Ralph Palmer, Mark Koetsier, Andrew Hickson, Dick Zondag and Ralph Zondag
, went on to become staff members at Walt Disney Feature Animation
and DreamWorks
in the 1980s ,1990s and 2000s. Allers, who worked on Aladdin, The Lion King
and Hercules
. Lenora Hume
, from the company's early years, is the senior vice-president of DisneyToon Studios
.
series Clone Wars. During Chapters 23 to 25, Anakin Skywalker travels to a planet called "Nelvaan". Clone Wars also pays homage to the franchise's animation predecessors in the form of the planet's dog-like inhabitants, who resemble characters from Rock & Rule, the studio's first film.
The "Nelvana Independent Short Film Grand Prize", given out at the Ottawa International Animation Festival
since 2004, pays homage to the name of the company. So far, the recipients of this prize have been 2004's Ryan
, the Chris Landreth
biography about Canadian animator Ryan Larkin
; 2005's Milch, from director Igor Kovalyov; and, in 2006, Joanna Quinn
's Dreams and Desires: Family Ties.
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
. It was named by founders Michael Hirsh
Michael Hirsh (producer)
Michael Hirsh is a Belgian-born Canadian citizen. He has been a significant figure in the Canadian television industry, or more specifically children's programming, since the 1980s.-Personal life:...
, Patrick Loubert and Clive A. Smith after a Canadian comic book superheroine
Nelvana of the Northern Lights
Nelvana of the Northern Lights is a Canadian comic book character and the first Canadian national superhero, debuting in Hillborough Studio's Triumph-Adventure Comics #1 . She is also one of the first female superheroes, debuting before Wonder Woman but after Fantomah, the Golden Age Black Widow,...
created by Adrian Dingle
Adrian Dingle (comic book artist)
Adrian Dingle was a painter whose career was based in Canada. He was also a creator of comic books during the 1940's.Born John Adrian Darley Dingle in Barmouth, Gwynedd, north Wales, he emigrated to Canada when he was three years old...
in the 1940s. Corus Entertainment
Corus Entertainment
Corus Entertainment Inc. is a publicly traded Canadian media and entertainment conglomerate.Corus is a leading Canadian specialty television and radio producer, with additional assets in pay television, advertising services, television broadcasting, children's book publishing and children's...
, a spin-off from Shaw Communications
Shaw Communications
Shaw Communications is Canada's largest telecommunications company that provides telephone, Canada's fastest Internet and television services as well as broadcasting and soon Wifi. Shaw is headquartered in Calgary, Alberta...
, has owned the company since September 2000.
Most of its films, shows and specials are based on licensed properties, mainly children's literature, but original programming is also part of its roster. It ventured into the world of live action
Live action
In filmmaking, video production, and other media, the term live action refers to cinematography, videography not produced using animation...
from its establishment up until the late 1990s.
Well-known franchises include Care Bears
The Care Bears (TV series)
The Care Bears is an animated television series based on the Care Bears franchise, which aired between 1985 and 1988 in syndication; on the ABC network in the United States; and on Global in Canada. The 1985 episodes were produced by DIC Entertainment; the ABC/Global episodes were made by...
, Mythic Warriors: Guardians of the Legend
Mythic Warriors
Mythic Warriors was a Canadian-produced animated television series that was a fixture of CBS' Saturday-morning cartoon lineup...
, Babar
Babar (TV series)
Babar is an animated television series produced in Canada by Nelvana Limited and The Clifford Ross Company. It premiered in 1989 on CBC and HBO, subsequently was rerun on HBO Family and Qubo. The series is based on Jean de Brunhoff's original Babar books, and was Nelvana's first international...
, Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin (TV series)
The Adventures of Tintin is an animated television series based on The Adventures of Tintin, a series of books by Hergé. It debuted in 1991, and 39 half-hour episodes were produced over the course of three seasons...
, JumpStart Superheroes, Maggie and the Ferocious Beast
Maggie and the Ferocious Beast
Maggie and the Ferocious Beast is an animated TV series based on the books by Michael Paraskevas and his mother Betty. It currently airs on the American Channel Nick Jr.....
, Rupert
Rupert (TV series)
Rupert is an animated television series based on the Mary Tourtel character Rupert Bear, produced by Nelvana, Ellipse Programmé and TVS for the first season, with Scottish Television taken over control when TVS closed. Aired from 1991 to 1997 with 65 half-hour episodes produced. It was broadcast...
, Fievel's American Tails
Fievel's American Tails
Fievel's American Tails is an American/Canadian animated television series, produced by Steven Spielberg's Amblimation animation studio, Nelvana, and Universal Cartoon Studios. It aired for one season in 1992, and continued Fievel's adventures from the film An American Tail: Fievel Goes West...
, Little Bear
Little Bear (TV series)
Maurice Sendak's Little Bear is a Canadian children's television series starring a Little Bear voiced by Kristin Fairlie. Originally produced by Nelvana for Nickelodeon, it currently airs on Treehouse TV in Canada and Nick Jr. in the United States. A direct-to-video full-length feature film was...
, Eek! The Cat
Eek! The Cat
Eek! The Cat is an American and Canadian animated series, created by Savage Steve Holland and Bill Kopp and produced by Fox Kids and Savage Studios with animation by Nelvana, that ran from September 11, 1992, to August 1, 1997.-Premise:Eek! the Cat is about a purple cat named Eek whose motto is...
, The Terrible Thunderlizards
The Terrible Thunderlizards
The Terrible Thunderlizards is a segment that aired in Canada on YTV and in the United States as part of Eek! Stravaganza on the Fox Kids programming block. It aired from November 20, 1993 to July 28, 1997. The series was originally intended as a spin off from Eek! The Cat...
, Franklin
Franklin (TV series)
Franklin is a Canadian animated television series, based on the Franklin the Turtle books by Brenda Clark and Paulette Bourgeois. The television series was named after its main character, Franklin the Turtle...
, Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose is a Canadian children's live-action and animated series which was aired on TVOntario in Canada and PBS in the United States as part of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch until it was cancelled....
and 6teen
6teen
6teen is a Canadian animated sitcom, which premiered in Canada in 2004 on Teletoon. In the USA, 6teen first premiered on Nickelodeon on December 18, 2005 and was removed from the schedule on May 13, 2006 before being removed completely in 2007 before the series' run could be completed. 6teen was...
, along with the North American dubs of the anime
Anime
is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....
series Beyblade
Beyblade
is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Takao Aoki. Originally serialized in CoroCoro Comic from 2000 to 2002, the individual chapters were collected and published in 14 tankōbon by Shogakukan...
, Cardcaptor Sakura
Cardcaptor Sakura
, abbreviated as CCS and also known as Cardcaptors, is a Japanese shōjo manga series written and illustrated by the manga artist group Clamp. The manga was originally serialized monthly in Nakayoshi from the May 1996 until the June 2000 issue, and later published in 12 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha...
, Medabots
Medabots
Medabots, known in Japan as , is a role-playing video game franchise developed by Natsume and published by Imagineer in Japan in 1997. The video game franchise was later adapted into a Japanese anime television series produced by Bee Train. Spanning 52 episodes, the series originally aired on TV...
, and Bakugan. The company has also tried miniseries
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
, like Rotting Hills.
Nelvana also distributes Nicktoons
Nicktoons
Nicktoons are animated television shows that are produced by and aired on the children's television channel Nickelodeon. Prior to 1991, Nickelodeon aired mostly foreign made animated series. The idea for Nicktoons was formed in 1989 and on Sunday, August 11, 1991, the first Nicktoon, Doug, was...
such as Oh Yeah! Cartoons
Oh Yeah! Cartoons
Oh Yeah! Cartoons is an American animation showcase that appeared on the Nickelodeon cable channel. Oh Yeah! was an animation project guided by Fred Seibert, former Creative Director of MTV Networks and President of Hanna-Barbera...
, The Backyardigans
The Backyardigans
The Backyardigans is a Canadian/American 3-D CGI-animated children's TV series, created by Janice Burgess. It features five animal children, who imagine that their backyard becomes an adventure place. It is a coproduction of Treehouse TV, and the Canadian animation studio Nelvana. Debuting on...
, The Fairly OddParents
The Fairly OddParents
The Fairly OddParents is an American-Canadian animated television series created by Butch Hartman about the adventures of Timmy Turner, who is granted fairy godparents named Cosmo and Wanda. The series started out as cartoon segments that ran from September 4, 1998 to March 23, 2001 on Oh Yeah!...
, Chalkzone
ChalkZone
ChalkZone is an American animated television series that aired on Nickelodeon. It was created by Bill Burnett and Larry Huber, and produced by Frederator Studios for the Nickelodeon TV channel...
and Danny Phantom
Danny Phantom
Danny Phantom is an American animated television series created by Butch Hartman for Nickelodeon, produced by Billionfold Studios. The show was about a teenage half-ghost boy, who frequently saves his town and the world from ghost attacks, while attempting to keep his ghost half a secret...
, and the Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network is a name of television channels worldwide created by Turner Broadcasting which used to primarily show animated programming. The channel began broadcasting on October 1, 1992 in the United States....
original series My Gym Partner's a Monkey
My Gym Partner's a Monkey
My Gym Partner's a Monkey is an American animated television series created by Timothy and Julie McNally Cahill and produced by Cartoon Network Studios. It premiered on December 26, 2005 and ended in November 27, 2008 following a marathon of its final regular-run episodes...
, Disney Channel
Disney Channel
Disney Channel is an American basic cable and satellite television network, owned by the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company. It is under the direction of Disney-ABC Television Group President Anne Sweeney. The channel's headquarters is located on West Alameda Ave. in...
original series Handy Manny
Handy Manny
Handy Manny is a Disney animated children's television program that premiered on September 16, 2006. The program was originally part of the Playhouse Disney daily block intended for preschoolers...
, Webkinz Jr., Webkinz
Webkinz
Webkinz are toy stuffed animals that were originally released by the Canadian Ganz company on April 29, 2005. The toys are similar to many other small plush toys, however, each Webkinz toy has an attached tag with a unique "Secret Code" printed on it that allows access to the "Webkinz World" website...
, Club Penguin
Club Penguin
Club Penguin is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game involving a virtual world containing a range of online games and activities, by Club Penguin Entertainment . Players use cartoon penguin-avatars and play in a winter-set virtual world...
, Line Rider
Line Rider
Line Rider is an internet game. Versions are available for Microsoft Silverlight and for Flash. It was originally created in September 2006 by Boštjan Čadež , a Slovenian student...
, and My Friend Rabbit
My Friend Rabbit
My Friend Rabbit is a children's picture book book written and illustrated by Eric Rohmann. Published in 2002, the book is a lighthearted tale about the friendship between a mouse and a rabbit. Rohmann won the 2003 Caldecott Medal for his illustrations...
outside the United States. , its library comprises more than 1,650 cumulative half-hours of original programming. The company has international offices in France, Ireland and Japan.
1970s
York University
York University is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's third-largest university, Ontario's second-largest graduate school, and Canada's leading interdisciplinary university....
, Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert, teamed up with a Vitaphone animator-designer Clive A. Smith in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
. Hirsh and Loubert, who had a passion for underground film
Underground film
An underground film is a film that is out of the mainstream either in its style, genre, or financing.-Definition and history:The first use of the term "underground film" occurs in a 1957 essay by American film critic Manny Farber, "Underground Films." Farber uses it to refer to the work of...
making, had founded a small company called Laff Arts in the late 1960s. Smith, whose interest was in rock n' roll music, had previously been among the crew for the Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
' animated series and their 1968 film, Yellow Submarine. Hirsh has commented on the background of Nelvana's founding:
Soon after they discovered a collection of local comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
s from the 1940s and acquired the ownership rights. In turn, they made a half-hour television documentary for the CBC
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...
focusing on Canadian comics. Their two-year traveling tour of the art from the National Gallery of Canada
National Gallery of Canada
The National Gallery of Canada , located in the capital city Ottawa, Ontario, is one of Canada's premier art galleries.The Gallery is now housed in a glass and granite building on Sussex Drive with a notable view of the Canadian Parliament buildings on Parliament Hill. The acclaimed structure was...
, "Comic Art Traditions in Canada, 1941-45", gave locals a chance to revisit the country's past heritage in that field. Meanwhile, Hirsh and Loubert collaborated on a related primer from Peter Martin and Associates, The Great Canadian Comic Books
The Great Canadian Comic Books
The Great Canadian Comic Books is a 1971 book from Peter Martin Associates. It was written by Nelvana founders Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert, with partner Clive A. Smith as designer and illustrator...
. Amid all this success, Hirsh, Loubert and Smith named their new enterprise Nelvana—after a Canadian comic book superheroine from World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Nelvana of the Northern Lights
Nelvana of the Northern Lights
Nelvana of the Northern Lights is a Canadian comic book character and the first Canadian national superhero, debuting in Hillborough Studio's Triumph-Adventure Comics #1 . She is also one of the first female superheroes, debuting before Wonder Woman but after Fantomah, the Golden Age Black Widow,...
, who was one of the characters in the Canadian Whites canon.
A derelict apartment in downtown Toronto served as the company's first building, and a homemade wooden stand mounted over a toilet was among its first camera equipment. "To create zooms," Hirsh recalled of his early experience with this machine, "we would pile up phone books under the art work." During their first year and a half, the trio lived off a superfluous Chargex credit card that Loubert received at university, spending up to C$7,500 on it before they reclaimed double that cost as their first ever transaction. Under those conditions, Nelvana was involved in the production of documentaries and live-action films. In the area of part-time animation work, they made ten C$1,500 filler
Filler (media)
In media, filler is material that is combined with material of greater relevance or quality to "fill out" a certain volume.-Early television:...
s for the CBC.
Among the studio's first productions was a low-budget CBC short subject
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
series, Small Star Cinema
Small Star Cinema
Small Star Cinema was a mid-1970s series of live-action/animated shorts made by Canada's Nelvana Limited, and broadcast on the CBC. It was produced by Michael Hirsh and Patrick Loubert, and starred Clive A. Smith....
, which combined live-action and animation to tell stories of ordinary life from a child's point of view. It was followed by 1974's Christmas Two Step
Christmas Two Step
Christmas Two Step is a 1975 live-action/animated television special made by Nelvana Limited, and broadcast on the CBC. A follow-up to the studio's earlier Small Star Cinema series, it tells the story of a girl who wants to be a lead dancer at a Christmas pageant. The production of the special...
, a similarly-styled special in which a girl tries to be a lead dancer at a Christmas pageant.
Nelvana worked on their first television specials: A Cosmic Christmas
A Cosmic Christmas
A Cosmic Christmas is the first television special produced by the Canadian animation company, Nelvana. It premiered on December 4, 1977 in Canada on CBC Television.-Plot:...
(1977), The Devil and Daniel Mouse
The Devil and Daniel Mouse
The Devil and Daniel Mouse is a 1978 animated Halloween television special, from Canada's Nelvana animation studio. It is based on the story of The Devil and Daniel Webster.The Nelvana logo made its first appearance at the end of the film.-Story:...
(1978), Please Don't Eat the Planet (better known by its subtitle, Intergalactic Thanksgiving
Intergalactic Thanksgiving
Intergalactic Thanksgiving is the fourth television special from the Canadian animation company, Nelvana.-Story:...
) (1979), Romie-0 and Julie-8
Romie-0 and Julie-8
Romie-0 and Julie-8 is the third animated television special made by Nelvana Limited, inspired by William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet...
(1979), Easter Fever
Easter Fever
Easter Fever is the fifth television special from the Canadian animation company, Nelvana.-Plot:...
(1980) and Take Me Up to the Ball Game
Take Me Up to the Ball Game
Take Me Up to the Ball Game is the sixth animated television special from Nelvana Limited, released in September 1980. The title is a play on the song title "Take Me Out to the Ball Game".-Synopsis:...
(1980). During that time, George Lucas
George Lucas
George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
, an aficionado of their work, commissioned the company to work on a 10-minute sequence for the CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
TV film, The Star Wars Holiday Special
The Star Wars Holiday Special
The Star Wars Holiday Special is a 1978 American television special set in the Star Wars galaxy. It was one of the first official Star Wars spin-offs, and was directed by Steve Binder. The show was broadcast in its entirety only once, in the United States and Canada, November 17, 1978, on the U.S...
. This short scene, officially entitled "The Faithful Wookiee", would introduce audiences to the villainous bounty hunter Boba Fett
Boba Fett
Boba Fett is a character in Star Wars. A bounty hunter hired by Darth Vader to find the Millennium Falcon, he is a minor villain in both Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back and Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi....
, who would make his first theatrical appearance in 1980
1980 in film
- Events :* May 21 - Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is released and is the biggest grosser of the year ....
's The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner. The screenplay, based on a story by George Lucas, was written by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan...
.
1980s
At the start of the 1980s, Nelvana was offered the chance to work on Heavy MetalHeavy Metal (film)
Heavy Metal is a 1981 Canadian fantasy-animated film directed by Gerald Potterton and produced by Ivan Reitman and Leonard Mogel, who also was the publisher of Heavy Metal magazine....
, an animated anthology of science fiction stories that studios in Canada and other countries were working on. Nelvana declined this opportunity, instead going on to concentrate on the production of its first feature film, Rock & Rule
Rock & Rule
Rock & Rule is a 1983 Canadian animated film from the animation studio Nelvana. It was produced and directed by the company's founders, Michael Hirsh, Patrick Loubert, and Clive A. Smith. The film features the voices of Greg Salata, Susan Roman, and Don Francks, with Catherine O'Hara, Chris...
.
Based heavily on the earlier special The Devil and Daniel Mouse, and originally titled Drats!, the film was produced for five years using all of the studio's resources, totalling $8 million. Upon its release by MGM/UA in 1983
1983 in film
-Events:*February 11 - The Rolling Stones concert film Let's Spend the Night Together opens in New York*May 25 - Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, the final film in the original Star Wars trilogy, is released. Like the previous films, it goes on to become the top grossing picture of...
, it received little promotion in the United States and quickly disappeared at the box office.
The financial demise of Rock & Rule would have ended Nelvana's operations altogether, had the company not saved themselves from debt by working full-time on children's television series. On its agenda at that time were its first three live-action franchises, The Edison Twins
The Edison Twins
The Edison Twins is a Canadian children's television program which aired on CBC Television from 1983 to 1986. The Disney Channel also picked up the rights in the mid-1980s...
, 20 Minute Workout and Mr. Microchip
Mr. Microchip
Mr. Microchip is a live-action children's television series, and one of the first three of its kind produced by Canadian animation studios, Nelvana Limited. 13 episodes focusing on the world of computer technology were made and broadcast in 1983...
. With DiC Entertainment
DiC Entertainment
DIC Entertainment was an international film and television production company. In addition to animated television shows such as Ulysses 31 , Inspector Gadget , The Littles , The Real Ghostbusters , Captain Planet and the Planeteers , and the first two seasons of the English adaptation of...
, Nelvana worked on the first season of Inspector Gadget
Inspector Gadget
Inspector Gadget is an animated television series that revolves around the adventures of a clumsy, simple-witted cyborg detective named Inspector Gadget – a human being with various bionic gadgets built into his body. Gadget's arch-nemesis is Dr...
, and animated the pilot episode of The Get-Along Gang
The Get-Along Gang
The Get Along Gang were characters created in 1983 by American Greetings' toy design and licensing division, "Those Characters from Cleveland" , for a series of greeting cards...
.
Early in the decade, the company worked on four television specials based on American Greetings
American Greetings
American Greetings Corporation, Inc. is the world's largest publicly-traded greeting card company. It is based in Brooklyn, Ohio and sells paper greeting cards, electronic greeting cards, party products , and electronic expressive content...
properties. They were The Magic of Herself the Elf
The Magic of Herself the Elf
The Magic of Herself the Elf is a 1983 animated television special produced by the Canadian animation company, Nelvana Limited. Directed by John Celestri and Raymond Jafelice, it stars the voices of Jerry Orbach, Georgia Engel and Priscilla Lopez...
, based on Mattel
Mattel
Mattel, Inc. is the world's largest toy company based on revenue. The products it produces include Fisher Price, Barbie dolls, Hot Wheels and Matchbox toys, Masters of the Universe, American Girl dolls, board games, and, in the early 1980s, video game consoles. The company's name is derived from...
's toy line
Herself the Elf
Herself the Elf was a franchise line for young girls similar to Strawberry Shortcake. It was created by American Greetings/Mattel. It included a series of dolls, an animated special, books, records and an animated series.-Character Descriptions:...
; Strawberry Shortcake's Housewarming Surprise; Strawberry Shortcake and the Baby Without a Name
Strawberry Shortcake and the Baby Without a Name
Strawberry Shortcake and the Baby Without a Name is an animated television special from 1984, produced by Nelvana. This is the fifth to feature American Greetings character Strawberry Shortcake.-Synopsis:...
; and Strawberry Shortcake Meets the Berrykins
Strawberry Shortcake Meets the Berrykins
Strawberry Shortcake Meets the Berrykins is a 1985 animated television special from Canada's Nelvana Limited, and the last one until DiC's recent revival to feature the American Greetings character, Strawberry Shortcake on Fox Kids.-Synopsis:...
, the last three of which featured the eponymous doll
Strawberry Shortcake
Strawberry Shortcake is a licensed character owned by American Greetings, originally used in greeting cards and expanded to include dolls, posters, and other products...
. There were two shows from Nelvana based on the AmToy
AmToy
AmToy was the toy division of American Greetings Corporation. Its most notable products were the mid-1980s lines, Madballs and My Pet Monster, both of which had animated shows from the Canadian company Nelvana. AGC sold the company to Tyco Toys in 1988....
properties, Madballs
Madballs
Madballs were a series of toy rubber balls created by AmToy, a subsidiary company of American Greetings in the mid-1980s.The toys incorporated gross-out humor in the vein of Wacky Packages and Garbage Pail Kids...
and My Pet Monster
My Pet Monster
My Pet Monster is a plush doll first produced by American Greetings in 1986. As one of the few plush dolls marketed to boys at the time, My Pet Monster would prove popular throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s. The doll has blue fur, horns, and a fanged smile and is recognizable by its orange...
.
But perhaps its greatest success at the time came in the form of the Care Bears
Care Bears
The Care Bears are characters created by American Greetings in 1981 for use on greeting cards. The original artwork for the cards was painted by artist Elena Kucharik. In 1983, Kenner turned the Care Bears into plush teddy bears...
, thanks to its acquisition of the character rights from American Greetings, the franchise owners. In early 1985
1985 in film
-Events:* 3 December - Roger Moore steps down from the role of James Bond after twelve years and seven films. He is replaced by Timothy Dalton.* The Academy Award for Best Picture was won by Out Of Africa, while the highest grossing film was Back to the Future.* Bliss wins AFI Award for best Movie...
, the first movie based on the toy line
The Care Bears Movie
The Care Bears Movie is a 1985 Canadian animated film, the second feature production from the Toronto animation studio Nelvana. One of the first films based directly on a toy line, it introduced the Care Bears characters and their companions, the Care Bear Cousins. In the film, orphanage owners...
turned the company's fortunes around, grossing $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
23 million in the U.S., and another $
Canadian dollar
The Canadian dollar is the currency of Canada. As of 2007, the Canadian dollar is the 7th most traded currency in the world. It is abbreviated with the dollar sign $, or C$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies...
1.5 million in its native Canada. Its tremendous success gave way to two more big-screen movies, A New Generation
Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation
Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation is a 1986 children's animated film produced by LBS Communications, Inc. and Canadian animation studio Nelvana. The third animated feature from Nelvana, it was directed by Dale Schott, written by Peter Sauder and produced by Nelvana's three founders...
and Adventure in Wonderland
The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland
The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland is the third theatrically released film in the Care Bears animated franchise. It was released in the United States and Canada on August 7, 1987 by Cineplex Odeon Films, and is based on Lewis Carroll's Alice stories...
, as well as a television series
The Care Bears (TV series)
The Care Bears is an animated television series based on the Care Bears franchise, which aired between 1985 and 1988 in syndication; on the ABC network in the United States; and on Global in Canada. The 1985 episodes were produced by DIC Entertainment; the ABC/Global episodes were made by...
.
In the area of science fiction, Nelvana produced Droids
Star Wars: Droids
Star Wars: Droids, also known as Droids: The Adventures of R2-D2 and C-3PO, was an animated television series that featured the exploits of R2-D2 and C-3PO, the droids who have appeared in all six Star Wars films...
and Ewoks
Star Wars: Ewoks
Star Wars: Ewoks is an American/Canadian animated television series featuring the Ewok characters introduced in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi....
, two Saturday-morning series based on Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
. At one point, there was talk of an animated CBS show from the studio, based on the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
's Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
; the plan never came to fruition, but concept art was created by Ted Bastien.
For Orion Pictures
Orion Pictures
Orion Pictures Corporation was an American independent production company that produced movies from 1978 until 1998. It was formed in 1978 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and three former top-level executives of United Artists. Although it was never a large motion picture producer, Orion...
' 1986 live-action western comedy
1986 in film
-Events:*April 12 - Actor Morgan Mason marries The Go-Go's Belinda Carlisle.*April 26 - Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger marries television journalist Maria Shriver.*May - Actress Heather Locklear marries Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee....
, ¡Three Amigos!
¡Three Amigos!
Three Amigos is a 1986 American adventure musical comedy film directed by John Landis and written by Lorne Michaels, Steve Martin, and Randy Newman...
, the company made use of animatronics
Animatronics
Animatronics is the use of mechatronics to create machines which seem animate rather than robotic. Animatronic creations include animals , plants and even mythical creatures...
in one scene with a talking turtle. In 1987
1987 in film
-Events:*January 31 - The Cure for Insomnia premieres at The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, Illinois, to officially become the world's longest film according to Guinness World Records....
, Michael Hirsh produced Nelvana's first self-made film of this calibre, the Whoopi Goldberg
Whoopi Goldberg
Whoopi Goldberg is an American comedian, actress, singer-songwriter, political activist, author and talk show host.Goldberg made her film debut in The Color Purple playing Celie, a mistreated black woman in the Deep South. She received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress and won...
comedy Burglar
Burglar (film)
Burglar is a 1987 American comedy film directed by Hugh Wilson and distributed by Warner Bros. The film stars Whoopi Goldberg and Bobcat Goldthwait.-Plot:...
.
In 1988, Nelvana and Scholastic Corporation produced a video series of Clifford the Big Red Dog
Clifford the Big Red Dog
Clifford the Big Red Dog is an American children's book series first published in 1963. Written by Norman Bridwell, the series helped establish Scholastic Books as a premier publishing company....
based on the 1962 book. It was also distributed by Family Home Entertainment
Family Home Entertainment
Family Home Entertainment was an American home video company founded in 1980 by Noel C. Bloom. It was a division of International Video Entertainment, which had its headquarters in Newbury Park, California.-General information:...
on the video releases.
The company's fourth live-action series, T. and T.
T. and T.
T. and T. is a Canadian-produced television series, in production from 1987 to 1990. The series premiered in first-run syndication in January 1988, later moving to new episodes on the Family Channel in 1990. It was a starring vehicle for Mr...
, premiered in 1988 on Canada's Global network. The show's title duo was Mr. T
Mr. T
Mr. T is an American actor known for his roles as B. A. Baracus in the 1980s television series The A-Team, as boxer Clubber Lang in the 1982 film Rocky III, and for his appearances as a professional wrestler. Mr. T is known for his trademark African Mandinka warrior hairstyle, his gold jewelry,...
of A-Team
The A-Team
The A-Team is an American action adventure television series about a fictional group of ex-United States Army Special Forces personnel who work as soldiers of fortune, while on the run from the Army after being branded as war criminals for a "crime they didn't commit". The A-Team was created by...
fame, playing a former boxer named T.S. Turner, and Canadian actress Kristina Nicoll as an East Coast lawyer by the name of Terri Taler. Nelvana faced bankruptcy for the second time when the show's original American distributor was going out of business; in six weeks, they were saved when they found a replacement. Also that year, Nelvana established BearSpots, a facility for producing television commercials that lasted until 1993.
As the decade came to a close, the revived Nelvana had its next big success with a movie
Babar: The Movie
Babar: The Movie is a 1989 drawn-animated film made by Canada's Nelvana Limited and France's Ellipse Programme, and distributed by New Line Cinema. It is based on the characters of Jean de Brunhoff's eponymous children's books, and was a follow-up to the first season of the HBO TV series...
and an HBO television show
Babar (TV series)
Babar is an animated television series produced in Canada by Nelvana Limited and The Clifford Ross Company. It premiered in 1989 on CBC and HBO, subsequently was rerun on HBO Family and Qubo. The series is based on Jean de Brunhoff's original Babar books, and was Nelvana's first international...
based on Jean de Brunhoff
Jean de Brunhoff
Jean de Brunhoff was a French writer and illustrator known for creating the Babar books, the first of which appeared in 1931. He was the fourth and youngest child of Maurice de Brunhoff, a publisher, and his wife Marguerite. He attended Protestant schools, including the prestigious Ecole Alsacienne...
's Babar book series. This franchise, its first international co-production
International co-production
An international co-production is a production where two or more different production companies are working together, for example in a film production...
, won many ACE Awards
CableACE Award
The CableACE Award was an award that was given from 1978 to 1997 to honor excellence in American cable television programming...
in the United States and Geminis
Gemini Award
The Gemini Awards are annual television broadcasting industry awards in Canada.First awarded in 1986, the Geminis celebrate the achievements of TV members of the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television. Essentially, it presents awards for the best television productions in Canada. Awards are...
in Canada. In September 1989, ABC began to air one of the company's products: an animated series
Beetlejuice (TV series)
Beetlejuice is an American-Canadian animated television series which ran from September 9, 1989 to May 7, 1992 on ABC and, later on, on Fox. Loosely based on the 1988 homonymous film of the same name, it was developed and executive-produced by the film's director, Tim Burton...
based on Tim Burton
Tim Burton
Timothy William "Tim" Burton is an American film director, film producer, writer and artist. He is famous for dark, quirky-themed movies such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet...
's Beetlejuice
Beetlejuice
Beetlejuice is a 1988 American comedy horror film directed by Tim Burton, produced by The Geffen Film Company and distributed by Warner Bros...
.
From 1984, Nelvana produced the Thames Television
Thames Television
Thames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992....
's UK animated show based on Thames TV programme, We Love Father voiced by Patrick Cargill (Father Dear Father), and late from 1989, this Sky Television
Sky Television
Sky Television may refer to:*British Sky Broadcasting in the United Kingdom**Sky Digital , the television network run by BSkyB...
of launched and Nelvana produced the faster science game-show in UK from the contestant and studios in Canada, The Face Time which broadcast on Sky Channel from February 6, 1989 until June 29, 1989 before Sky One, and Sky One launched from flagship Sky Channel which premier back from August 1, 1989 until March 14, 2009.
1990s
Hergé
Georges Prosper Remi , better known by the pen name Hergé, was a Belgian comics writer and artist. His best known and most substantial work is the 23 completed comic books in The Adventures of Tintin series, which he wrote and illustrated from 1929 until his death in 1983, although he was also...
's The Adventures of Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin is a series of classic comic books created by Belgian artist , who wrote under the pen name of Hergé...
, Maurice Sendak
Maurice Sendak
Maurice Bernard Sendak is an American writer and illustrator of children's literature. He is best known for his book Where the Wild Things Are, published in 1963.-Early life:...
's Little Bear
Little Bear (book)
Little Bear is a series of children's books, primarily involving the interaction of Little Bear and Mother Bear . The first book in the series was published in 1957, written by Else Holmelund Minarik and illustrated by Maurice Sendak...
, Joanna Cole
Joanna Cole
Joanna Cole , is a United States author of children’s books. She is most famous as the author of The Magic School Bus series of children's books...
's The Magic School Bus
The Magic School Bus
The Magic School Bus is a series of children's books about science written by author Joanna Cole. They feature the antics of Ms. Valerie Frizzle, an elementary school teacher, and her class, who board a magical school bus which takes them on field trips to impossible locations such as the solar...
and the British comic strip Rupert the Bear. Nelvana had self-made successes of its own during the 1990s, such as Eek! The Cat, Dog City
Dog City
Dog City is a television series that was produced by Nelvana Limited and Jim Henson Productions and aired on FOX from September 26, 1992 to January 28, 1995, and in Canada on Global in 1993, then on Teletoon until 2000. The show contained both animation by Nelvana, and puppetry by Jim Henson...
(with Jim Henson Productions) and Ned's Newt
Ned's Newt
Ned's Newt is a Canadian/German cartoon series produced by Nelvana and TMO Film GmbH. The program aired from 1993 to 1996 in Germany, and on Teletoon from 1997 to 1998 in Canada. In the United States, the program aired on Fox Kids from 1998 to 1999, and was later rerun on Fox Family Channel...
. Less successful was its animated series for children, Little Rosie
Little Rosie
Little Rosey was Roseanne Barr's first attempt at a cartoon.-Plot:Based loosely on comedian Roseanne's childhood, this animated series aired late in the day on ABC's Saturday morning lineup...
featuring the voice of Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Cherrie Barr is an American actress, comedian, writer, television producer and director. Barr began her career in stand-up comedy at clubs before gaining fame for her role in the sitcom Roseanne. The show was a hit and lasted nine seasons, from 1988 to 1997...
for the American Broadcasting Company
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
, which was cancelled in 1991, after its first season.
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
, with Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall producing; the first two began production the following summer, at a cost of over US$20 million each. Three of the projects were based on books by E.B. White (The Trumpet of the Swan
The Trumpet of the Swan
The Trumpet of the Swan is a children's novel by E.B. White published in 1970. It tells the story of Louis, a Trumpeter Swan born without a voice and trying to overcome it by learning to play a trumpet, always trying to impress a beautiful pen named Serena.-Plot summary:In Canada in the spring of...
), Clive Barker
Clive Barker
Clive Barker is an English author, film director and visual artist best known for his work in both fantasy and horror fiction. Barker came to prominence in the mid-1980s with a series of short stories which established him as a leading young horror writer...
(The Thief of Always
The Thief of Always
The Thief of Always is a novel by Clive Barker that was published in 1992.It is a fable written for children, but is intended for adults as well. The book contains many black and white drawings by the author, and the cover illustrated by the author...
) and Graeme Base
Graeme Base
Graeme Rowland Base is an Australian author and artist of picture books. He is perhaps best known for his second book, Animalia published in 1986, and third book The Eleventh Hour which was released in 1989....
(The Sign of the Seahorse
The Sign of the Seahorse
The Sign of the Seahorse is an illustrated children's book by Graeme Base. It was published in 1992. Originally designed by Base to become a narrated concert, the story is composed of two acts, each owning the traditional components of high drama and romance, a hero and villain, and an eventual...
); an original production called Mask Vision was also in the works.
However, none of those films ever made it past the finishing stage. During the 1990s, another set of features from Nelvana was distributed by different companies. A 1993
1993 in film
The year 1993 in film involved many significant films, including the blockbuster hits Jurassic Park, The Fugitive and The Firm. -Events:...
live-action thriller called Malice
Malice (film)
Malice is a 1993 American thriller film directed by Harold Becker. The screenplay by Aaron Sorkin and Scott Frank is based on a story by Jonas McCord.-Plot:...
came out under the Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
banner; 1997
1997 in film
-Events:* The original Star Wars trilogy's Special Editions are released.* Production begins on Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.* Titanic becomes the first film to gross US$1,000,000,000 at the box office making it the highest grossing film in history until Avatar broke the record in 2010.*...
saw the studio's retelling of Pippi Longstocking
Pippi Longstocking (1997 film)
Pippi Longstocking is a 1997 animated musical film from AB Svensk Filmindustri and Nelvana, based on the eponymous children's books by Astrid Lindgren. It was distributed theatrically by Legacy Releasing and on DVD by Warner Bros., and was served as a pilot of a spin-off television series on HBO in...
from Legacy Releasing
Legacy Releasing
Legacy Releasing was an independent film distribution company based in California. It was founded in 1996 by Mark Borde, a veteran in the motion picture industry....
; and Babar: King of the Elephants
Babar: King of the Elephants
Babar: King of the Elephants is a 1998 animated film made by Nelvana Limited and released in theaters in Canada by Alliance Communications and in the U.S. straight to video by New Line Home Video. Based on Jean de Brunhoff's book series, it is the second Babar movie, following 1989's Babar: The...
was released in Canada by Alliance Atlantis
Alliance Atlantis
Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. was a Toronto-based media company that operated primarily as a specialty service operator in Canada. Alliance Atlantis also had offices in Halifax, Los Angeles, London, Dublin, Madrid, Barcelona, Shannon and Sydney.Alliance Atlantis was acquired by Canwest...
in 1999. Among them, only Malice would go on to achieve box-office success in North America. Its US$46 million gross was the highest ever attained by a Nelvana production, doubling what the first Care Bears Movie received during its original release.
In September 1996, Golden Books Family Entertainment was in talks to acquire the company for US$102 million,
just after having purchased the family video library of Broadway Video Entertainment, a subsidiary of Broadway Video
Broadway Video
Broadway Video is a media production and distribution company located within the Brill Building on Broadway, New York, United States. Founded in 1979 as a production house tasked with post-production work on Saturday Night Live, Broadway Video has since become one of the largest independent...
.
Many of the company's staff members, including Smith and Loubert, expressed interest in the proposition. But Hirsh went up against it, arguing with then COO
Chief operating officer
A Chief Operating Officer or Director of Operations can be one of the highest-ranking executives in an organization and comprises part of the "C-Suite"...
Eleanor Olmsted about its possible effects on his institution. Two months later Golden Books withdrew from the deal stating that they would concentrate more on children's entertainment.
In 1997, a small computer animation
Computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
company called Windlight Studios
Windlight Studios
Windlight Studios was a computer animation and visual effects company established in 1993, and based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was folded into the holdings of Canada's Nelvana studio in 1997. Its co-founder, Scott Dyer, became Nelvana's senior vice president in charge of production in late...
was absorbed into Nelvana's assets. Its co-founder, Scott Dyer, became Nelvana's senior vice president in charge of production in late 2001.
In late 1997, Nelvana and Britain's Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
began work on Bob and Margaret
Bob and Margaret
Bob and Margaret was a Canadian/UK animated television series that was also shown in the United States and all over the world. The series was produced by Nelvana, a Toronto animation studio, and created by Canadian David Fine and Brit Alison Snowden...
, the company's first animated franchise for adults since Rock & Rule. It was based on the National Film Board of Canada
National Film Board of Canada
The National Film Board of Canada is Canada's twelve-time Academy Award-winning public film producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary, animation, alternative drama and digital media productions...
's Bob's Birthday
Bob's Birthday
Bob's Birthday is a 1993 animated short by Alison Snowden and David Fine, winner of the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film at the 67th Academy Awards. The 12 minute 18 second film features a humorous look a wife's plans to throw a surprise birthday party for her husband on his 40th...
, an Academy Award winner for Best Short
Academy Award for Animated Short Film
The Academy Award for Animated Short Film is an award which has been given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as part of the Academy Awards every year since the 5th Academy Awards, covering the year 1931-32, to the present....
, which Channel 4 also produced.
In August 1998, Nelvana acquired Kids Can Press
Kids Can Press
Kids Can Press is Canada's largest children’s book publisher, started in 1973 by a small group of women in Toronto who wanted to produce books for Canadian children....
, publishers of the Franklin
Franklin the Turtle (books)
-Books:*Franklin in the Dark, illustrated by Brenda Clark, Kids Can Press , 1986.*Hurry Up, Franklin, illustrated by Brenda Clark, Kids Can Press , 1989, Scholastic , 1990....
and Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose is a Canadian children's live-action and animated series which was aired on TVOntario in Canada and PBS in the United States as part of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch until it was cancelled....
children's books upon which the Franklin (TV series)
Franklin (TV series)
Franklin is a Canadian animated television series, based on the Franklin the Turtle books by Brenda Clark and Paulette Bourgeois. The television series was named after its main character, Franklin the Turtle...
and Elliot Moose (TV series)
Elliot Moose (TV series)
Elliot Moose is a Canadian children's live-action and animated series which was aired on TVOntario in Canada and PBS in the United States as part of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch until it was cancelled....
were based. This turned them into an "integrated company" in which Kids Can's subsequent publications would begin with Nelvana's franchising of those works.
The company's first two computer-animated shows, Donkey Kong Country
Donkey Kong Country (TV series)
Donkey Kong Country is a French/Canadian computer-generated animated television series. It is based on the Nintendo franchise Donkey Kong as portrayed in the Donkey Kong Country video game series by Rare. Created by France 2 and Nelvana, it was originally titled La Planète de Donkey Kong...
and Rolie Polie Olie
Rolie Polie Olie
Rolie Polie Olie is a children's television series produced by Nelvana and created by William Joyce. The show centers on a little boy who is composed of several spheres and other three-dimensional geometric shapes...
(with Paris-based Sparx*) premiered on American TV in 1998. That same year, it held a monopoly on CBS' Saturday-morning schedule; the deal included Franklin, Flying Rhino Junior High
Flying Rhino Junior High
Flying Rhino Junior High is a Canadian animated television series produced by Nelvana Limited and Scottish Television. It originally aired from October 3, 1998 to January 22, 2000 on the CBS Kids Show. Reruns used to be shown on STV in Scotland, and in 2011 reruns returned to YTV after a four...
, Anatole
Anatole (TV series)
Anatole is an animated children's television series based on the Anatole book series by Eve Titus. The series tells the story of Anatole, a mouse who lives in Paris. He works as a night watchman in a cheese factory. He has a wife, Doucette and a family of six little mice. It originally aired in...
, Birdz
Birdz
Birdz is an animated television series produced by Canada's Nelvana studio, and Scottish Television . The show was first broadcast in 1998 on CBS...
and Mythic Warriors
Mythic Warriors
Mythic Warriors was a Canadian-produced animated television series that was a fixture of CBS' Saturday-morning cartoon lineup...
as part of the package. In January 1999, Franklin (on the CBS line-up) and Rupert (a part of Nick Jr.
Nick Jr.
Nick Jr. was a programming block on the Nickelodeon television channel, seen on Nickelodeon weekday mornings. It was aimed at a preschool-age audience ages 6 and under. On September 28, 2009, Nick Jr. became its own official channel, replacing Noggin...
since 1995) swapped networks.
In August 1999, Nelvana made a US$40 million deal with the Public Broadcasting Service
Public Broadcasting Service
The Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
to produce its first ever Saturday morning shows, all of them based on popular children's books. The six series—Timothy Goes to School
Timothy Goes to School
Timothy Goes to School is a cartoon series based on the books by Rosemary Wells.It features a young raccoon, Timothy, who attends a fictional primary school kindergarten. The series aired on PBS Kids as part of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch from 2000 until 2004. It was later broadcast on Discovery...
, Seven Little Monsters
Seven Little Monsters
Seven Little Monsters is a children's television program produced by Suzhou Hong Yang Cartoon Co. Ltd. for Nelvana, and is about a family of seven monsters and their mother. The series is created by Maurice Sendak, and directed by Neil Affleck, Lynn Reist, and Glen Sylvester. Each monster is named...
, Corduroy
Corduroy (TV series)
Corduroy is a 1997 animated TV series based on Don Freeman's 1968 children's book Corduroy. The show was shown on PBS Kids' Bookworm Bunch until it was cancelled along with Elliot Moose. The show was set in New York City. It was directed by Louis Piche and Larry Jacobs...
, Marvin the Tap-Dancing Horse
Marvin the Tap-Dancing Horse
Marvin The Tap-Dancing Horse is a Canadian animated television show produced by Nelvana. It tells the stories of a young horse named Marvin who is part of a carnival. Among the Executive Producers are Michael Paraskevas and Betty Paraskevas, creators of Maggie and the Ferocious Beast who also...
, George Shrinks
George Shrinks
George Shrinks is a Canadian animated television series. It is based on the children's book by William Joyce, produced in China by Jade Animation and in Canada by Nelvana, in association with Public Broadcasting Service . It tells the story of a ten-year-old boy named George who, for unexplained...
and Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose
Elliot Moose is a Canadian children's live-action and animated series which was aired on TVOntario in Canada and PBS in the United States as part of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch until it was cancelled....
—were launched the following September as part of the Bookworm Bunch line-up. That same month, it acquired the North American rights to its first anime property, Clamp
Clamp (manga artists)
, is an all-female Japanese manga artist group that formed in the mid 1980s. Many of the group's manga series are often adapted into anime after release. It consists of their leader , who provides much of the storyline and screenplay for all their works and adaptations of those works respectively ,...
's Cardcaptor Sakura
Cardcaptor Sakura
, abbreviated as CCS and also known as Cardcaptors, is a Japanese shōjo manga series written and illustrated by the manga artist group Clamp. The manga was originally serialized monthly in Nakayoshi from the May 1996 until the June 2000 issue, and later published in 12 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha...
(in Korea Cardcaptor Cherry
Cardcaptor Sakura
, abbreviated as CCS and also known as Cardcaptors, is a Japanese shōjo manga series written and illustrated by the manga artist group Clamp. The manga was originally serialized monthly in Nakayoshi from the May 1996 until the June 2000 issue, and later published in 12 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha...
). The resulting English dub was broadcast on in the U.S. market, Teletoon
Télétoon (Canadian TV channel)
Télétoon is a Canadian French language Category A specialty channel that specializes in animation programming. Télétoon is owned by Teletoon Canada Inc; a 50/50 partnership between Astral Media and Corus Entertainment...
in Canada, ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
in the UK and SBS in Korea.
2000s
In April 2000, Nelvana announced its purchase of the Palo AltoPalo Alto, California
Palo Alto is a California charter city located in the northwest corner of Santa Clara County, in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, United States. The city shares its borders with East Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Stanford, Portola Valley, and Menlo Park. It is...
-based children's book publisher Klutz in a US$74 million deal—at that time, its largest buyout ever— and integrated it into its Branded Consumer Products division. The company, founded in 1977, was best known for its children's series, Books Plus. Nelvana's separate subsidiary, Kids Can, started taking advantage of the acquisition by making its output available through Klutz merchandise.
On September 29, 2000, after almost two weeks of negotiation, Corus Entertainment acquired Nelvana's operations for C$554 million.
A year after Corus' purchase, co-founders and co-CEOs
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
Loubert and Smith left the studio. Loubert voluntarily left in November after Corus eliminated 50 positions from the staff, saying "The time has come that Corus will stop acquiring for a while and start operating. John Cassaday has made that clear, but this makes my job less rather than more".
In 2001, the studio began to work on computer-animated feature films aimed at young audiences. So far, only one of them
Rescue Heroes: The Movie
Rescue Heroes: The Movie is a Canadian 2003 CGI family film from Artisan Entertainment, based on the Rescue Heroes TV series.-Plot:A series of mysterious lightning storms are wreaking havoc worldwide as they spiral through the atmosphere toward Greenland. Once they collide, they will create one...
, based on the Rescue Heroes
Rescue Heroes
Rescue Heroes is a line of toys from Fisher-Price that was introduced in 1997. Rescue Heroes depicts various rescue personnel and their equipment. In 1999, an animated television series titled Rescue Heroes was released and was based on the figurines...
Committed
Committed
Committed may refer to:* Committed , a film starring Heather Graham and Luke Wilson* Committed , a comic strip by Michael Fry** Committed , an animated television series based on the strip...
toy line and TV show, has seen the light of day in U.S. cinemas. The rest of them, based on Rolie Polie Olie and the Care Bears, have been released directly to DVD
Direct-to-video
Direct-to-video is a term used to describe a film that has been released to the public on home video formats without being released in film theaters or broadcast on television...
.
In 2001, Nelvana acquired the rights to the English-language version of yet another anime series, Medabots. The following January, Beyblade (in association with Hasbro
Hasbro
Hasbro is a multinational toy and boardgame company from the United States of America. It is one of the largest toy makers in the world. The corporate headquarters is located in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, United States...
and Mitsubishi
Mitsubishi
The Mitsubishi Group , Mitsubishi Group of Companies, or Mitsubishi Companies is a Japanese multinational conglomerate company that consists of a range of autonomous businesses which share the Mitsubishi brand, trademark and legacy...
) became its third such property.
In October 2002, Corus announced Hirsh's resignation; the following month, Paul Robertson
Paul Robertson
Paul W. Robertson is a Canadian businessperson, media executive and producer known for his work in animated television and broadcasting. He is currently the Group Vice President, Broadcasting of Shaw Communications and the President of Shaw Media....
, former president of Corus Television and head of YTV, became leader of the studio's senior management. With Hirsh's departure, Corus announced a C$200 million writedown for the company; by next August, it planned to reduce the staff down to 200. Hirsh has also taken an advisory role in the studio.
The following September, Corus launched their home entertainment division. Texas-based FUNimation, along with British company Maverick, has distributed titles from the studio with this label, including Redwall
Redwall (TV series)
Redwall is a television series made by Canada-based Nelvana and France-based Alphanim and is based on the Redwall novels by Brian Jacques. The series currently spans three seasons, the first based on the first book Redwall, the second on Mattimeo and the third on Martin the Warrior...
, Pecola
Pecola
Pecola is a Japanese 3-D Anime series that was computer-generated in Canada, with cube-shaped anthropomorphic animals in a place called Cube Town. It is based on a series of children's picture books by Naomi Iwata. The show stars Pecola, a curious and hyperactive penguin that tries to help the...
, Tales from the Cryptkeeper
Tales from the Cryptkeeper
Tales from the Cryptkeeper is an animated series aimed at children made byNelvana Limited, PeaceArch Entertainment, kaBOOM! Entertainment and Warner Bros. Television Animation. It was shown on TVO and ABC,and is still shown near Halloween on Teletoon. It was based on the live-action television...
, Timothy Goes to School and the Disney Channel TV special The Santa Claus Brothers. Nelvana's newer titles have been distributed by MGM, Lionsgate
Lions Gate Entertainment
Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation is a North American entertainment company. The company was formed in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1997, and is headquartered in Santa Monica, California...
and ADV Films, which have no involvement with the label. Since 2007, Shout! Factory
Shout! Factory
Shout! Factory is an entertainment company founded in 2003 that was started by Richard Foos , Bob Emmer and Garson Foos initially as a specialty music label...
releases Nelvana's shows on DVD.
In May 2006, Nelvana joined forces with ion Media Networks
ION Media Networks
ION Media Networks is an American television broadcasting company that owns and operates over 60 television stations in most major American markets. It is now a privately owned company.-History:...
(owners of TV network ion), NBC Universal
NBC Universal
NBCUniversal Media, LLC is a media and entertainment company engaged in the production and marketing of entertainment, news, and information products and services to a global customer base...
and Scholastic Books
Scholastic Press
Scholastic is a global book publishing company known for publishing educational materials for schools, teachers, and parents, and selling and distributing them by mail order and via book clubs and book fairs. It also has the exclusive United States' publishing rights to the Harry Potter book...
, along with Classic Media
Classic Media
Classic Media, LLC, is an American production company and distributor of family programming. It was founded in 2000 by former Marvel Entertainment CEO Eric Ellenbogen and former Broadway Video executive John Engelman in hopes of acquiring mismanaged classic properties and giving exposure to...
and its Big Idea
Big Idea
Big Idea may refer to:* Big Idea Entertainment, an American Christian computer animation production company best known for "Veggie Tales" videos.* The Big Idea, a Scottish museum* The Big Idea , a 1917 short comedy film...
Productions unit, to launch qubo
Qubo
Qubo is a multi-platform children's television specialty channel endeavor operated as a joint venture between ION Media Networks, NBCUniversal, Nelvana, Scholastic Corporation, and Classic Media...
, a new children's entertainment endeavour spread across all medium platforms, including video-on-demand on digital cable. The new project will feature new and library programming from the partners, each one producing a new show every year. The NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
network, along with Spanish-speaking sister station Telemundo
Telemundo
Telemundo is an American television network that broadcasts in Spanish. The network is the second-largest Spanish-language content producer in the world, and the second-largest Spanish-language network in the United States, behind Univision....
, first aired the block on September 9; ion began carrying it six days later.
In September 2006, Nelvana was integrated into Corus' children's television division. A spin-off unit, Nelvana Enterprises, was created in the process; it will focus on international distribution of the company's shows. Scott Dyer, the studio's executive vice president of production and development, became the overseer of the division, which includes Treehouse TV
Treehouse TV
Treehouse TV is a Canadian English language cable television specialty channel with programming targeted towards preschoolers that was launched on October 17, 1997. Its name comes from YTV's old children's programming block, The Treehouse...
, Discovery Kids Canada, and YTV. Doug Murphy, another former EVP at Nelvana, became president of the new distribution unit.
In 2007, Nelvana acquired the rights to its fourth anime series, Bakugan Battle Brawlers
Bakugan Battle Brawlers
is a Japanese action adventure anime television series produced by TMS Entertainment and Japan Vistec under the direction of Mitsuo Hashimoto. The story centers on the lives of creatures called Bakugan and the battle brawlers who possess them...
. The series was aired on Teletoon
Télétoon (Canadian TV channel)
Télétoon is a Canadian French language Category A specialty channel that specializes in animation programming. Télétoon is owned by Teletoon Canada Inc; a 50/50 partnership between Astral Media and Corus Entertainment...
and became a quick success. In 2008, merchandising rights were sold by Nelvana to Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network is a name of television channels worldwide created by Turner Broadcasting which used to primarily show animated programming. The channel began broadcasting on October 1, 1992 in the United States....
in the US, and the series began airing on CN in February 2008.
Franchises
Many of Nelvana's TV shows are based on properties from other companies, most of which started in other forms of media. A great deal of them are based on children's literatureChildren's literature
Children's literature is for readers and listeners up to about age twelve; it is often defined in four different ways: books written by children, books written for children, books chosen by children, or books chosen for children. It is often illustrated. The term is used in senses which sometimes...
and comic books
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
; examples include Anatole
Anatole (TV series)
Anatole is an animated children's television series based on the Anatole book series by Eve Titus. The series tells the story of Anatole, a mouse who lives in Paris. He works as a night watchman in a cheese factory. He has a wife, Doucette and a family of six little mice. It originally aired in...
, Babar, The Berenstain Bears, Franklin, Jane and the Dragon, Little Bear, The Magic School Bus, Pippi Longstocking
Pippi Longstocking
Pippi Longstocking is a fictional character in a series of children's books by Swedish author Astrid Lindgren, and adapted into multiple films and television series...
, Redwall
Redwall (TV series)
Redwall is a television series made by Canada-based Nelvana and France-based Alphanim and is based on the Redwall novels by Brian Jacques. The series currently spans three seasons, the first based on the first book Redwall, the second on Mattimeo and the third on Martin the Warrior...
, Rupert, Tintin, Wayside School and the shows of the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch
PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch
PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch was a three-hour block of shows on PBS, produced by Canada's Nelvana animation studio.The block was typically shown on Saturday or Sunday mornings, depending on local station preference and scheduling. The various shows in Bookworm Bunch are based on then-popular children's...
block
Block programming
Block programming or television block is a strategy of broadcast programming and radio programmers. Block programming occurs when the television network schedules similar television programs back-to-back. The concept is to provide similar programming to keep the viewers. Radio stations use it...
.
Nelvana has also had considerable success with animated fare based on toys; American Greetings' Care Bears has been the most familiar example of this. Also, there have been series and specials based on Strawberry Shortcake (also from American Greetings), Madballs and My Pet Monster (from AmToy) and Rescue Heroes (from Fisher-Price
Fisher-Price
Fisher-Price is a company that produces toys for infants and children, headquartered in East Aurora, New York. Fisher-Price has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Mattel since 1993.-History:...
).
It has also translated big-screen franchises to televised properties, such as Star Wars (Droids and Ewoks), Beetlejuice, An American Tail
An American Tail
An American Tail is a 1986 American animated adventure film directed by Don Bluth and produced by Sullivan Bluth Studios and Amblin Entertainment. The film tells the story of Fievel Mouskewitz and his family as they immigrate from Russia to America for freedom. However, Fievel gets lost and must...
(Fievel's American Tails
Fievel's American Tails
Fievel's American Tails is an American/Canadian animated television series, produced by Steven Spielberg's Amblimation animation studio, Nelvana, and Universal Cartoon Studios. It aired for one season in 1992, and continued Fievel's adventures from the film An American Tail: Fievel Goes West...
), Free Willy
Free Willy
Free Willy is a 1993 family film directed by Simon Wincer, and released by Warner Bros. under its Family Entertainment label. The film stars Jason James Richter as a young boy who befriends an orca whale, named "Willy."...
and The Neverending Story
The Neverending Story
The Neverending Story is a German fantasy novel by Michael Ende, first published in 1979. The standard English translation, by Ralph Manheim, was first published in 1983...
. It has even ventured into the video game world with a show based on Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
's Donkey Kong in Donkey Kong Country
Donkey Kong Country (TV series)
Donkey Kong Country is a French/Canadian computer-generated animated television series. It is based on the Nintendo franchise Donkey Kong as portrayed in the Donkey Kong Country video game series by Rare. Created by France 2 and Nelvana, it was originally titled La Planète de Donkey Kong...
, as well as Kirby in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!
Kirby: Right Back at Ya!
Kirby: of the stars, known in Japan Kirby right back at ya!', is an anime series based on Nintendo's Kirby franchise. The series was produced by Warpstar Inc., a company formed between a joint investment between Nintendo and HAL Laboratory, Inc.The series, which takes place in a village called...
, which is also based on a Nintendo video game series
Kirby (series)
The series is a fantasy video game series developed by HAL Laboratory and Nintendo, and produced by Nintendo. The gameplay of a majority of the games in the series consists mainly of action, platform and puzzle-solving elements...
.
In the field of anime, the company holds the North American rights to Clamp/Kodansha
Kodansha
, the largest Japanese publisher, produces the manga magazines Nakayoshi, Afternoon, Evening, and Weekly Shonen Magazine, as well as more literary magazines such as Gunzō, Shūkan Gendai, and the Japanese dictionary Nihongo Daijiten. The company has its headquarters in Bunkyō, Tokyo...
's Cardcaptor Sakura series. Also, it holds international licensing rights to Beyblade and Medabots.
As with many other animation studios, Nelvana had it's fair share of established original series and characters within it's roster. 6teen
6teen
6teen is a Canadian animated sitcom, which premiered in Canada in 2004 on Teletoon. In the USA, 6teen first premiered on Nickelodeon on December 18, 2005 and was removed from the schedule on May 13, 2006 before being removed completely in 2007 before the series' run could be completed. 6teen was...
, Clone High
Clone High
Clone High is a Canadian-American animated television series that aired for one season on MTV and Teletoon....
, Mission Hill
Mission Hill
Mission Hill is an American animated television series that first aired on The WB in 1999. Although 18 episodes were planned, only 13 episodes were produced. The show was put on hiatus by the WB Network after two episodes due to poor ratings. It returned to the WB in the summer of 2000 but was...
, and Eek! The Cat
Eek! The Cat
Eek! The Cat is an American and Canadian animated series, created by Savage Steve Holland and Bill Kopp and produced by Fox Kids and Savage Studios with animation by Nelvana, that ran from September 11, 1992, to August 1, 1997.-Premise:Eek! the Cat is about a purple cat named Eek whose motto is...
among others, are some of Nelvana's cartoon series that were not based on any other source material.
, the studio has made close to 25 feature films for theatrical, home entertainment, and television distribution. Well-known releases include Rock & Rule, the first five Care Bears movies, two Babar films and 1997's Pippi Longstocking.
Live-action has been a part of its mainstay from its early years. The company has had Burglar and Malice as its own feature projects in that area, and has contributed as such to The Star Wars Holiday Special and ¡Three Amigos!. On television, Nelvana has made live-action shows such as The Edison Twins, T and T, :20 Minute Workout, Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys.
Around the world
In the United States, Nelvana's series have been broadcast on the ABC, CBS, FOX, PBS, NBC and (the now defunct) networks (now part of The CW), and cable stations including NickelodeonNickelodeon (TV channel)
Nickelodeon, often simply called Nick and originally named Pinwheel, is an American children's channel owned by MTV Networks, a subsidiary of Viacom International. The channel is primarily aimed at children ages 7–17, with the exception of their weekday morning program block aimed at preschoolers...
, Disney Channel, Showtime, Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network is a name of television channels worldwide created by Turner Broadcasting which used to primarily show animated programming. The channel began broadcasting on October 1, 1992 in the United States....
, Adult Swim
Adult Swim
Adult Swim is an adult-oriented Cable network that shares channel space with Cartoon Network from 9:00 pm until 6:00 am ET/PT in the United States, and broadcasts in countries such as Australia and New Zealand...
, and ABC (FOX) Family
ABC Family
ABC Family, stylized as abc family, is an American television network, owned by ABC Family Worldwide Inc., a subsidiary of the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company...
and MTV. In Canada, they can be seen on Teletoon
Télétoon (Canadian TV channel)
Télétoon is a Canadian French language Category A specialty channel that specializes in animation programming. Télétoon is owned by Teletoon Canada Inc; a 50/50 partnership between Astral Media and Corus Entertainment...
, YTV, CBC Television
CBC Television
CBC Television is a Canadian television network owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the national public broadcaster.Although the CBC is supported by public funding, the television network supplements this funding with commercial advertising revenue, in contrast to CBC Radio which are...
, the Family Channel and Treehouse TV
Treehouse TV
Treehouse TV is a Canadian English language cable television specialty channel with programming targeted towards preschoolers that was launched on October 17, 1997. Its name comes from YTV's old children's programming block, The Treehouse...
. Elsewhere, they have aired on the Boomerang
Boomerang (TV channel)
Boomerang is a 24-hour American cable television channel owned by Turner Broadcasting System, a division of Time Warner. Boomerang specializes in reruns of animated programming from Time Warner's extensive archives, including pre-1986 MGM, Hanna-Barbera, Cartoon Network, DePatie-Freleng Enterprises...
channel (in Latin America); on the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
, Sky One
Sky One
Sky1 is the flagship BSkyB entertainment channel available in the United Kingdom and Ireland.The channel first launched on 26 April 1982 as Satellite Television, and is the fourth-oldest TV channel in the United Kingdom, behind BBC One , ITV and BBC Two...
, Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, TCC
The Children's Channel
The Children's Channel, also known as TCC, was a television station in the United Kingdom, Benelux and Scandinavia, which was owned by Flextech . It began broadcasting on 1 September 1984, and was closed on 3 April 1998...
, Five, Disney Channel (UK), Nick Jr.
Nick Jr. (UK)
Nick Jr. is a television channel in the United Kingdom and Ireland operated by Nickelodeon UK. The channel is aimed at pre-school children.-History:...
, POP, Tiny Pop
Tiny Pop
Tiny Pop is a free-to-air television channel in the UK. It is owned by CSC Media Group, and launched on 24 July 2004, and broadcasts cartoons and pop music videos for pre-schoolers.Its sister channel is Pop which was launched on 29 May 2003...
, Pop Girl
Pop Girl
Pop Girl is a free-to-air television channel owned by CSC Media Group, showing cartoons, live action and pop music videos for girls aged 6 to 16...
, Kix!, Nicktoons (UK) and CITV
CITV
CITV is a British television channel from ITV Digital Channels Ltd, a division of ITV plc. It broadcasts content from the CITV archive, as well as commissions and acquisitions. CITV itself is the programming block on the main ITV Network .The CITV channel broadcasts from 06:00 to 18:00...
, KidsCo
KidsCo
KidsCo is an international children's entertainment brand founded by Canadian broadcaster Corus Entertainment's Nelvana Enterprises, American-based producer DIC Entertainment, and European broadcaster Sparrowhawk Media Group in April 2007. By the end of 2007, Sparrowhawk was purchased by media...
(in the United Kingdom); on RTÉ (in the Republic of Ireland); on France 2
France 2
France 2 is a French public national television channel. It is part of the state-owned France Télévisions group, along with France 3, France 4, France 5 and France Ô...
and France 3
France 3
France 3 is the second largest French public television channel and part of the France Télévisions group, which also includes France 2, France 4, France 5, and France Ô....
; and on ABC Television
ABC Television
ABC Television is a service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation launched in 1956. As a public broadcasting broadcaster, the ABC provides four non-commercial channels within Australia, and a partially advertising-funded satellite channel overseas....
, KidsCo
KidsCo
KidsCo is an international children's entertainment brand founded by Canadian broadcaster Corus Entertainment's Nelvana Enterprises, American-based producer DIC Entertainment, and European broadcaster Sparrowhawk Media Group in April 2007. By the end of 2007, Sparrowhawk was purchased by media...
(in Australia). Nelvana's franchises have been shown on over 360 television stations in more 180 countries, in approximately 50 languages.
The Fairly OddParents
The Fairly OddParents
The Fairly OddParents is an American-Canadian animated television series created by Butch Hartman about the adventures of Timmy Turner, who is granted fairy godparents named Cosmo and Wanda. The series started out as cartoon segments that ran from September 4, 1998 to March 23, 2001 on Oh Yeah!...
, created by animator Butch Hartman
Butch Hartman
Elmer Earl "Butch" Hartman IV is an American animator, executive producer, animation director, storyboard artist, voice actor, occasional singer, producer, and creator of the animated series The Fairly OddParents, Danny Phantom and T.U.F.F. Puppy.-Childhood:Hartman was born in Highland Park,...
, is distributed by Nelvana outside the United States. This show has been in the top of the ratings for Nickelodeon, YTV and the BBC, and has also been successful among viewers in several European markets, Latin America and Australia, Canada.
Notable personnel
Apart from its trio of founders, there have been several key personnel from Nelvana's past and present, a great deal of whom have left the company. Among the better-known people to work in the studio are Bill Perkins, John de Klein, Wayne GilbertWayne Gilbert
Wayne Gilbert is a Canadian working in Vancouver, British Columbia, now Head of Animation at VanArts after three and half years as Senior Animation Director for EA Blackbox where he directed animation and cinematics for the ground breaking video games 'skate and skate2'. He is also a Mentor for...
, John Halfpenny
John Halfpenny
John Francis Halfpenny AM was an Australian unionist.-Biography:Halfpenny was born in Donald in Victoria and joined the Communist Party, travelling to Moscow in 1960 as head of the Eureka Youth League. A metal worker, he became an organiser for the Amalgamated Engineering Union in 1969 and was...
, Peter Hudecki
Peter Hudecki
Peter Hudecki is an animator. He directed the Roseanne Barr animated series Little Rosie, and was Chief Modelmaker for Gemini and Emmy award winning series Rolie Polie Olie.-Biography:...
, Vincenzo Natali
Vincenzo Natali
Vincenzo Natali is an American-Canadian film director and screenwriter, best known for writing and directing science fiction films such as Cube, Nothing and Splice.-Early life:...
, Arna Selznick
Arna Selznick
Arna Selznick is a Canadian Director and Artist, known for directing Nelvana's 1985 animated film The Care Bears Movie. She is one of only four women to have directed a full length animated feature...
, Laura Shepherd, Susan Snooks and John van Bruggen. Voice & acting work from the company's past and present includes, but is not limited to, Charlie Adler, Kathleen Barr
Kathleen Barr
Kathleen Barr is a Canadian voice actress. She is also the sister of Professor Mark Lyle Barr at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.-Filmography:...
, Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Barr
Roseanne Cherrie Barr is an American actress, comedian, writer, television producer and director. Barr began her career in stand-up comedy at clubs before gaining fame for her role in the sitcom Roseanne. The show was a hit and lasted nine seasons, from 1988 to 1997...
, Melleny Brown
Melleny Brown
Born in Toronto, Canada, Melleny Brown is a singer, songwriter, artist, music producer, video producer and voice actress....
, Arthur Burghardt
Arthur Burghardt
Arthur Burghardt is an American actor known for portraying Dr. Jack Scott on the soap opera One Life to Live.His first movie appearance was as the Great Ahmed Kahn in Network . A prolific voice actor during the 1980s, his most celebrated roles were Destro in the animated series G.I. Joe and...
, Jackie Burroughs
Jackie Burroughs
Jacqueline "Jackie" Burroughs was an English-born Canadian actress.-Life and career:Born in Lancashire, England, Burroughs acted in live theatre at Ontario's Stratford Festival...
, Len Carlson
Len Carlson
Len Carlson was a Canadian voice actor on many animated television series from the 1960s onward, an occasional live-action TV actor, and a Kraft Canada TV pitchman during the 1970s and 1980s...
, Dan Castellaneta
Dan Castellaneta
Daniel Louis "Dan" Castellaneta is an American actor, voice actor, comedian, singer and screenwriter. Noted for his long-running role as Homer Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons, he voices many other characters on The Simpsons, including Abraham "Grampa" Simpson, Barney Gumble,...
, Michael Cera
Michael Cera
Michael Austin Cera is a Canadian actor best known for his roles in Arrested Development, Youth in Revolt, Superbad, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Juno. Cera received the 2008 Canadian Comedy Award for best male performance for his work in Superbad.-Early...
, Cam Clarke
Cam Clarke
Cameron Arthur "Cam" Clarke is a prolific American voice actor and singer, well known for his work in animation and video games. Clarke is well known for providing the voices of Leonardo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Shotaro Kaneda in the 1989 original English-dub of Akira. He often voices...
, Ted Cole
Ted Cole
- Anime Roles :* Beyblade - Lee, Spencer, Kane, Coach Barthez* Dokkoida!? - Pierre the Slave* Death Note - Reiji Namikawa, Yukito Shiraba, John McEnroe/Larry Conners, Jack Neylon/Kal Snydar* Dragon Ball - Yamcha...
, Steve Coogan
Steve Coogan
Stephen John "Steve" Coogan is a British comedian, actor, writer and producer. Born in Manchester, he began his career as a standup comedian and impressionist, working as a voice artist throughout the 1980s on satirical puppet show Spitting Image. In the early nineties, Coogan began creating...
, Alyson Court
Alyson Court
Alyson Stephanie Court is a Canadian actress who first appeared in the 1985 children's film Sesame Street Presents Follow That Bird, and played summer camper Dawn in the animated film Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation the following year...
, Amos Crawley, Jim Cummings
Jim Cummings
James Jonah "Jim" Cummings is an American voice actor who has appeared in almost 100 roles. He has appeared in classic animated movies such as Aladdin and The Lion King, as well as taking on roles in more current films, such as Bee Movie, Princess and the Frog, and Winnie the Pooh.-Personal...
, Anthony Daniels
Anthony Daniels
Anthony Daniels is an English actor. He is best known for his role as the droid C-3PO in the Star Wars series of films made between 1977 and 2005.-Early life:...
, Harry Dean Stanton
Harry Dean Stanton
Harry Dean Stanton is an American actor, musician, and singer. Stanton's career has spanned over fifty years, which has seen him star in such films as Paris, Texas, Kelly's Heroes, Dillinger, Alien, Repo Man, The Last Temptation of Christ, Wild at Heart, The Green Mile and The Pledge...
, Dom DeLuise
Dom DeLuise
Dominick "Dom" DeLuise was an American actor, comedian, film director, television producer, chef, and author. He was the husband of actress Carol Arthur from 1965 until his death and the father of: actor, director, pianist, and writer Peter DeLuise; actor David DeLuise; and actor Michael DeLuise...
, Brian Drummond
Brian Drummond
Brian Drummond is a Canadian actor. He also serves on the board of directors for the New Westminster-based Urban Academy along with his wife, Laura Drummond, also a voice artist. He and his wife serve as vice-president and president, respectively.- Career :Drummond was born in Salmon Arm, British...
, James Earl Jones
James Earl Jones
James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...
, Don Francks
Don Francks
Donald Harvey Francks or Iron Buffalo is a Canadian actor, vocalist and jazz musician.- Life and work :Francks was born in Vancouver, British Columbia. He is a drummer, poet, native nations champion, motorcyclist, author and peace activist...
, Corey Feldman
Corey Feldman
Corey Scott Feldman is an American film and television actor. He became known during the 1980s, with roles in the Hollywood films Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, The Goonies, Stand by Me, The Lost Boys, License to Drive, Dream a Little Dream, Gremlins and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles...
, Colin Fox
Colin Fox
Colin Fox is the national spokesperson of the Scottish Socialist Party, and a former member for Lothian in the Scottish Parliament...
, Brad Garrett
Brad Garrett
Bradley "Brad" Garrett is an American actor, voice actor, stand-up comedian, and professional poker player. Throughout he has appeared in numerous television and film roles....
, Brian George
Brian George
Brian George is a British-Israeli actor and voice actor for Indian accents, who typically plays guest roles for characters of South Asian descent. Perhaps his most famous role is as Pakistani restaurateur Babu Bhatt on Seinfeld.-Early life:...
, Whoopi Goldberg
Whoopi Goldberg
Whoopi Goldberg is an American comedian, actress, singer-songwriter, political activist, author and talk show host.Goldberg made her film debut in The Color Purple playing Celie, a mistreated black woman in the Deep South. She received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress and won...
, Bobcat Goldthwait
Bobcat Goldthwait
Robert Francis "Bobcat" Goldthwait is an American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and film and television director. He is commonly known for his energetic, ravenous stage personality, his dark, acerbic black comedy, and his gruff but high-pitched voice.- Early life :Goldthwait was born in Syracuse,...
, John Goodman
John Goodman
John Stephen Goodman is an American film, television, and stage actor. He is best known for his role as Dan Conner on the television series Roseanne for which he won a Best Actor Golden Globe Award in 1993, and for appearances in the films of the Coen brothers, with prominent roles in Raising...
, Graham Halley, Mark Hamill
Mark Hamill
Mark Richard Hamill is an American actor, voice artist, producer, director, and writer, best known for his role as Luke Skywalker in the original trilogy of Star Wars. More recently, he has received acclaim for his voice work, in such roles as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series, Firelord...
, Elizabeth Hanna
Elizabeth Hanna
Elizabeth Hanna is a Canadian film and television actress, most notable for her voice acting work in animated films. She later complemented her voice acting skills by becoming a Speech-Language Pathologist.-Early history:...
, Dan Hennessey
Dan Hennessey
Dan Hennessey is a Canadian voice actor who, early on in his career, performed with a children's comedy troupe,...
, Jim Henshaw
Jim Henshaw
Jim Henshaw is a professional actor, screenwriter and film and television producer.The first Actor graduate of the University of Saskatchewan, he began his professional career in 1971...
, Tony Jay
Tony Jay
Tony Jay was an English actor, voice actor and singer. A former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, he was known for his voice work in animation, film and computer games. Jay's distinctive baritone voice often landed him villainous roles...
, John Kassir
John Kassir
John Kassir is an American actor, voice artist, and comedian who is best known as the voice of the Crypt Keeper in HBO's, Tales from the Crypt franchise...
, Hadley Kay
Hadley Kay
Hadley Kay is a Canadian-born voice actor who appeared in the first two Care Bears movies: as the voice of magician Nicholas in The Care Bears Movie and as the villain Dark Heart in Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation. He also voiced P.C...
, David Kaye
David Kaye
David V. Hope , known professionally as David Kaye, is a Canadian American actor who is better recognized for his work as a voice actor...
, Keith Knight
Keith Knight (actor)
Keith Knight was a Canadian actor. He made his screen debut as Larry 'Fink' Finkelstein in the 1979 comedy Meatballs, voiced the White Rabbit in The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland, and voiced Pigface in the BBC drama Ace Lightning. He was also known for voicing Lowly Worm in The Busy World of...
, Bill Kopp
Bill Kopp
Bill Kopp is an American animator and film director who animated the Whammy on the 1980s game show Press Your Luck, and voiced the title character on Nelvana's Eek! The Cat and Kutter in The Terrible Thunderlizards, which he created with Savage Steve Holland...
, Nathan Lane
Nathan Lane
Nathan Lane is an American actor of stage and screen. He is best known for his roles as Mendy in The Lisbon Traviata, Albert in The Birdcage, Max Bialystock in the musical The Producers, Ernie Smuntz in MouseHunt, Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls, Pseudolus in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to...
, Martin Lavut
Martin Lavut
Martin Lavut is a Canadian voice actor who is best known for his contributions to early Nelvana productions, such as The Devil and Daniel Mouse and its spin-off, Rock & Rule. He studied acting at California’s Pasadena Playhouse, and New York’s American Theatre Wing...
, Julie Lemieux
Julie Lemieux
-Character voices:Julie Lemieux has provided the voice for characters such as Sammy Tsukino and Young Sapphire in Sailor Moon, Darien Shields in Sailor Moon R the Movie: Promise of the Rose, and Peruru in Sailor Moon Supers the Movie: Black Dream Hole. She has also played Funshine Bear Care Bears:...
, Christopher Lloyd
Christopher Lloyd
Christopher Allen Lloyd is an American actor. He is best known for playing Emmett Brown in the Back to the Future trilogy, Uncle Fester in The Addams Family and Addams Family Values, and Judge Doom in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He played Reverend Jim Ignatowski in the television series Taxi and more...
, Billie Mae Richards
Billie Mae Richards
Billie Mae Richards was a Canadian voice actress, who also appeared onstage and on television.-Career:...
, Danny Mann
Danny Mann
Daniel "Danny" Mann is an American voice actor, writer, singer, musician, and production manager. He is best known for his voice of Hector from Heathcliff and the Catillac Cats, Freeway, Cloudraker and Lightspeed in Transformers, Backwoods Beagle in DuckTales, Kaltag in Balto, Ferdinand from Babe,...
, Scott McCord
Scott McCord
William Scott McCord is a Canadian actor, voice actor, singer and bandleader for the soul/rock pop band . On television he is best known for playing Dan Kuso in Bakugan Battle Brawlers, Owen and Trent in Fresh Animation's Total Drama series.- Animation:* 6teen - Stone* Babar and the Adventures of...
, Colin Murdock
Colin Murdock (actor)
Not to be confused with Colin MurdochColin Murdock , is a voice actor who is often miscredited as Colin Murdoch.-Anime:* Cardcaptors - Spinner Sun* InuYasha - Ryokan, Sango's Father, Water God, Orochidayu* MegaMan: NT...
, Richard Newman
Richard Newman
Richard Newman is a voice actor with numerous voice roles in Transformers cartoons.-Career:Newman started his career in voice acting in Beast Wars voicing Rhinox and the Vok...
, Neil Ross
Neil Ross
Theodoric Neilson "Neil" Ross is an English voice actor and announcer, born in London, England and now resident and working in Los Angeles, in the United States. He has provided voices for in many American cartoons, particularly those based on Hasbro products and Marvel Comics, and numerous...
, Stephen Ouimette
Stephen Ouimette
Stephen Ouimette is a Canadian actor and director, born and raised in St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada, and a graduate of the University of Windsor...
, Gary Owens
Gary Owens
Gary Owens is an American disc jockey and voice actor. His polished baritone speaking voice generally offers deadpan recitations of total nonsense, which he frequently demonstrated as the announcer on Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In. Owens is equally proficient in straight or silly assignments and is...
, Ron Pardo
Ron Pardo
Ron Pardo is a Canadian actor, voice artist and impressionist, known for playing a wide variety of characters on the television show History Bites.-Life and Career:...
, Wayne Robson
Wayne Robson
Wayne Robson was a Canadian television, film and stage actor best known for playing the part of Mike Hamar, an ex-convict and sometime thief, on the Canadian sitcom The Red Green Show from 1993 to 2006, as well as in the 2002 film Duct Tape Forever.Robson was born in Vancouver, British Columbia...
, Susan Roman
Susan Roman
Susan Roman is a Canadian voice actress best known for voice acting the role of Lita/Sailor Jupiter in the North American DiC dub of the anime, Sailor Moon. She is one of the few voice actors to remain throughout the entire run of the series...
, Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award...
, Lia Sargent
Lia Sargent
Lia Sargent is an American voice actress. She is known for extensive anime and video game voice work and has also done ADR directing and script writing for Animaze.. iNC...
, John Stocker, Stuart Stone, Tara Strong
Tara Strong
Tara Lyn Strong is a Canadian actress, voice-over artist, singer, who is best known for her voice work in cartoons.-Early life and career:...
, Allen Stewart-Coates, Colin Mochrie
Colin Mochrie
Colin Andrew Mochrie is a Scottish Canadian actor and improvisational comedian, most famous for his appearances on the British and US versions of television improvisation show Whose Line Is It Anyway?.-Early life:...
, Cree Summer
Cree Summer
Cree Summer Francks , best known as Cree Summer, is a Canadian actress, musician and voice actress. She is perhaps best known for her role as college student Winifred "Freddie" Brooks on the NBC sitcom A Different World...
, Colin O'Meara
Colin O'Meara
Colin O'Meara is a voice actor who provided the voice of the Tintin character from The Adventures of Tintin television series. Other roles include Sailor Moon, Little Bear, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and one episode of Police Academy as well as voicing Wrench in the animated TV show Cadillacs and...
, Brent Titcomb
Brent Titcomb
Brent Arthur Titcomb is a Canadian actor and musician. He played the voice of Sleazy, Mok's sidekick, in 1983's Rock & Rule, and additional voices for the The Care Bears Movie in 1985. His son is singer Liam Titcomb...
, Louise Vallance
Louise Vallance
Stevie Vallance, born Stephanie Louise Vallance on September 8, 1958 and also known as Louise Vallance, is a Canadian television actor, voice actor, stage performer, voice director and singer...
, Frank Welker
Frank Welker
Franklin Wendell "Frank" Welker is an American actor who specializes in voice acting and has contributed character voices and other vocal effects to American television and motion pictures.-Acting career:...
, Chris Wiggins
Chris Wiggins
Chris Wiggins is an English actor.He started out as a banker in his home country before he began his acting career in Canada, where he moved in 1952....
and Harland Williams
Harland Williams
Harland Williams is a Canadian actor, comedian, author, artist, musician and radio personality.-Personal life:Harland Reesor Williams was born on November 14, 1962, in Toronto, Ontario, to Lorraine , a social worker, and John Reesor Williams, who worked as a member of the Ontario Provincial...
.
Eight former Nelvana employees, Roger Allers
Roger Allers
Roger Allers is an Oscar-nominated American film director, screenwriter, storyboard artist, animator and Tony-nominated playwright...
, Charles Bonifacio
Charles Bonifacio
Charles Bonifacio is a Canadian animator who worked on Nelvana productions such as Rock and Rule, Inspector Gadget, Star Wars: Ewoks and the first two Care Bears movies of the 1980s. He was director of animation on The Care Bears Movie and on Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation...
, David Brewster
David Brewster
Sir David Brewster KH PRSE FRS FSA FSSA MICE was a Scottish physicist, mathematician, astronomer, inventor, writer and university principal.-Early life:...
, Anne Marie Bardwell, Tom Sito
Tom Sito
Tom Sito is a well-known American animator, animation historian and teacher. He has been called a "key figure in the Disney Renaissance", and one of the One Hundred Most Important People in Animation.-Education:...
, Ralph Palmer, Mark Koetsier, Andrew Hickson, Dick Zondag and Ralph Zondag
Ralph Zondag
Ralph Zondag is an animation director of Russian origin. He is best known for directing We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story for Universal Pictures and Dinosaur for Disney...
, went on to become staff members at Walt Disney Feature Animation
Walt Disney Feature Animation
Walt Disney Animation Studios is an American animation studio headquartered in Burbank, California. The studio, founded in 1923 as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio by brothers Walt and Roy Disney, is the oldest subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company...
and DreamWorks
DreamWorks
DreamWorks Pictures, also known as DreamWorks, LLC, DreamWorks SKG, DreamWorks II Distribution Co., LLC, DreamWorks Studios or DW Studios, LLC, is an American film studio which develops, produces, and distributes films, video games and television programming...
in the 1980s ,1990s and 2000s. Allers, who worked on Aladdin, The Lion King
The Lion King
The Lion King is a 1994 American animated film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is the 32nd feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series...
and Hercules
Hercules (1997 film)
Hercules is a 1997 American animated film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The thirty-fifth animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, the film was directed by Ron Clements and John Musker...
. Lenora Hume
Lenora Hume
Lenora Hume is a Canadian animation crewmember who has worked for Nelvana, The Walt Disney Company and Hit Entertainment.- Career :Hume graduated from Toronto's Havergal College in 1970, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Waterloo four years later...
, from the company's early years, is the senior vice-president of DisneyToon Studios
DisneyToon Studios
DisneyToon Studios is an American animation studio owned by The Walt Disney Company, responsible for producing direct-to-video and occasional theatrical films for Walt Disney Studios....
.
Influence in popular culture
Nelvana had a planet named after it in the Star Wars series, on Cartoon Network's Expanded UniverseStar Wars Expanded Universe
The Star Wars Expanded Universe encompasses all of the officially licensed, fictional background of the Star Wars universe, outside of the six feature films produced by George Lucas. The expanded universe includes books, comic books, video games, spin-off films like Star Wars: The Clone Wars,...
series Clone Wars. During Chapters 23 to 25, Anakin Skywalker travels to a planet called "Nelvaan". Clone Wars also pays homage to the franchise's animation predecessors in the form of the planet's dog-like inhabitants, who resemble characters from Rock & Rule, the studio's first film.
The "Nelvana Independent Short Film Grand Prize", given out at the Ottawa International Animation Festival
Ottawa International Animation Festival
-History:In 1976, the Canadian Film Institute founded the biennial Ottawa International Animation Festival . First held August 10 to 15, 1976, the OIAF created a gathering place for North American animation professionals and enthusiasts to ponder the craft and business of animation...
since 2004, pays homage to the name of the company. So far, the recipients of this prize have been 2004's Ryan
Ryan (film)
Ryan is a 2004 animated documentary by Chris Landreth about the Canadian animator Ryan Larkin, who in later years lived on skid row in Montreal following a history of drug and alcohol abuse....
, the Chris Landreth
Chris Landreth
Chris Landreth is an American animator working in Canada, best known for his work on the 2004 film, Ryan. He has made many CGI animated films since the mid-90s, including The End, Bingo, The Listener, Caustic Sky: A Portrait of Regional Acid Deposition, and Data Driven The Story Of Franz...
biography about Canadian animator Ryan Larkin
Ryan Larkin
Ryan Larkin was a Canadian animator, artist, and sculptor who rose to fame with the psychedelic 1969 Oscar-nominated short Walking and the acclaimed Street Musique . He was the subject of the Oscar-winning film Ryan.-Home life and education:Ryan Larkin's father was an airline mechanic...
; 2005's Milch, from director Igor Kovalyov; and, in 2006, Joanna Quinn
Joanna Quinn
Joanna Quinn is an English film director and animator. She was born in Birmingham. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Famous Fred in 1998....
's Dreams and Desires: Family Ties.
Related topics
- Cinema of Canada
- History of Canadian film
- History of Canadian animationHistory of Canadian animationThe history of Canadian animation involves a considerable element of the realities of a country neighbouring the United States and the competition from Hollywood.-1910s-1950s:...
Related Canadian companies
- National Film Board of CanadaNational Film Board of CanadaThe National Film Board of Canada is Canada's twelve-time Academy Award-winning public film producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary, animation, alternative drama and digital media productions...
- Cookie Jar EntertainmentCookie Jar EntertainmentThe Cookie Jar Group is an American and Canadian producer of children’s entertainment, consumer products and educational materials...
(formerly Cinar) - CinéGroupeCinéGroupeCinéGroupe Corporation is a Canadian animation studio based in Montreal, Quebec. The company also has offices in nearby Toronto and in the U.S. city of Los Angeles...
- Atkinson Film-ArtsAtkinson Film-ArtsAtkinson Film-Arts was an animation studio based in Ottawa, Ontario, The company is best known for the first two Care Bears television specials, The Land Without Feelings and The Freeze Machine, and the four syndicated specials that inspired The Raccoons...
(defunct since 1989) - Studio B ProductionsStudio B ProductionsDHX Media Vancouver is a Canadian animation studio based in Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada.-Studio B Productions original shows:*The Amazing Adrenalini Brothers...
- C.O.R.E.C.O.R.E.C.O.R.E. Digital Pictures was a film and television computer animation special effects studio, which has branched out into fully animated television series and feature films. On March 15, 2010 the company announced it was suspending operations and shut down....