Cold Hard Flashback: Circus Peanut
Back in 2003, I produced a pilot at Warner Bros. titled Circus Peanut. It was Andy Suriano’s original concept, aimed at Cartoon Network. Matt Danner directed, Eric Pringle was Animation Director, while animation was handled by Brendan Burch, Greg Franklin, Dave Vamos and a number of other folks who soon after launched Six Point Harness. 
Suriano hand painted (it was actually sort of a marker wash process) each and every one of the 40 backgrounds, which were then scanned into Flash. On his blog, Andy recounts my reaction to his decision to go it alone.
As with so many pilots, testing success and a quality project don’t always equate to a season order. Politics, timing and just pure luck play huge roles in the outcome, and in this case the show never saw the light of day. You may recognize Dave Foley as the voice of Circus Peanut and if I remember correctly Tom Kenny handled the Rollo. Kim Olds, the lead development executive on the project, played the Sweet Tooth. Thanks again, Andy, for teaming up with us to bring your vision to life. Here’s the pilot episode Lunchtime For Leo.
Suriano remains a sought-after series creator, storyboard artist and character designer, but he also designed a popular comic book and recently found time to hang some art on the walls.
Note to the team at WB Animation – who else was on the crew? Help me fill this out….
October 3rd, 2008 at 9:06 am
I love the feel of this cartoon. This production schedule (noted on Andy’s blog) is typical of the production process some of the studios have come to expect because of the advantages of flash. My favorite part of this story was reading that Andy had to do all 40 backgrounds in one night…I’ve been there! But sometimes pressure like that forces us to come up with great, fun work like this.
October 3rd, 2008 at 9:56 am
Thanks for sharing. We’re all big fans of Andy’s work!
October 3rd, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Mike Jacobson, and Vinh Chung also worked on it. I’m drawing a blank on anyone else who contributed.
October 3rd, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Lois Lee did the inks!
October 5th, 2008 at 4:38 am
Very nice stuff.
The backgrounds were amazing! Too bad this isn’t on a network.
October 5th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Pretty good animation for the time I suppose.
October 5th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Wow! How cool. What a blast from the past…I’ve even stopped being relatively bitter about them passing on something that tested better than any show in their networks history (what, I still sound bitter?). It was SO MUCH fun working with you guys, I learned so much, as well. In thinking about other peeps, from my end, CHARLIE BEAN helped out w/the 1st storyboard and Chris Reccardi helped on the second. Paul Stec provided some framework with layouts. I’d love to work with you all again, how about mini Circus Peanut eps? I own the rights now! What do you say?
Thanks again for the props.
BTW, I’m wearing my PROPHET BUDDY TEE right now.
October 7th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Awesome, I love the style!! Would love to see more of these guys!
Ease up on the compliments Steve, anybody would think you were gushing