The Co-Creator of PHINEAS and FERB was a Child Prodigy!

we are. I don't know that that I've met Will. He looks like like I might have met him. He looks like vaguely familiar to have. That's how I thought about it with you as well. I think we've done something together in the past at some at some point, I would imagine that at least been at the same party or something at some point. Yes, I actually we were probably on a yacht with for Michael uh wait, Kevin Michael Richardson. Kevin Michael Richardson's uh part Okay, So

then we absolutely were. Yes, that is exactly yes, I think that's where we probably met. Yes, yes, for our everybody Kevin. Michael Richardson is oh I love that man, Michael Richardson in the voice of everybody, and he'll be on at some point. But I also think I did a Phineas and Ferb back in the day oh excellence.

So you probably you may have met Swampy because because I would usually only come in on the days that I was recording, because I was I was back doing the rest of the stuff and Swampy was running the recording. So who did you do on Phineas? Yeah, that well, I I honestly can't remember we were doing. I think

we might have. Didn't we do some kind of kimpossible thing with Phineas and Ferb, well not not verbally, not believe we did, for they had that Spot the Difference episodes where where we would add visual things to stuff and play them and to see if kids could could spot anything like and we put kimpossible into a shot that you know, like like we've got some assets from

one of the Impossible shows. And I'm sure we also did some sort of like promo crossover kind of thing where it's you know, it's like hi, run and this is Phineas and like that kind of stuff. There were. There were thousands of those and continue to be. And one thing I will say is Dan Phineas and took over the Epcot ride impossible, and we were okay with it because we were going to give it to anybody. We were happy to give it. They just took down.

They just took down the Phineas and Ferb version of that at Upcot. Yeah, did you like two months ago or something. Well, it wasn't even a ride. It was sort of like a go around and and follow these instructions kind of. I never played it all the way through, but I played like a section of it when they were putting it together. Swampy and I went out and did some press out there, and uh, And they've told me that they're sending me one of the Doofenschmart sculpts

from from the park, which I'm so excited about. But like they told me this like a month ago, and so I'm like constantly looking because it looks like it's gonna be like four ft tall, and I'm like, like, I keep looking for a big box and it it has not come yet. I I hope they remember, you know, Like they got my address and everything at the corner of my office. He's just going to be like standing at your driveway one day. So I have a question because you only come in, Uh, you only come were

going in there when you were recording your character. Because you're doing double and triple and quadruple duty on finn Us and verbs, so I'm doing a lot. I mean, you create, you co created the show. You were I'm sure, writing on the show, producing the show, helping with every aspect of the show, and doing character voices. Yes, I was. I was. I was the show runner and also writing songs for the show and also doing doing you know, I basically would do doofin Schwirtz and then like two

other incidentals if we needed incidentals. There were only I did climp Baloon, this weird magical you know, recurring character. It was a magical old timey bathing suit that lived in the Himalayas for some reason. But otherwise I was just I was just defin Schwirtz. But but I was, you know, making notes on boards. I designed the characters. I was. I was directing first season until what I made them higher some of the directors, so I didn't

also have to do that. But I was back doing, you know, doing a lot of the day to day work of just making all those decisions and stuff for the for the show and reach. I'm I'm a bit a d D. So it's second hyper focus on a bunch of things at a time if I like them all, can we can we go back to the beginning of of your career in animation and just what got you into the world of animation, What attracted you to this

this incredible business of show. You know, you know, it's funny because because when I was I was applying to college, as I applied to to Cal Arts and to USC and uh and cal and I sent in a bunch of my artwork along with you know, with other things for my portfolio. I sent some some actual art because I was a professional artist when I was like twelve, and uh and I was this weird. I was like a child prodigy kid as as an illustrator and uh and I sent in some artwork for for them and

uh and they sent me back a thing. And I was but I was applying to the live action film department at Cal Arts and they said, uh, and they sent me a thing that said, we don't We're not making decision on the live action department for you know, for a while yet. But we did show some of your artwork to the animation department and they said they will take you right now, but that you'll get an early admittance if you want to go into animation. And

I said, I don't want to go into animation. And I threw that letter away and I went and uh and and I ended up going to USC and never got into that film school either, but I took nothing but film classes and then I dropped out and UH and I was just looking for work to you know, to keep the power on and uh and they they were looking for a storyboard artists on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the eighties, the original Teenage Muting. And I was like, well, I I understand filmmaking and I can draw.

I should go and apply for that. And so I applied for that and UH and I did UH storyboard clean up for them for for like a year or so, just freelance, like every week they would give me a new one. And I'm making good money. And then UH, I went in in the house and did and work on uh the UH Toxic Crusaders and James Bond Jr.

And UH. And then when that was drying up suddenly, you know, like that they didn't have other shows for a while, and so I was out of work for for a while, and I had let all my freelance art stuff go, you know, like like sort of followed by the wayside then and there was like six months where I didn't work at all, and I was down to my last like two or three hundred dollar ers in the bank, which was gonna be rent next you know, and I was like, I really need to get something

going and UH and UH, and I took it, and I applied to the Simpsons and I applied to UH, applied to the Simpsons and I and I got hired to write a low budget slasher movie on this in the same week. And the Simpsons says, said, UH, said well, we'll hire you. Come on in and draw here. And so I was going in during the day and drawing, and at night I would go I would come home, I would have dinner, I would I would get up and I would start writing this script to for this

little bit low budget slasher movie. Untill ten o'clock, eleven o'clock, twelve o'clock at night. I'd go to sleep, i'd wake up, I'd go into work again. And I did that for two weeks. And then I had a a movie that was gonna get made that I had written the script for, and and I was told that I could direct it, but they would only be able to pay me this

amount of money. And I was working at The Simpsons and making at least that in the next month, and then I was going to continue to work months and months and months, and and I realized I would have to quit the Simpsons to go and direct this little budget slasher movie. And and I suddenly realized that all the time I had spent in live action I had I didn't really necessarily feel a kinship to the people in live action. I didn't feel like those were my people.

And uh, and it was actually a party at Swampy's house, my my uh, my partner on Phineas and ferb was another artist on The Simpsons, and he was throwing a party. And my my first wife was was an actress and and and I was trying to get her to come to this party with him, and she was like, I don't know if I want to go to an industry party. And I was I was like, let's just go. We'll make it a point, we will just make an appearance. And these are a bunch of people I'm working with them,

and say, okay, we'll go. And we went and we had a great time. And nobody quoted their resume to me. Nobody like, you know, like nobody got a glassy I'd look and start turned away if they didn't feel they felt like I couldn't help their career or anything like that. And it was just a bunch of people hanging out and having a great time. And we got in the car and my wife was was was like, you know

what that was? That was an actual party. I haven't been an actual party in like ten years in Los Angeles. I've never never been to it. Like that was great. And I was like, I think these are my peeps. I think this is you know, and so I so I turned down the gig on the on the Slasher movie, you know, directing it, and I just stayed at The Simpsons. And then from the Simpsons, I ended up uh going to a Brocco's Modern Life over a Nickelodeon, which they needed.

They needed people who could write and draw, and I had done a comic strip, UH for daily comics strip at USC at the for the for the school at USC for the time I was there, and I had, you know, so hundreds of things that I had written and drawn, and I came in and handed it to Roger Chassan, who was the supervising director who had animated Jessica Rabbit for the for the movie back in the day. And if I had known that, I would have been

a lot more more nervous. Nervous would have been like but but I handed him like a book of my comic strip and he laughed, laughed at the first like three pages and said, Okay, you're hired. And it was

like the easiest job interview I've had. But that's okay, So wait, I have to I have to ask you a question because there's so much there that I you could do an entire show and the justice stories you told, because first of all, I have to start with because you glossed over this very quickly a professional artist at

twelve years old. At twelve years old, I was doing all the juried art shows in the Deep South where I grew up in Alabama, and UH, and there were a bunch of art shows in that whole area where you had you had to to uh send in slides of your work, but you didn't have to send in a picture of yourself. They would decide whether you were good enough to go into these art shows and binding and they would always pick me. They would always like approve me, and I would show up and they would like,

so it is your father the artist. No, no, it's and they would do like like stories on me in the in the in the in the paper. And I got, you know, like the the Atlanta Institute of the Art or whatever that's that's called in Atlanta was really trying to recruit me to come to their their art department and stuff. But I was making good money for for a twelve you know, like like for a teenager who's not able to pay rent. I would go to these art shows and make fifteen hundred dollars in a weekend.

And I was doing that a bunch of times in the in the year, and uh and like the there's a magazine that the San Diego Zoo puts out that's uh that I sent them some art and they and they and they paid me to use one of their things on the cover. And I was just doing a lot of a lot of that, and I and with those proceeds, I bought a super eight camera and movie projector with a sound on sound thing where I, you know, where I can make little movies, because that's what I

really wanted to do, was make movies. This is where I find your journey very interesting, because we will eventually get to how he isn't obviously an icon, but an icon in the whole TikTok world. Right now, he's million followers. That is not something to down. It's a lot of people to be paying attention to what I do. But what I find so interesting is that a man, a legend such as yourself, I understand your pain about loving film and cinema and taking the classes. I went to

Columbia for that. I was waitlisted at a f I I couldn't get in. I tried twice. I tried to get into their women's program for directing. I was waitlisted because of their silly little reasons whatever. I get it. But at the same time, our business it is so weird about who it lets in the gate keeping. It's so strange, like you could have the most obvious amount of like talent, enthusiasm, professionalism and it just doesn't go in your direction, and and and you know, it just

just really encouraging that you were, you know, rejected. I'm sorry to say so many people are fans of yours, and I don't know if they know that about your story, that you know that that was maybe in a multiverse you're Scorsese somewhere. Yeah, it's possible, but you have to see in the animation world, you know, I've done very well and and I you end up finding the thing

that you're really meant to do. And I think that, you know, part of the reason I threw away that that that cal Arts letter was because at the time, at that time, that was like the Dark Cauldron days. That's where nothing good was happening in animation. Disney wasn't Disney was doing Oliver and Company. And you know, like there were there were no classic animated things happening in TV was all like like the care Bears or Transformers. It's all stuff based onto you know, like, so there

was nothing cool happening in animation. By the time I got into animation, the Simpsons had happened, and suddenly that was cool and and uh and ran and stimpy and and Batman the animated series, and and then Little Mermaid. There was this whole second renaissance in animation. So suddenly it was like, oh, no, I can do all the things that I do in animation. I can, you know, And that's what I do, like, you know, like for

a living. Now. I draw silly pictures, I write stupid stories, I talk in silly voices, and I write stupid songs, which are all the things that I would be doing if I was unemployed. I would just nobody would be paying me to do them. It's all I would be at home doing by myself. So well, that's also the joy of our industry though. It's what I mean. It's like if you want to be a doctor and you're rejected from medical school, you can't walk away and go, you know what, I'm gonna go try it anyway. Yes,

as industry exactly, but entertainment industry you get. You hear stories all the time, the Quentin Tarantinos, the Dan's, all these people where it's like I got rejected, so I went, I'm gonna go do it anyway, and they become huge successes. So it is one of the few industries in the world where you don't need the education. If you have the talent and the drive and everything else you can do um. If you just have the will to go out and make it happen, you can make it happen.

Now you're still it's still winning the lottery, I mean, the chances of it happening are are slim. But you then get people like Dan who say, Okay, well you said no to me here, I'm gonna go find a

different avenue and become hugely successful over here. And and also it's much easier, I you know, like I think the reason that I found this a better way to get in is because you can show Like somebody who doesn't draw doesn't think they can draw, someone who doesn't write or doesn't direct, thinks they could write or direct. You know, you know, you know what I mean, Like

people think they can write because they can spell. So it's you know, it's it's like, oh, I would be able to do that if I just sat down and thought about it. So so you don't fight against that thing where where people who are there to hire you sort of feel like they could do it do it as well. Also, somebody who doesn't write can't read a script and tell you whether it's any good because they don't get what's good or bad about it. But somebody who doesn't draw and look at the drawing and say,

that looks like what it's supposed to look like. So so to me, it's like the fact that I could sort of draw anything you put in front of me. I've always been able to change styles to whatever show I'm on and stuff. It's loving that the fact that I was able to just go, oh, you wanted drawn like that, Okay, I'll do this. They were like, Okay, well you're hired. That's it's an easier way to get work. I think if because it's a it's a more distract

demonstrable talent. I think, who are the artists that inspired you? Dan or Um? It really sort of all starts and stops with Chuck Jones, and there's a lot of others, but he's the one that I that I that like, every frame that I've seen that's drawn by Chuck Jones just makes me go, oh, that's the perfect you know, like, and that's what I would always try to do when I was when I was you know, when I was boarding, which I don't do as much of now. I boarded the pilot to the to the to the new show

in the in the first episode. But but when whenever I would be like working on a visual gag, I would just put post it's over post its over post its and try to like keep pushing the pose until it was perfect. Like, Okay, if I go any further, it's not going gonna be good anymore. This is right where it has has to be. And I just was always trying to trying to um channel Chuck Jones when I when I drew and and as far as visual storytelling, I was always trying to channel Miyazaki, who I got

to meet. I got to meet Chuck Jones in a book signing once but which was cool. Uh And and then I got to meet Miyazaki in his studio in Japan, which was like one of these really really cool moments I got to I was actually in Howe's Moving Castle and that was that was that's what they were making when I when I went to the studio, getting to go in and do some of the I think I did three characters for the English dub was was really cool.

And Jason mars And who's has been a guest on the show, and is my best friend growing up was actually the lead in Spirited Away. Very cool. So yeah, we talked about how he booked that entire role from his closet, right story you hear those, but yeah, you do you I mean again, I imagine it would be like any other medium where you know, there are the people that do it, and then then there are people that do it well, and then there are people that do it so well, but other people just like yep, yeah,

but and that's one of those. I felt that the way the first time I saw a Kira where it was like, oh, this is what anime and animation could be. Like, Okay, it's not because I grew up on all the shows you were talking about, which when you're eight years old, Thundercatch, Transformers, g I Joe, they were the greatest thing in the world. But then you get a little older and you watch the first episode of Batman in the animated series, and

you go, oh, wait, everything's different now. Yeah, yeah, you know you've got those. Okay, so you get a call, Hey, we want you to come in to work on a little show called the Simpsons. Now what was the Simpsons? When you joined up? It was cool because I loved them on The Tracy Ullman Show. And then when I heard they were doing that, I actually applied to them way early and got turned down like I didn't define well,

I didn't have any studio experience. It was before I was on The Ninja Turtles, and I've never worked in a studio, and they were just a little a little scared about it. Um, I applied. The time they took me was was second season and I and UH and and I went in. So I had already seen first season and fallen in love with it, and I was like, this is this is a show I really want to work on. So you're a fan already by the time

you were on that second season. They gave me, they gave me a drawing test and then you know, like before I had just taken in like like this far Out Man Hippie Land amusement sequence I did for Tommy Chong's movie for it was it was his first movie

without Cheech. It was called Far Out Man, and I did this psychedelic animation was like the first actual animation gig that that I had done, and and UH and I took that and showed them that and when I look at it, now it's like, I understand why they didn't take me, because you know, it's it's like, this doesn't look like the Simpsons. Doesn't know. There's a lot of things I was doing wrong back then and stuff.

But but later on they were like, well, let's see if you can do the Simpsons, and I drew them. They were like, okay, you're at your end. So did you have a lit agent or no? No, I didn't. I didn't have an agent till Disney called me a year after turning down Phineas and Ferb. They called me out of the blue and said, I know this is out of the blue, but we want to option Phineas and B. And I was like okay. They were like,

so just give it. Give us the name of your agent, and Will are like, well, I better get an agent. That was that was how I how I got an agent. Everything else, I find all these applications like, because I've noticed that you really like proactive about finding you would think so I sort of feel like most of that just sort of happened to me, like someone would say, hey, I saw an ad for this. I was not looking

through stuff looking for ads. It was just people that I knew said you can draw right, you should do this? You know that? Yeah. Literally, the first my first animation gig with Tommy Chong was was me at home on a Sunday, just eating cereal and a friend of mine calling Dan, you you can do animation right, And I was like, yeah, I took that one animation classic college.

And they said and she said, oh, I'm going to give somebody your number, and they're like two phone calls later, I'm talking to Tommy Chong was like, hey, man, I hear you're a great animator. And I was like, yes, that that that's me. That's the entertainment industry. The entertainment industry is fake. Get till you make it. Say yes to whatever they ask. Can you play the drums? Sure can? And then yes? And so you go into the Simpsons.

You sit down and you are deskmates with your future partner. Right. Well, he's right across the aisle from me. There's like there's like there was like this huge bullpen of just just uh you know, cubicles as far as that I could see on the on the bottom floor and uh and and we were both on the aisle and so we we got to know each other. That way, and did you hit it off right away? And you know you had the same kind of animation background, you knew all that kind of it was like, oh this this could

be something here. Yeah. No, No, we had a great time. And actually, uh, he's the one that got me, that got me to come and apply to Rocco because that we were getting laid off. And I was like, so what are you gonna do. I've already got a lot work lined up Nickelodeon I show called Rocko. You should you should go apply? All right, you know there's another woe. Somebody just said you should have I for this. Okay, I will. And then then I got it. And then

we got put together as a writing team. And that's where the magic really started happening. We just had a great time writing together and just you know, like like just sort of like finishing each other's sentences in funnier and funnier ways. And so where did where did this? Eventually? I want to get into obviously how Phineas and FIRB came about and all that kind of stuff, But where

did you go from this to doing voice over? I mean, were you doing the voices of the characters that you're kind of animating, whether it's The Simpsons or whatever, you're kind of throwing the voices out. Where are we were? We were. I would always pitch, you know, pitch gags, and especially at Nickelodeon, you're writing the show. So the first time anybody here's sees the show, the executives see the show, you're just pitching it to them. And Swampy

and I were both came from performance backgrounds. I was I did a lot of uh of theater, you know, through through through college and out of college, I made a being doing dinner theater for a while and uh and uh, and I was also in a band. I did a lot of performing and Swampy was the same. And so we were, you know, like which is very unusual for animators to be also outgoing, you know, extroverts,

and it makes us real outliers. But we would go into the pitch and have a great time pitching and get the get the executives just laughing all the way through. We could really just work a room and and I think that's really what set us apart with like like one of the other board artists once found it, like, so how'd your pitch go? And it's like they laughed in all the right places in these they they laughed like out loud. Well, yes, they like and then we

realized that a lot of them were just working there. Okay, and then this guy does this this and he says this under and they were reading and we were performing it and you know, and sometimes we write songs for for episodes and you know, and I bring my guitar rim and we would play and sing the song as

as we were going. Uh so yeah, so so so that was so so for Phineas and ferb which was the first show that I that I created, I exactly, you know, they ordered this pilot and they were asking and so, when when do you want to try to get the script? And I said, well, I'd rather not

do a script. I'd rather write it and draw it at the same time, because there's two characters in here who barely talk, and I think you won't get it otherwise, you know, it's like and uh and so uh so I boarded that whole first episode, the roller coaster episode, while I was on vacation in France with my wife's family, and we would all go out to the uh the museums at the day or go down to the riviera or whatever the hell we were doing, you know, and

then we've come back at uh at like uh, you know, seven or eight at night, they'd make dinner at this villa that that my mother in law had rented, and then everybody would go to sleep and I would stay up and start drawing and writing the roller coaster episode. And then uh. And then Swampy was living in England at the time, and I and I and I, so we went by England for a couple of days and he and I just put it out and just punched it up and change, you know, like like did whatever

rewrites we wanted to do. And then I just pitched it to them and they'd never had that happen. They'd never had had an episode just pitched to them. And I'm good in a room, So I made everybody laugh, and then the head of the channel. I pitched it to the studio guy. And then the head of the channel heard how much fun this pitch was and wanted me to come and pitched to him and I got to Gary. Yeah, Gary, Gary, we were I just had lunch with Gary just after him. He looks much more

relaxed now. He's doing great. He's got he's got his top button unbuttoned. In an industry where where studio presidents change everything three months, he he was there forever the channel for years through Yeah, through all the best stuff. He's the one that we made. It was a great guy episode. Yeah, so Phineas and Ferb is created internationally.

You had to take the chunnel to actually finish the peas. Yeah, basically basically, and uh and we you know, And so I pitched it that way, and then other people wanted to see a pitched and stuff, and my executive said, okay, we also have to show this to Disney UK. Uh should we write up a script now or should we just send them on the boards? And I said, well, neither is going to have the effect of me actually

pitching it. So I got in a room. I said, I said, tell you what, there's a there's a microphone

in the casting room down here. I'll just bring the computer in because it's all on power points, it's all scanned in, and I'll pretend I'm pitching it to a room full of people into the microphone, and then I'll take at and turn that into an animatic and so so I went home that weekend and I edited all together, and I and I you know, found some sound effects and then you know, and I would cut out stuff that I felt like was absolutely unnecessary where I would

be describing something. But most of the time I'm just like doing different voices for different characters and stuff, and the and the duven Schmertz. And first of all, that's the best selling tool that's ever existed. And as far as I've been able to figure out, I invented it the pitch reel, and lots of people have done that since then, but I was the first person, I think, to actually do that as a way of pitching their show. Like here's an episode like mostly finished, and and it

takes away any of their having to try to figure out. Yeah, it's it's like, oh, how is this gonna how is this going to be executed? They know how it's going to be executed because they can see it. That's the most In all fairness, you you are a rarity in that there. I can do all those people can do all of it. You know, I'm gonna draw, I'm gonna

sing the song, I'm gonna do the voice. I mean, that's like that I mean, there's you know, Seth McFarland, there's a handful of people that can do that, and I'm not even can draw the way the way that you can draw. He can, he can draw, but he would not have probably been able to use an editing software. So that's a verity to kind of say, I'm going to go in and I'm gonna do essentially do the entire thing one man bandit to to figure out what's

going on. And I've sold them three shows now and I've sold them all the same way by going in and just I'm just gonna get like, you know, part of it is that I don't really like the process of development. I don't like the here's the script, will get some notes changes like I don't want to do that for a year. I just want to show them what the show I want and let them decide whether they want that show and and and so so that's

what I've done. I've got I've gone through development three times and never had to go through develop element because I just like, here it is crazy to yell now, it's funny. You know, you must know Bob and Mark, right, yes, yes, I just remember we had a lot of notes on Kim we did. I mean, we always had something going on and we would send it, you know, overseas for animation, and our a R process would sometimes from episode to episode be very lengthy. Um, that's normal. I mean, you know,

you do. We have a lot of because I'm but it's because I'm rewriting, It's not because the executives are rewriting. But Bob and Park were also cut from the original kind of cloth of But who are They're wonderful writers, the greatest guys you'll ever meet, great producers. But they're not going to get into a room and start singing songs and playing, you know, doing your voices quieter they are there. They are much much quieter guys. Um. So

then let me ask you a question. Well, let's very quickly. Would you rather it? Uh? If you had you had a choice, somebody came to you right now and said, you get to produce and draw or you get to voice act. You can't do both, which one do you pick?

I think I would want to produce and draw. I think as much fun as voice acting is, and it's a lot of fun, I think that I would get a little board just voice acting for somebody else's show where you know, you know, like like a lot of duven Schwirtz uh, you know in Dufen Schmarts came from that pitch reel. In answer to your earlier question, like the executive said, I think you should do differen Schmarts

because you should. We should do that voice that you're doing in the in the ice real so um and I love that character. And but so much of the lines that we hear on TV for him were me making stuff up in the editing room because what we were getting wasn't quite what you're like, Oh, I think maybe we should go this way with it. What if his what if what he's trying to do is this? And I would just like I would, I would do

you know, I would. I would make something up about girl Scott's trying to buy me cookies and stuff and uh and then I then I would have to then a d R it and match it exactly. And definitely first has a lot of he's doing a lot of stammering, and so I would have to account he's not doing a lot, you know, like I would have to match my own, you know, gobbledygook that I just made up on the spot. Rightly exactly. So now, how did you come up with that voice? Is that? Had you been

doing that most of your life? You hear that a lot of people. It's like, I kind of did this voice forever. I guess I didn't. You know. My sister tells me that that's the voice I would use when we were kids, and if we were playing some pretend thing where I was the bad guy and she was the good guy, I would always use that voice. I didn't remember that, but she says, no, just it was like you to me. E G Daily said the same thing.

Will e G said that when she was a baby that she would when she got a little bit older, she would make these baby sounds and that's what influenced her for Tommy Pickles And I know you also directed for rug Grads and whatnot. I did not direct for Rugs. That's that's that's it's on MYMB. It's absolutely yeah, that's my favorite things. It still says that that's one of the few shows I didn't work on. Yeah, but let's talk.

Oh yeah, no, it says my my my nephew was going to was applying to Occidental out here and he got the packet from Occidental and it says notable celebrity alumni. There's my name fourth down and I looked. He called me and he went, you went to Occidental. I went, I did, yes, Occidental. As far as I'm concerned at this point, if they've been using me to recruit I get an honorary degree. Should This is a perfect segue into the other things you've done, because you have a

you know, Phineas and Ferb obviously enormous. But we just talked about how you were the creator of rug Rats. Um, thank you. There's a whole online thing on TikTok because this one creator has continued this running joke that she says that I created the minions. She's always thanking me for creating the minions, which I did not do. But I get thanks for the Minions all the time and TikTok's and I'm like, I had nothing to do with

the minions. Okay. So to to clear it up, then here on I hear voices you created rug Rats, you created the Minions and Despicable Me. That's too all those things did you also? So let's see if if you worked on Hey Arnold. I worked on Hey Arnold almost every thing else on I am dB is correct, directed on Hey Arnold Bungebob. Yes, I wrote and directed on SpongeBob. Family Guy. Family Guy was a director for six seasons I don't even need to name. And I was the

story Yeah, so the family Guy. I was not only the direct in my own episodes, but I was storyboard supervisor, which meant that that that Seth would do this thing where that he called punting to pap and Meyer because he quickly realized that I have the same sense of humor as him and drew the same way he would like to draw up. He had the time and uh, and so he would do any musical number or any like thing that he just needed a big bunch of

visual gags. He would just say, and then Dan's gonna put in a bunch of visual gags here, and he would just give it to me and let me go. So I was the only guy on the on the artist's side who was also sort of writing for the show. He called me their rider. Now, did you do any voices on Family That was a great gig? No, No, Family Guys a great gig. Not a Family Guy's a

great gig. It's it's it's a good gig. So okay, so again not to not to Desert Island you again, But if you all the shows you've done, is there one you look back at and it's kind of like that's the show for me, that's how I look, you know, my career, that's that show. I think that would have to be Phineas and for I think, okay, I think that that feels the most like me. Although this this new one I'm doing, I'm doing one called Hamstern Gretel

for for the Channel right now. It's premiering something. Is it even the channel anymore? Isn't It is the Channel, but it's also a Disney Plus. It's Disney Plus where it's it's oh my god. I went there. Okay, I was in. I was in l a not to side, went to the Channel it and it's tried. Nobody was there, nobody's there's black and white, no color, no page. Yes, no, Gary's not there. I would went in, I got my Starbucks, thought I could crash four whatever it was, and it

was like, I haven't been back to the studio. I haven't been back to the studio since that friday that they had us had us leave two years ago. So I have friends at work at Disney. They're still doing

everything remote, so it's there. They're starting. They're just now this month is starting to get some other some productions back in there, and I was thinking, why can't they just let us all come in, and they said, well, the computers are over two years old now and they've been sitting, so they like the problem is is that they are trying to replace all the computer systems and that's what's taking a long time. So that's why they're doing one production at a time. And we're like the

you know, we're like late July. I think we're going so nobody nobody's turned on the Starship Enterprise in two years and they don't know what crank up the nescells again. Excellent. Actually, actually I sort of lined before because last week I went to go find something at the studio and I had to like like planned three days in advance so if they would actually grant me access to the studio. And it was like this weird ghost place. It was.

It was really strange, and I'm like I got were in my office, it was like absolutely silent there, and somebody had like I have a whole shelf full of Phineas toys and somebody had obviously cleaned the shelf and put them back into like much better arrangement than I have. I was like, put some real care into this. And then I went and I and I was like, oh, I should see it. I should, and I filmed it. I was like, how badly out of tune with my guitar be? After two years? And I picked it up

and it was in tune. So that means whoever cleaned the room they walked around, that's exactly what it is. Somebody picked it up and said, no, no, we gotta we're gonna tune this. And I was I was like that trauma, was like, oh my god, it was. It wasn't perfectly in tune, but it was not two years? Was two years out of tude? All right? Since we're talking Phineas, I think we would get our fans would be very upset if we did not ask where did it come from? Where? I mean, how did that start? Where?

Where did the ideas start? And how did it go from there? Phineas was it was swampy and I trying to create, you know, like we've been thrown together as a writing team. And we loved writing together. We're like, let's just create a show together and then we'll just get to write together for the rest of our careers. And then it took like thirteen years to sell it. You know, really it took years. Uh here, hold on one second, Yeah, definitely, I have the original. Oh this

is cool, this is gonna be cool. Everybody. Wow, only on I hear voices? Do you get this kind of guess this kind of what you know? Why? I can honestly tell you what it's because it's we're nerds and we love this stuff and love look at that. We will have to take a screenshot and put this on our Instagram. So that is the original. That's the original.

And it was and it was a a one of those those butcher paper tablecloths they give you at some restaurants where they give you a little can of crayons to do all the while you're it's so it's drawn in purple crayon on on on my table cloth. And I liked it so much I told my my my wife said, oh, who's that? And I was like, this

is Phineas. This is this show I'm going to sell someday. As. That was those were the actual words I said on that occasion, and I tore it off and I took it home and I drew Perry the Platypus and Dufin Schmarts and ferb that night, and I took those four drawings into work the next day and swamping and I built the whole room around that. That's unbelievable. And you still have it, which is the thing. I still have

it all these years, so sure. And and what's funny is that I had lost it for a long time. I had no idea where that was. And then within a week, I think it was the week that the show finally got its official green light. That weekend, we were planning a yard sale and I was going through boxes and stuff like that, and in between two books was this drawing and I was like, I was like, I'm keeping it now, and I went and got it framed and and stuff. So that is that is a

piece of animation in Hollywood history right there. That is very, very cool, very so. The other thing, we are about a couple of minutes away, so I don't know if you're aware of what we do, but we do something kind of fun here on the show where a guest gets to come in and you know, Christine and I go to a lot of conventions and we deal with we we get to to meet a lot of people who want to be voice over actors and don't know how to go about it and and don't really get

the opportunity. So what we do is we have somebody come on he wants to be a voice over actor, and they get to do a little ad lib scene and then we have a couple of lines of dialogue that we have written for them. We have a little game that we have called Across the Garden, and so what it is is Christie and I are two little mice that are trying to get from one side of a garden to the other side of the garden, and

we're meeting all of these characters along the way. UH, and they get to pick who they want, you know, what kind of characters they want to be. We had some some great ones. Phil Lamar was this awesome hummingbird. He was great. We have some people that are vegetables. And the last episode that we did, which was very very cool, Andrea Romano came out of retirement and actually directed some of UH. Directed one of the guests um, so we have a guest coming on today, all all

the way from England. It's like one thirty in the morning there right now. But they are going to come on and uh and if it's okay with you, we're just gonna do a little scene. And then once they get the opportunity to do this. The hope is that when the season is over, we're going to take all these little segments and we are going to animate them and people are gonna get to see themselves as cartoon

characters and characters that they've created. Because what do you mean from me, am I supposed to be somebody in this Yeah, we'd love you to be somebody. And so where we are so far, if memory picking up where we left off with our two mice uh mice characters, we had just come around a very scary tree and we are trying Christie's characters trying to get to the

mall uh to meet her boyfriend. She's like a gen z, you know, like whatever's and my character is just very scared of everything and please because my little brother really annoying. So we're very mellow and we're meeting all these crazy along the way. You can be whoever you want to be uh if you we always say you want to be a woodled creature, you want to be a vegetable, you want to be a human that's yelling down at whatever you'd like to be. You are more than welcome.

And uh, I think gonna tell us before I'll be I'll be a long known Oh yes, yes, Oh, I love that so so much. That's awesome. And I think Elizabeth that we're gonna be bringing is it Jordy George? There's George? How are you? Oh? I'm very well. Wow, this is something that wasn't a thing earlier on. Now we know that it is. It is very early in the morning where you are right now, is it not? Oh? Yes, I am three cups of teas and so I'm I'm

all right, I'm wired and ready to record that. Like any voice over actor in the world, it's nice to this is how cool this podcast is and how amazing our fans are. I had, you know, we needed to get somebody today because we've been doing different scheduling, and I put on my stories, which, by the way, Dan knows a thing or two about engaging with his fans on his TikTok, but I put on my stories, and George was the person who I picked to be on

today's show. So George, let's explain what we're doing today. That's how it happens. It's that fast. When I saw your story, it was seven hours ago. Surely not. Yes, is how fast the entertainment industry works. George. We need an actor, we get an actor. That's how quick it is. And you're a good fan, so thank you. That is amazing. So I don't know if you're familiar with our with our little game here and you're gonna play with Dan,

Pop and Meyer over here with George. Uh So, we are going across the garden, and what it is is Christy and I are two little mice trying to get across the garden and we are trying to eat people along the way who are helping us on our journey. You each get to pick your character, So Dan is going to be a garden gnome, which is kind of awesome. And Jorgan, is there some kind of character you'd like to be? And keep in mind it could be animal, vegetable,

or mineral, doesn't matter. You're allowed to pick whatever you want. That is the joy of the world of animation is you can be whatever you'd like to be, so we'll good. Is none of that fair enough? I Am going to be a dog that happens to be in the God love that that. Does your dog have a name? O the dog? The dog as in as in Garfield and Odi? Yes, love that totally based on my actual dog called od. Okay great. So what we're they gonna do is we will do a very quick run of the scene, will

keep it real brief. And then I think you also have some lines that we sent you, right, George, Yes, So the first thing we're gonna do is we're just gonna do a quick ad lib scene and uh, and then we're gonna come back to you and we're gonna do a real vo session with you. We're gonna need you to do the three lines three different times. We're gonna give you a little direction and uh, just like in a session, we're gonna go from there. Does that work for you? Excellent? Is a dream come true. I've

always wanted to do this, So thank you. That's good, very very cool. We cannot wait, all right, Christie, I think we set the scene where last time. Oh, she's already in character. She's like, yeah, last time as we left off across the garden, memory serves we had just rounded a very very nasty tree who didn't want us to be anywhere near him. And we're still very far away from the mall, aren't we, Christy take it away? Yeah? Okay, so we're going to a mall and um, we're a

little lost right now. Would you come along? Come on? Yeah, we're hiding. Maybe this garden Nome can help us. Excuse me, Mr Nome, Please don't scare me. Um, we're trying to get to the mall. Why why did you have to go to the mall again? I told it doesn't matter. I don't want to keep talking about it. Okay, so you're asking me for directions? Yeah, you realize I made out of ceramic. I then moved from the spots, and well, since they stuck me here, it's a point. I'm assuming

which way did you come from? Was there a mall where you came from? There? Then maybe if you keep going the direction you you're going, you're at least fifty of the way there. Vague everything in that direction is not a mall, is what I am saying. So everything in this direction might be a mall because that's the direction you're going. Would you like us to try to spin you around? Are you happy with your direction? Actually?

If if you could give me just like a quarter turn, because I'm just trying to do the other side of my face? Oh do you want to cart the other side? Okay, go ahead going wait wait wait wait, no, No, that's too much. Is the mall straight? The grass is nice? Okay, grass is nice? I do not see them all straight up? If that helps you at all. Hold on a second. Aren't you that guy from TikTok? No, No, that's some other guy entirely. I'm a much better looking guy than

that the TikTok nome. That guy's got like five point eight million followers is awesome. Ye, there's a dog. There's a dog calling. Oh hello. I noticed that you were putting over hitty talk nome. I was wondering, how, how, what, why? Why are you doing? Oh? God? I hate dogs. They're so cute. Hi, what's hello? Hello? Hello? Mission? No, if you could just turn over your ears, can hear my name is and I am a lovely to dog. And I hear that you want to go to a more Well,

I don't they want to go to the mall. I just want I just want to lay here in the grass and hopefully not get peet on by a dog. Well that's okay, you're not red and you're not a fire hydrant. Excellent, pe down by a mouse because we're kind of past that stage at this point. Okay, I thought it was just the moisture of the grass green. You just peed on the TikTok noo. Yeah, maybe then i'll go viral. I didn't mean that. I'll show myself out, don't. Okay,

So can you see where we're going up there? Odi? Yeah, I'm a British little dog, so I called them shopping centers. But I believe it's the one with the big target red over there. That's it. That's it. Yes, that closed. What you're gonna have to do closed? My boyfriend, the rat is there. We have to go and see him before he leaves. Are you telling you that it doesn't exist anymore? Well, I'm telling you he had a rat and he had liked to you. Or maybe just stay

with me on this. Maybe it's not closed for rats. Yeah that's possible too, but yeah, maybe it's just people. I don't know dogs. It's because you're a dog. That's why. It's because I'm not a guide dog, and I don't guide people because it's not helpful. It just made me so upset and seen her. That was wonderful. Now, George, very quickly, so you got you got the dialogue in front of you, all right. So in the entertainment industry, in the the the the voiceover world, we're doing a

B and C takes. So we're gonna give you give us three takes of each line and switch it up. Uh in between you know, the how you want to what you want to emphasize or kind of energy you want to give it. But give us that dialogue. We'll do the first one first and go from there. You ready, You're ready? All right, here you go. Here's number one. Go for it and action. Yeah, oh avoid that guy like the be avoid. Oh oh just stay away from him. Nice.

Give us one more and then uh instead of in the middle, Uh, just give us kind of hemming and hawing sounds like um something like that. Okay, go ahead, Yeah, yeah, I avoid that guy like the be avoid. Um oh I got nothing. Just stay away from him, perfect, see take anything you want to do, just play. Yeah, I avoid that guy like the beach. Avoid Oh what's shoving? Really clever? Oh look Kevin, I've got nothing. Just stay away from him. Perfect, as they would say in the booth,

Circle the sea. Take all, right, now you got here's your second line again, give us an a take? Here you go? Is that the more with the good food court and the two forever twenty one? Doesn't that make it forty two? Right? How about one more kind of to yourself and a little quicker? Is that the movement a good food court and the two forever twenty ones? Doesn't that make it forty two? Awesome? Give us a seat,

take anything you want to do it? Is that the most slash shopping shed with the food court and the two forever twenty one, which me age a British question never never heard of? Doesn't that make it forty two? Circling the sea? Take again? I think we've seen that when you let George go, that's when you get the best take. Let's try Robin Williams. Let's Williams. Let's try your your third line here? Take it away. You think you've got problems. My best friend ran off with my

wife and you really mean him? Give us an it's perfect. Give us another one. You think you've got problems. My best friend ran off with my wife and oh, I really mick him. And now the seat take anything you want to do. You think you've got problems. My best friend ran off with my wife and I really miss him. When he just struck my back. Oh there we go, George. You killed it. You kill you. Mike dropped got into

the booth and you killed it, my friend. Thank you so much for for hanging out with us, and uh for for sharing this with us. We think that's great. Thank you. Oh, thank you for the opportunity for me to come in. I've been watching What k Pieces She Doesn't Too. KP started when I was starting second we school, high school, and it finished when I left school. So it was literally the perfect program for me to find myself and to become who I am today. And Dad, Parvameyer,

thank you for pos for your new show. Oh, thank you, thank you very much. That is so cool. George, thank you for staying up with us. Hopefully after your three cups of tea, you're gonna be able to sleep now. But you killed it and we can't wait till you get to actually see yourself animated. H and Odi the dog comes to life because you're the one who who gave him life. My friend, that's awesome. I did not know that. I'm even more. Just wait, we're working on it.

Thank you so much for joining us. You're welcome. Thank you everybody. Awesome. Wow, that was so unbelievably cool. Oh man, I love doing that. It is fun. Now, Dan, you do have this new show coming out. Do you want to talk about that or can you? It's it's coming out on the Channel and on Disney Plus. I don't think I can give you a date yet, but it's but it's. Uh. Sometimes I think this summer and uh and we are. I'm really thrilled with it. I think it's it's got all the humor of Phineas and Ferb,

but it's also got a bunch of action. It's also got a bunch of heart. It's really about a family in a way that none of the none of the other shows really were and uh. And it's about a brother and sister who are are quite quite a few

years apart. The brother can drive, and he's been waiting to get his license so that he can be out on the open road and in charge of his destiny, and of course he gets in license and then he just becomes the chauffeur to his little his little sister, which is what happened to me when I was growing up. I had a sister that was ten years younger than me, and I just became her, Like, Okay, you're going to soccer practice, let's go. You know, It's like I became that.

But in the midst of that, they're on the road one day and they get, uh, they get stopped by aliens that that tell them that they that the two of you have been chosen to receive superpowers, and they shoot them with this beam and he's like, this is great. Well, you like, like we're gonna be a brother sister superhero team, you and me, and then uh, but unfortunately the superpowers go on to Gretel, the sister and her pet hamster, who happens to be in the car, which causes a

little preaching. But but so that this series is really just about sort of the two of them and the hamster, uh, you know, and he's still the older brother and still still feels very protective of her and wants to, you know, make sure she's okay and guide her and and she's all in an impulse and she doesn't really need protection because she can lift a school bust bus over her head.

But he becomes like the guy on the headphones in the in the in the van, you know, telling her which way to go and like, you know, some of the brains of the team. He's the chair guy, and we're having the best time with apparently got the best uh, the best audience scores in the in the focus tests since the original Phineas, So the executives are really excited about it, the channel is really excited about it, and I'm having just the time of my life. I think

that's amazing. And where can people find you? Social media wise? I'm Dan pav and meyer at on TikTok. I'm Dan Pavar Twitter Sometimes I don't need Twitter or Instagram as much, uh, and I'm YouTube. Why are you on TikTok? TikTok? TikTok is so much more fun than any than any social media that I've ever attempted. And you know, it's it's and you know part of it is that that's where

all the Phineas and ferb fans. You know, it's like like you know, I didn't grow much on Twitter or Instagram after the show stopped, but I did like one TikTok and where I did the Douf voice and it got like two million views, and I was like, oh, this is where all like I thought people just forgotten about the show. And I was like, I was fine, it had its day, you know, and I suddenly realized there's this rabid following of people who just love that show.

But the other is like, I get to make little movies all the time. I get to you know, I get to you know, like plan and edit and perform in these little movies and I'm just I'm just having the most fun. And as soon as I started doing

stuff on and I grew so fast. I had, like I had I had a million followers within like the first two months, um, you know, and it was like, which was so much more than I've ever you know, I think I have a hundred thousand on on Twitter, which is a great number of Like I would have been really thrilled to that to have that number back in the day, and uh uh. And so now I just do That's what I do with my spare time. You know. The pandemic made it very easy to do that.

Now I'm running a show again. I started. I started doing it when we were in the end of the Phineas and for a movie that we did for for Disney plus Candice against the University on Disney plus hundred percents Rotten Tomatoes ratings, just just gonna throw it out there.

But but you know, so I was everything was winding down, and that would usually be a time in between shows where I would sort of feel depressed and like like really just like, oh man, you know, and uh, and now you know, and because of TikTok, I was able to throw myself into something else and you're like, I

can rein screen. I was learning a lot of new things about the editing program and and uh and doing skits with my daughters and and uh, you know, promoting the show, promoting the movie, and it was just so much fun. It kept me sane during that time where I would have otherways been been stuck inside a house, you know, for for a year and uh. And so so I've just had the best time. I'm so addicted to It's the first thing I do in the morning is I checked my mentions and me too. I don't know,

maybe I'm fighting a losing battle here. I don't know I might have to do, you know, are you not TikTok I I have no social media presence whatsoever. I don't really have I don't even have Facebook. I have nothing. Will Yeah, I love that. And also what I think it's cool about data is that, like all of that live action stuff that you wanted to do, it's like a part of that. In year, it's so nice to see when the fans react so organically to every you know,

to your legacy. And I think it's really cool that. Yeah, and it's cool. It's cool to see that, you know, Like, but there's all these songs that we wrote, you know, for Phineas, we wrote a song for every eleven minute. I wrote four five hundred songs for Disney at this point. And uh, and there's all these songs that we wrote in you know, there's a song called Busted where I just was looking it up the other day on TikTok. And there's hundreds of thousands of videos not views. Is

that the videos that people did. Huh, Yeah, the wrap one was a huge that was a huge trend on on TikTok. There were the hundreds of thousands of those. There was like hundreds of millions of of of views for that. But just watching people doing like Busted was great because there's a whole choreography that I drew for it, and it's it was Candice and Vanessa, these two characters, and and it's like a shot like a music video,

and it's it's just this fun little pop song. Then me and Martin Olsen wrote in an hour in two thousand five, and there's and so like people doing cool harmony parts of it and stuff like that. It's so cool to see that these songs have really stood the

test of time. You know, there was a guy who was at Lollapalooza with his band and played the Phineas and ferb theme songs like just a surprise thing for them, And it's this sea of people who goes off into the horizon and they're all freaking singing along and maybe I like burst into tears and I'm like crying, and my wife comes out and she's like, what's going on.

It's like watch this and then she started crying. It's it's it's just cool to see that that the show meant so much to so many people, like like the guy said, you know, Kim Possible defined this part of his childhood and that's what that's what you get when you do kids TV. As you get people growing up and they and and nostalgia for them is the thing that you made. And uh and you know that's amazing. I think, yeah, man, well thank you so much for joining us. Yeah to say, lasting the test of time

and generational are as an understatement. It's around. However, that's awesome, whole new generations to finding it with all the streaming services and everything going on. So that's really pretty wonderful. Well, will you come back and join us again? I feel like we have scratch the surfing studio in studio next next time you're in all come into the studio. Thanks

to you, alright. I Hear Voices assosted by Wilfred Ell and Gristi Garls and Romano, produced by Elizabe Joy Windham and executive produced by Brendan Rooney and Wilfred l. Our sound engineer and editor is Elizabeth Joy Wyndham and our video editor is at Guardo Gamba And that was my announcer voice. Some side effects of listening to I Hear Voices are sore abs from Larity, falling down the Coco Melon rabbit hole, sneezing due to mass nostalgia, and hugs.

Follow I Hear Voices wherever you listen to podcasts you don't miss any of the amazing voices. Be sure to follow us on Instagram and TikTok at I Hear Voices podcast. To see the video stream, subscribe to my YouTube channel. You can also check us out on my Space. O'megal Vine, Lime Wire, a M The Napster. Okay, well let's teach you about the Internet. What