SALT ORIGINALLY SOUNDED LIKE TONY SOPRANO. "We thought, it couldn’t be a little puppy, could it?" said Johnson in a behind-the-scenes special celebrating the show’s 10th anniversary.
#Blues clues thinking rock picture series
However, Nickelodeon already had an animated series in the pipeline that featured a cat, so the network asked the team to pick a different animal.
They didn’t like that color, so they turned the cat blue and named him Mr. Johnson, Santomero, and Kessler’s first choice for their show’s main character was an orange cat named Mr. The winner was co-creator Traci Paige Johnson, who filled the role throughout the show’s run. In determining who would play the part of Blue, the team went around the table to see who had the best bark. Salt, while his co-composer, Michael Rubin, provided the voice of The Sun. Nick Balaban, who composed the music, played the role of Mr. THE ORIGINAL PRODUCTION TEAM PROVIDED SOME OF THE VOICES.īecause they were working with such a limited budget, the production team provided voices for the show themselves rather than hire talent. All told, each episode took around nine to 10 months to produce. The team would move on to another group, and then another, using the kids' reactions to further develop the episode as it went into the animation phase.
#Blues clues thinking rock picture full
THE PRODUCERS FIELD TESTED EACH EPISODE THREE TIMES.Īfter each script was finished, the show’s research team would test it on a classroom full of preschoolers, noting how the children responded to the material. After finding that kids' engagement with the show increased with repeat viewings, Nickelodeon decided to air the same episode every day for a week before moving on to a new one. In the episode " Blue’s Predictions," for example, second host Joe says the word "predict" 15 times to help viewers become acquainted with the word. So the show’s script repeated key words and phrases over and over in varying contexts. More than memorization or rote learning, mastery boosts kids’ self-esteem and ensures they’ll internalize information, which in turn better prepares them for school. The Blue’s Clues team wanted to promote mastery in children-that feeling that they were experts on a given topic. Its research-based approach became what the production team called the "special sauce" in its recipe for success. The show had its own research department, which was rare for a kids’ program. Simple, recognizable objects and sounds became the clues that eased young viewers into each episode, while the puzzles grew more challenging without becoming frustrating. To keep kids engaged, they enlisted their help by having host Steve Burns pose questions to the camera, then pause to hear their answers. Instead of the varied, nonlinear format popularized by Sesame Street and geared toward short attention spans, the team developed a narrative format.
Along with co-creator Santomero, who had a master’s degree in child developmental psychology from Columbia University, the team enlisted the help of educators and consultants to craft a format that reflected the latest research in early childhood development. Todd Kessler, Angela Santomero, and Traci Paige Johnson-the trio that developed Blue’s Clues-wanted the show to be entertaining as well as educational. On the 20th anniversary of the show's premiere episode, we look back at Blue, Steve, Joe, and the show that redefined children’s television.
Over the course of 11 years, Blue’s Clues not only became the hit Nickelodeon sought-it exceeded everyone’s wildest expectations. After 30 days holed up in a tiny conference room high above Times Square, the three came up a puzzle-based show starring a little blue dog. In the summer of 1994, Nickelodeon handed three novice producers a monumental task: Create a hit television show for preschoolers, and do it on a shoestring budget.
0 kommentar(er)
