wiley207
12-09-2008, 10:12 PM
A field of "animated" videos that have interested me for some time were the videos that Golden Book Video produced in 1985-1986. They were typically adaptions from children's Golden Books, but they shot the images right out of the books, often added cheesy limited Flash animation-like effects to them (such as eyes blinking or a tail wagging, characters walking in silhouette, etc.) and also added a full voice cast, music and sound effects. More often than not, they'd also add on some bits and scenes that were not in the original books being adapted, and there would also be some musical segments in the stories as well (and they would often have sing-along lyrics on the screen inviting the young viewers to sing along). The background music was occasionally originally written, but in most cases they just dipped into the KPM/Associated Production Music library for the videos' background music (ala "Spongebob Squarepants" and "The Ren & Stimpy Show.") It was as if the limited animation for each video only cost $40 to produce!
I remember viewing one quite a bit when I was little, entitled "Five Sesame Street Stories." The cover art looks like this:
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/muppet/images/2/27/Video.fivestories.jpg
It features four Super Grover stories, then "Big Bird Brings Spring to Sesame Street." The only Muppeteers they got in the voice cast were Caroll Spinney (as Big Bird and Oscar), Frank Oz (as Bert, Grover and Cookie Monster) and Fran Brill (as the female Muppets). They also brought Sesame Street writer Emily Perl Kingsley (whom also wrote the Super Grover book that the video was adapting) in to write some of the new bits not in the original books. They also did not feature any of the original songs or background music from "Sesame Street," either. And Jim Henson, Jerry Nelson and the other Muppeteers/human cast were unavailable to do voices, so Ernie and the Count's dialogue was described by the narrator (i.e. the narrator would say "Ernie told Big Bird that he was going to visit Betty Lou, because she was sick in bed!"), and the Count's bats did the counting instead! And Maria was renamed "Dolores" for some reason, probably because Fran Brill had to substitute for Sonia Manzano and kids would notice the difference.
Around 2005-2006, we lost the original tape, and around that time someone uploaded one of the He-Man Golden Book Videos to YouTube, and it caught my interest a bit, because it reminded me of "Five Sesame Street Stories."
Then near the end of summer 2007, at a used video store, I came across a copy of another Golden Book Video, entitled "Herbert the Timid Dragon and Other Tales." The cover art looks something like this:
http://i23.ebayimg.com/01/i/001/14/2d/be81_1.JPG
...except the background was red and it said "A Golden Book Video Classic" on top, and had the pre-1996 Little Golden Books spine on the side. After reading the back (finding out this video was a reissue copy of a video entitled "3 Mercer Mayer Stories") my mind instantly flashed back to "Five Sesame Street Stories," so I bought it to check it out, for a good price and in great condition too! Once I got home, I popped it in the VCR (yes, we still have the VCR in our living room set up) to check it out. And man, like "Five Sesame Street Stories," the video program was like mondo-bizzaro! It featured three stories by the great Mercer Mayer, including "Herbert the Timid Dragon," "Just For You" (with Little Critter) and "How the Trollusk Got his Hat." Since then, it's become one of my favorites, and jumpstarted my interest in Golden Book Videos again! My favorite part was the "Just For You" story, because I had the book when I was a kid, and I was able to tell what was changed in the video adaption of that story (they made Little Critter play "Space Critter" a bit when he was supposed to take a nap before deciding to just bounce on the bed, etc.)
I showed this to one of my friends, who had quite a bit of Golden Book Videos when he was younger. He used to have "Scuffy the Tugboat and Other Tales," and he still has his copies of "Amy Rosenberg's 3 Stories," "Richard Scarry's Animal Nursery Tales" and "The Poky Little Puppy's Favorite Stories." Watching these Golden Book Video Classics is a surreal (and sometimes nostalagic) experience for me!
Then this summer, I went back to that used video store, and found a copy of "Five Sesame Street Stories" in great condition! So of course I bought it and was able to relive childhood memories once again!
Any comments?
I remember viewing one quite a bit when I was little, entitled "Five Sesame Street Stories." The cover art looks like this:
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/muppet/images/2/27/Video.fivestories.jpg
It features four Super Grover stories, then "Big Bird Brings Spring to Sesame Street." The only Muppeteers they got in the voice cast were Caroll Spinney (as Big Bird and Oscar), Frank Oz (as Bert, Grover and Cookie Monster) and Fran Brill (as the female Muppets). They also brought Sesame Street writer Emily Perl Kingsley (whom also wrote the Super Grover book that the video was adapting) in to write some of the new bits not in the original books. They also did not feature any of the original songs or background music from "Sesame Street," either. And Jim Henson, Jerry Nelson and the other Muppeteers/human cast were unavailable to do voices, so Ernie and the Count's dialogue was described by the narrator (i.e. the narrator would say "Ernie told Big Bird that he was going to visit Betty Lou, because she was sick in bed!"), and the Count's bats did the counting instead! And Maria was renamed "Dolores" for some reason, probably because Fran Brill had to substitute for Sonia Manzano and kids would notice the difference.
Around 2005-2006, we lost the original tape, and around that time someone uploaded one of the He-Man Golden Book Videos to YouTube, and it caught my interest a bit, because it reminded me of "Five Sesame Street Stories."
Then near the end of summer 2007, at a used video store, I came across a copy of another Golden Book Video, entitled "Herbert the Timid Dragon and Other Tales." The cover art looks something like this:
http://i23.ebayimg.com/01/i/001/14/2d/be81_1.JPG
...except the background was red and it said "A Golden Book Video Classic" on top, and had the pre-1996 Little Golden Books spine on the side. After reading the back (finding out this video was a reissue copy of a video entitled "3 Mercer Mayer Stories") my mind instantly flashed back to "Five Sesame Street Stories," so I bought it to check it out, for a good price and in great condition too! Once I got home, I popped it in the VCR (yes, we still have the VCR in our living room set up) to check it out. And man, like "Five Sesame Street Stories," the video program was like mondo-bizzaro! It featured three stories by the great Mercer Mayer, including "Herbert the Timid Dragon," "Just For You" (with Little Critter) and "How the Trollusk Got his Hat." Since then, it's become one of my favorites, and jumpstarted my interest in Golden Book Videos again! My favorite part was the "Just For You" story, because I had the book when I was a kid, and I was able to tell what was changed in the video adaption of that story (they made Little Critter play "Space Critter" a bit when he was supposed to take a nap before deciding to just bounce on the bed, etc.)
I showed this to one of my friends, who had quite a bit of Golden Book Videos when he was younger. He used to have "Scuffy the Tugboat and Other Tales," and he still has his copies of "Amy Rosenberg's 3 Stories," "Richard Scarry's Animal Nursery Tales" and "The Poky Little Puppy's Favorite Stories." Watching these Golden Book Video Classics is a surreal (and sometimes nostalagic) experience for me!
Then this summer, I went back to that used video store, and found a copy of "Five Sesame Street Stories" in great condition! So of course I bought it and was able to relive childhood memories once again!
Any comments?