Fast Forward

Jumping ahead some 10 years or so I took on a job at Warner Bros Animation in Burbank, California as a supervising producer for the MAD animated series that appeared on Cartoon Network. WB Executives Sam Register and Peter Girardi were very old acquaintances from New York (you’ll recall my mention of Peter in my previous post). They had since moved west to join Warner Bros Animation and brought me in. During the course of the four years that the series aired I once again attempted to resuscitate Hercules. This time I was not coy about giving WB an 18 month option. One wrinkle however was clarifying my legal rights to the property since a version of “Hercules” had appeared in KaBlam!. At the time I had the foresight to design a distinctly different, older Hercules for the “Dave, Son of” version. Paunchier, with a comb-over.

Unfortunately that was not quite good enough for the WB legal suits. I needed a release from Nickelodeon in writing. It took literally two years and $9,000 in legal fees to track down the appropriate contact(s) at Nickelodeon and finally receive the appropriate clearance. Unfortunately the two year wait had dulled WB’s interest and once again Hercules fell to the wayside.

Sigh.