In 1991, the cable channel Nickelodeon— then known mostly for screening licensed offbeat children’ s programming and“ oldies” during its“ Nick at Nite” block— launched a line of original content dubbed“ Nicktoons” with three shows: The Ren & Stimpy Show, Rugrats, and Doug. The latter stood out among the roster. It lacked the grotesque absurdity of Ren & Stimpy and the similarly madcap appeal of Rugrats. It was a quiet, often slow affair, marked by imaginary flights of fancy but rooted in gently unfolding storytelling. Its lead character was often anxious, tentative, and confused.
In contrast to the then-two-year-old Simpsons, with its breakout star Bart and his wonderfully crude catch phrases, Doug was remarkably genteel and put together— a“ little gentleman,” says Billy West, the voice actor who portrayed him. Dressed in a sweater vest and khaki shorts, Doug didn’ t have a bad bone in his body; he was stridently earnest, the antithesis of early’ 90s slacker cool. Even today, the show remains among the most instructive cartoons Nickelodeon has ever aired: there’ s a moral taught in each episode, always a lesson learned.
Though Doug was the awkward middle child to the other, more immediately popular Nicktoon kids and took its time finding its footing, it has since become a template for some of the most sincere animated programming on television.
A graduate of Christian college Lipscomb University in Nashville, Doug creator Jim Jinkins wasn’ t sure his character was destined to be a cartoon— maybe he’ d star in a book series. But when one of Jinkins’ s friends who worked at Nickelodeon, Linda Schupack, heard the network was looking for original programming, she called him up and suggested he bring the character in to show to Executive Producer of Animation Vanessa Coffey.
“[ Linda called me ] and said,‘ Get over there, show Doug to them,’” says Jinkins over the phone from his office at his current production company, Cartoon Pizza.“ That’ s one of those phone calls that changes your life— but in that moment, you don’ t know it.”
Jinkins traveled to Studio City, California, from his Jumbo Pictures production base in New York City to show off a rough treatment of the Doug character: a book called Doug Got a New Pair of Shoes. The meeting with Coffey was short; her reaction was immediate.“ She ran out of the room to get permission, [ then came back in and said,]‘ You’ re going to go to pilot,’” says Jinkins.
Instead of focus group – tested concepts and“ corporatized development,” Jinkins says it was Coffey’ s intuition that provided Doug— along with the rest of the Nicktoons lineup— with its forward acceleration. The show began production immediately.“ Vanessa Coffey had this notion of creator-driven, innovative stuff,” says Jinkins.
With his writers and production team at Jumbo, Jinkins began to flesh out the world of Bluffington. A small town with eccentric characters à la Mayberry or Springfield, the fictional burg was rooted in his own childhood home of Richmond, Virginia. All the hallmarks are there— goofy neighbors, strict teachers, a town pond, the mall, the Honker Burger.
“ We had a lot of freedom in those days,” says director Yvette Kaplan, who’ d go on to co-direct episodes of Beavis and Butt-Head with Mike Judge as well as the movie Beavis and Butt-Head Do America. Notes from the studio, she explains, were scarce in the beginning.
“ Nickelodeon would give notes like,‘ Throw in some more fun stuff with Porkchop the dog’ and we’ d say,‘ Of course!’” she says.“ The artists had a lot of freedom to play and have fun.”
“ I definitely felt that we were working on something that was breaking new ground in children’ s programming,” says storyboard artist Tony Eastman, who codirected the pilot.
From the beginning, Doug was mostly autobiographical; the lead was based on Jinkins himself. Skeeter was based on Jinkins’ s pal Tommy Roberts, and Patti was a composite of Jinkins’ s childhood crushes. Like Jim, Doug was a little awkward and extremely anxious. He was quick to slip into his imagination, either to adopt the guise of the superhero Quailman, the debonair spy Smash Adams, or the Indiana Jones – like Race Canyon— or to simply forecast every possible disastrous outcome of any decision he might make.
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