 |
Move over, Barney.
A Canadian dragon named Dudley is grazing on your turf, to the delight of
millions of young viewers. In Canada, The Adventures of Dudley the Dragon
airs on provincial educational television networks and YTV for a weekly
domestic audience of roughly a half a million. In the United States, the
half-hour show appears on more than 245 PBS stations, up from 120 a year
ago. And in the fall, the big green guy not only consolidated his success
with a number of merchandising spin-offs but also made his debut as a
six-story-tall float in the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New
York City. There is more than a little irony in the rivalry between two
fuzzy reptiles (in both cases, actors in pile costumes) who encourage
friendliness and sharing. But Dudley’s creators insist there is no
competition: Barney’s audience is between one and three years old, they say,
and Dudley’s viewers are between
three and seven.
A big part of
Dudley’s appeal is humor. While
many parents find Barney and friends cloying, the Canadian dragon’s likable
goofiness makes him a foil for the sly wit of other characters. “There’s
something in it for parents as well,” says Joanne Shoveller of London, Ont.,
the mother of a three-year-old daughter and six-year-old son. “There’s
actually a plot, along with some jokes and comments that adults can
appreciate.” Dudley spends each
show solving a problem — the consequences of breaking a promise, how to
handle a bully — assisted by assorted puppets and a quintet of children
under 12. “It’s very imaginative,” says Patricia Chmara of Manhattan, mother
of two. She says her son Cary, 4, “just loves the theme song. The program
shows kids they can think their way through problems. Cary loves the fact
Dudley is a dragon — normally a
pretty scary animal — but in this case, because he’s so goofy, not very
intimidating.” Dudley
also benefits from the respected actors who are happy to appear in his
forest. Canadian Saul Rubinek, seen most recently as a campaign adviser in
the movie Nixon, once played a lion named Lou. He took the role at
the urging of his four-year-old daughter, Hannah. Actress Jackie Burroughs (The
Road to Avonlea) regularly plays a balloon pilot. Mary Walsh of This
Hour Has 22 Minutes made her children’s television debut as a confused
princess. And Graham Greene (Dances With Wolves, Die Hard With A
Vengeance) won a Gemini Award for his portrayal of a recurring
character, Mr. Crabby Tree.
The show’s
popularity has convinced toy-makers that they can duplicate Barney’s success
as a merchandising and licensing phenomenon. Last fall, Castle Licensing
Inc., approved the sale of Dudley videotapes, plush dolls and board games,
and more manufacturers are lining up to cash in on the dragon’s popularity.
Castle president Art Kraus predicts that product sales and money from
broadcast rights this year will approach Barney’s 1995 $1-billion take.
Curiously, the
increasingly lucrative Dudley was created by government bureaucrats. He was
the star of a play called The Conserving Kingdom, which toured grade
schools under the auspices of the Ontario ministry of energy in 1982. Ira
Levy and Peter Williamson, partners in Toronto’s
Breakthrough Films and Television Inc., bought the rights to the character
from the provincial government in 1990. The provincial educational
broadcaster, TVO, helped Breakthrough develop a series starring Dudley
and gave him a home in the B.C. rainforest. The program premiered in
October, 1993, with 12 episodes.
Head writer Alex
Galatis tests the basic story for each episode by reading it to children at
a Toronto-area daycare center. For the first two seasons, Galatis was also
inside the dragon’s fuzzy hide, but now just does Dudley’s voice. “I know
the character so well that performing him is like slipping into a
comfortable bed,” he says. “Dudley’s
worst quality — though I find it charming — is his tendency to be dramatic,
to be a little histrionic. For
Dudley, things don’t just taste
good, they’re DEE-licious.”
Dudley’s sense of
wonder is equally crucial, according to educational consultant Jean Morphee-Barnard,
who has worked with the dragon since The Conserving Kingdom. “We have
to show children how wonderful the world is before we can tell them how to
take care of it,” she says. “We talk to educators to find out what concerns
children have, what questions they want answered.” Morphee-Barnard, who also
writes guides to help teachers use Dudley
in the classroom, says the producers have high ethical standards for the
show. “We don’t want to use violence or insults. We want to avoid
stereotyping; girls have to be just as involved as the boys are. And usually
our villains are misguided rather than evil.”
Those standards
extend to Dudley merchandising. The dragon’s creators retain veto power over
which products can bear Dudley’s
likeness. “They want their ideals carried through in the products,” Kraus
says. “For toys and clothing, they want natural fibers — nothing artificial
or synthetic. For food products, no sugar and no preservatives.” Levy and
Williamson vetoed a karate-fighting Dudley: not in keeping with the dragon’s
nonviolent demeanor. That insistence on keeping Dudley uncorrupted is a big
part of the character’s success. Just call him Dudley Do-Right. |
|
