| Curious George | |
|---|---|
Title card |
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| Format | Animated |
| Created by | Margret Rey H.A. Rey |
| Developed by | Joe Fallon |
| Directed by | Scott Hemings Frank Marino Cathy Malkasian |
| Starring | Frank Welker Jeff Bennett Jim Cummings |
| Narrated by | William H. Macy Rino Romano |
| Opening theme | Written by Roc Gagliese, Steve D'Angelo, Terry Tompkins; performed by Dr. John |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 6 |
| No. of episodes | 80 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Ron Howard Brian Grazer David Kirschner Jon Shapiro |
| Producer(s) | Imagine Entertainment Universal Animation Studios WGBH Boston |
| Running time | 30 minutes(15 minutes per episode) |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | PBS |
| Picture format | HDTV 1080i |
| Original run | September 4, 2006 – present |
| External links | |
| Website | |
Curious George is an animated television series based on the Curious George children's book series, which features Jeff Bennett as the voice of The Man with the Yellow Hat. Frank Welker, who voiced George in the 2006 feature film, returns here as the voice of Curious George. The stories of Season One were narrated by William H. Macy, and Seasons Two, Three, Four and Five are narrated by Rino Romano. The show is currently broadcast on PBS Kids. The Fifth Season had its first few episodes in Fall 2010, and is supposed to continue in Spring 2011. Season 6 was confirmed by WGBH and is due in Fall 2011.
The series is produced by Universal Animation Studios (Universal Pictures released the Curious George film), Universal Television, in association with WGBH Boston. Each episode has two short cartoons per half-hour episode and a live-action segment after each story.
The series illustrates and explains various concepts in math and science and each live-action segment shows schoolchildren engaging in experiments that teach the math or science concept featured in the previous cartoon.
The series is Universal's first animated television series to be filmed in the high-definition format, although earlier Region 1 DVD releases are in full screen (cropping the left and right of the image), but not pan and scan as the camera stays directly in the center of the image.[1]
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At the start of the second season, the Boston Globe noted that Curious George was at the top of the national ratings among preschoolers 2 to 5. The show is also at the top of the ratings among women with children under 3.
When the show was developed, educational advisors suggested using it to teach science, math, and engineering concepts. Episodes are often structured around a "try-fail" series of incidents, which proved to be a good way to show scientific inquiries. There was some controversy about George's eyes, which in the series have whites and pupils (except when George daydreams; his imagined characters are all without scleras); in the original books they are black dots. This gives the very humorous effect of George seeing his dreams in the original "Classic George" style, at a slightly lower resolution than the real world appears to him. This is likely a gentle poke of fun at his (mildly) limited monkey brain. The studio felt the whites and pupils design was necessary to help George express emotions since neither he, nor any of the other animal characters, talks, sings, or reads words.
United States
Australia
United Kingdom
Canada
Indonesia
Sweden
Iceland
The setting for most episodes is either the city, where George lives in an apartment building with The Man in the Yellow Hat, or the country, where they share a small house near a lake called Lake Wanasinklake. The city is believed to represent New York City hence Endless park (Central Park) or the Empire State building in the Curious George movie. This allows George to mirror the experiences of kids who live in an urban environment and those who live on farms and in suburbs. A few episodes take place in alternate but familiar settings, like an airport or a train station.
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