Stay 'Tooned! Presents - Batman: The Animated Series

♪ ♪ Tragedy strikes. How does he react? The only way he could deal was to transform himself into this... ...alternative figure. Batman has always been a fascination to me because of the-- the serious origins. [ "origins" echoes ] [ ♪ ] Who IS Batman? Who IS Bruce Wayne? He's a fascinating character: fascinating. He's a myth, he's a character, he's a-- he's bigger than life. But like all myths it has a relevance to our-- our daily lives, or-- or we wouldn't still be fascinated by it. That's w

hat audiences find so fascinating about him, IS that backstory, how he came to be. This thing that really messed him up as a little kid empowers him and he uses his wealth. He's incredibly rich which is how he can get all those toys. He is a philanthropist. And he learned, y'know, martial arts. He learned philosophy. And he goes through great sacrifice: to protect us, all. He has suffered in his life, unreasonably because his parents were taken from him when he was a kid. And he made a vow and

he never grew up. He's really that-- that child in a way. He was unable to ever, y'know to keep that from happening. So, he has this sort of drive to-- y'know, to make himself perfect to make sure he's never in a position where he's helpless again. And he's-- he's used that as an inspiration. And instead of letting it crush him, he turns himself into this avenging angel who wants to heal the world. He doesn't want revenge on the whole world. He wants to make the world right so that other people

don't have to suffer the way that he suffered. And there's so many different ways to tell the stories. You can change a lot of things but there are certain base things about certain superheroes that they got right. The fact that he has no superpowers. He didn't come here from Krypton. He's a MAN... ...who got BURNED by life. He's human, and, y'know you can kill him. And so, that makes him a much more interesting character. It's not about superpowers. It's about the tragedy of his childhood. It'

s about the heroicism of his life overcoming pain and-- and heartache. Even though he's real it is a superhero kinda show y'know, we have fantastic villains. He will not kill for ANY reason whatsoever. It's open to different interpretations and I think that's okay, but I like the Batman that doesn't kill, even though in some of my books there, man I'm killin' 'em right 'n left 'cuz those-- they're not Batman. So, he takes people to jail if they need to be jailed. He takes people to the asylum if

they need to be looked after. But, he's not there to punish them. It's either rehabilitation or life in prison. You look at these characters and you see a guy who's trying to help other people who are really in bad shape and yet he himself is not in a great place, he's just in a better place. And he's a good human being in spite of all of it. He has his issues, he has-- his memories and things that motivate him and... ...he-- he probably needs to see a shrink. Batman's a mess! [ Laughs ] He's a

mess, y'know he-- but-- but the people he deals with... He's somebody that's found his center and these people are a LOT more unbalanced than Batman. And he locks them away to stop them from being a further nuisance but also, y'know, so they can get help. That's what people love so much about him: it's a-- it's a redemption story. The Batman character is just one that-- that I think has so much depth to him. And I liked Batman because when I was a kid I thought, "I can BE Batman. I can't be Su

perman." I found out I couldn't be Batman either. Every little kid throws a-- a towel and, y'know and and wraps it around his neck and runs around pretending to be-- pretending to be a comic book hero and all. My mom made me a Batman suit and I had-- the little ears and she put cardboard in it and I looked a little bit like an angry German Shepherd, y'know it's like... And my nephew had a Robin outfit, and we thought, "Well, we'll solve crime in Mount Enterprise!" Well, in Mount Enterprise where

I lived at that time there were about 150 people. And I remember going to bed one night and gettin' up the next morning and found out the bank was robbed, and I said, "Well, I'll be damned! I didn't get a Bat Signal, I didn't get nothin.' I'm-- I'm out! I'm not a crime fighter." Kids wanna be a hero like him. They wanna be the guy that saves the day and I think it carries on into adulthood. He was the adult in the room. That was my favorite version of Batman. My favorite Batman up until that

point was Frank Miller's. I mean, y'know, you read "The Dark Knight" and it's like your brain explodes, "Oh my God, I didn't know comics could BE this way!" Seeing the s-- y'know the more serious version in the comics, that was-- that was a real revelation. Y'know, Batman has to live with the fact that, "Yeah I-- y'know, who am I to be talking about obeying the law? 'Cuz I'm not! I'm-- I'm a vigilante." We still root for him because his-- his motives are right. The poli-- what he does is what-

- where the police can't fill in. And they can't-- and the police can't even acknowledge him! Commissioner Gordon is friends with The Batman. The police are not. Batman will NOT get involved in something where the police can handle it. Commissioner Gordon for some reason is willing to give Batman the benefit of the doubt and Bullock is like, "No! He's a criminal!" The character of Bullock is great. "He's a-- I tell ya' that guy's a vi-- I'm, we're gonna bring Batman in!" And I think it's always

best when you have a hero like Batman, who's a creature of the night, is make everybody after him. It's like the v-- having a vigilante showing you up is bad press. It's not the criminals that are after him: The police are after him! The FBI are after him! The-- the press hates him! Y'know, everybody thinks this guy is evil and really we in the audience know: "No, he's the guy that's keepin' you safe." Batman would be in an alleyway... ...and Commissioner Gordon would go over and talk to him.

And I thought that that dialogue where-- and how you could stage it where you, y'know, Gordon has his back to him. And no one else knows The Batman's there. It's kinda mysterious and it's like that-- that was like a really great element that I loved. So, it adds conflict it adds a real interesting point of view. And I think that's really the reason-- that's one of the reasons Batman is an enduring character. 'Cuz he-- he sort of stands for that, y'know that-- that complexity in our li-- y'know,

that dual nature in our society. Who is using every one of his resources to make the world a better place. That the weakest among us must be helped by the strongest. It may not be true in real life but that's how it should be. [ ♪ THEME MUSIC PLAYS ♪ ] We all had seen the previous Batman series that have existed. The movies, the-- the serials. The Adam West series that, Bruce Timm and I both loved when we were kids. Absolutely, that was-- that was appointment after school television for-- for m

e. It was real to me as a kid. I didn't understand, why people were laughing. Everyone I know at Warner Brothers and in the business, from Bruce Timm to anybody, LOVES that version of Batman; the '60s "Batman." One of the things that started happening is, well, if you had a date in college on Friday night everybody gathered around a TV and watched "Batman" together. Very campy, kinda funny, kinda silly: POW! ZAP! SMASH! They knew what they were doing was a campy kids show version of Batman. But

there's a place for farce and there's a place for that kind of theatre. We wanted to distance ourselves from that as mu-- as much as possible. Definitely not what we were driving at with "Batman: The Animated Series." Bruce Timm said, "What do you know about Batman?" And I said, "Well, I know the Adam West show from when I was a kid." And he said, "NO! NO! NO! "That's not what we're doing!" He said, "We ALL love Adam. We love Adam West but that is NOT what we're doing." I was at Warner Brothe

r (the first time) back in the early '80s when we stumbled upon (or came upon) the old Max Fleicher "Superman" cartoons. And that, to me, was just mind blowing. I just thought they were so fabulous. I remember the first time I saw the Fleischer cartoons was at a-- at a convention when I was 14, The World Science Fiction Convention. And it was at a booth, somebody was selling them at 16mm and I... "What is THIS? WHAT IS THIS?!" And I remember thinking back then, "Boy, it woulda been so cool if--

if the Fleischers had done Batman." A few years later, I was in Hanna-Barbara working with Alan Burnett. We were doing "Super Friends" which was: not so good. A bunch of very centaurion-voiced superheroes standing there and, "Hey, Wonder Woman! You should chase that guy." "I WILL go chase him!" It was-- it was a-- an unintentionally funny show, but we-- we used to enjoy it for what it was. They were always gathered for meetings. Which, I always thought, "They must HATE those meetings." So, you

have a character who wants to drain Earth's oceans. "Oh my God, you're gonna kill all life!" And it turns out at the end: Well, he did it because his planet has no water. "Oh! Well, let's go help him get some water!" And then go help the guy. So, it's like, here comes the sob story. So... [ LAUGHS ] I actually liked "Super Friends." I, y'know I know the production values were limited because we had so little money in those days to do animation. And we had so little money to do anything actual

ly. [ laughing ] We were doing "Super Friends", and Alan and I talked about spinning Batman out and doing a Batman series that would be serious and dark. I mean, there were action-adventure shows like "He-Man", y'know, "G.I. Joe", "Starcom" (which I worked on) was pretty much a straight up action-adventure show in outer space. Done very, y'know-- y'know, the attempt was to be very serious. Fortunately, actually looking back on it, we didn't sell it. Because I-- we wouldn't have been able to get

away with everything that we got away with in the '90s. This was back in the early '80s. I was actually working over at Disney Feature, when the Tim Burton Batman came out. That was the inspiration for getting the series made in the first place was that we had this wond-- this incredible movie coming out that was a whole new vision of Batman. And how did we want to continue to carry that forward? Stylistically, they're wonderful. There wouldn't have been an animated series if the-- if the Tim Bu

rton films hadn't been such a huge success. There was certainly a moment when I went, "GULP. You're following Danny DeVito." Warner Brothers saw the potential, y'know, that the merchandising and everything. 65 commercials to sell all this Batman stuff so... They decided to do a companion, y'know, in animation they said, "Well, now that Batman's hot, why don't we also do a cartoon series?" We can't say this was inspired by Tim's stuff and Tim never saw any of it. So: One. ONE. TWO: Tim Burton is

an animator. "Oh! The guy that directed the movie, HE knows animation. Let's get HIM to say!" Bruce and I were requested (not by Tim, but by Warner Brothers) to go to Tim at his place on the set of the-- Batman 2. Uh, yes it was a cursory kind of thing. And we thought, "OH NO! We're-- we're already in production! This is a really bad idea!" But Jean let us know, it's like, "Guys, y'know, we-- we need to make a formal presentation." He was VERY supportive of it. He-- and as an artist himself

I think he recognized how terrific the art was. And to our absolute delight and pleasure, he went, "Yeah, this looks great." [ laughs ] Literally! While we were benefitting greatly from the success of the-- the Batman feature films, we wanted to cut our own trail. The Batman that WE did wasn't based at all on the Batman that was done by Tim Burton. It's more atmosphere and-- and emotion than it was anything directly. It did affect me later on (and Bruce) because y'know, The Penguin design had t

o be changed. Catwoman design had to be changed. Things that were-- had to tie into the second Batman film. And I think that's a small price to pay. But all that really did was just, y'know, inform us of the style-- Tim Burton's style for Batman, which is terrific. I don't think it was the ONLY influence, but I think it was a BIG influence. I think Bruce Timm was able to take that and marry it to those old Fleischer-style cartoons-- the way those looked, and add in his own take which looked a l

ittle bit like the '50s comic books that I grew up reading. It just opened up the gates for a new Batman. Who-- who ARE you? I'm your worst nightmare. Jamie Kellner, who was such a interesting businessman. He was a really forward-thinking businessman. He doesn't get a lot of notice or attention but he should be credited with a lot of the successes that we had... ...from a business perspective. If we could make a deal with Warner Brothers and get some of their key properties that they could PAY

for the programming and it would reduce our-- our investment costs and I would get some big brands. I was very close with (personally and professionally) with Margaret Loesch, the head of FOX KIDS. Oh, Jean MacCurdy's a wonderful, long-time friend. And that's where it was being broadcast. I was having fun... [ laughs ] and y'know, I mean, they charged me with setting up the Television Division at Warner Brothers. Which was, at the time, a HUGE job. Warner Brothers, by the way, was not the Warne

r Brothers lot. "Warner Brothers" was a-- a bank in-- in Sherman Oaks where they had all the-- the animation offices. Warner Brothers hadn't done animation for quite a while. So, when "Tiny Toons" was started, Spielberg wanted to have a studio-- Warner Brothers Studio-- and bring it back. And-- and so, that happened because of Spielberg. I think that they had so much success with animation-- with the new Animation Division that they were forming, that they wanted to expand. They did have a depa

rtment that did commercials... But it was a VERY small group and we went from 15 to what-- 150 people within about three months. So, it was-- it was a HUGE push and it was exciting. Jamie knew that I was a fan of some of the Warner Brothers properties like Batman. She was definitely the one who had the guts to say, "No, we can do this in a" y'know, "in a more sophisticated way than "Super Friends" or anything that comes-- that came before." WE really wanted to do "Batman", we BOTH did. Jean and

I both wanted to do "Batman." The other five projects that were there were all comedy based. And Jean and I both wanted to do "Tasmania" and I also wanted "Tiny Toons." I was the Producer on "Tiny Toons" and I was writing lotsa stuff and producing those and seeing those through post. And... same thing with "Animaniacs." So, we ended up working out a deal where for a certain amount of years we got the properties. And Steven Spielberg, at around this same time, had been pitching an idea (I think

he and Tom Ruegger had worked on it) and that's "Animaniacs" ...which, of course we loved. So, tha-- "Animaniacs" was folded into the deal. Jean MacCurdy and Tom Ruegger really had this bug where they really wanted to do a Fleischer-style cartoon. And, of course, only Batman could be that. Bruce had done a page of character designs, and with my couple backgrounds we submitted that artwork and that was how Jean, y'know, saw the style and thought, "Well, this is interesting. Let's maybe pursue t

he Batman thing as an action show." To FOX's credit, they really wanted: THAT. They really wanted a show that had real peril. That series would not have happened in ANY form that we know it, if it hadn't been for-- for FOX KIDS, for-- for Karen Barnes and then absolutely positively for-- for Sidney Iwanter. I mean he-- he shephered the series... Two of our biggest successes: "X-Men" and "Batman." ...and he's the reason the show turned out to be the great show that it is. He's the unsung hero

. Oh, yes! Sidney was on my team. Sidney was one of my program executives. Sidney was with the Network so Alan was the day-to-day. And remember, Sidney would give notes. Sidney wouldn't sit in a story meeting. Y'know, we'd get-- we'd send a script and he'd come back and say, "Well, we can do this, we can do that." But I'm sure Alan probably talked to Sidney a lot about stories we wanted to do so, I wouldn't underestimate Sidney's role. Alan Burnett once, (we were talking about Sidney) and he s

ays, "You know, every great writer in the business respects and loves Sidney. Every mediocre writer can't stand him." [ laughs ] Jean MacCurdy said, "Let's-- let's do Batman." I mean, the front office wanted it. Warner Brothers was loaded at that moment. They had a lotta "Batman" money from the movies. They saw the success of "Tiny Toons" and they realized, "He we've got a unit of accomplished artists and animators and writers who can make a good Batman show." So, they told MacCurdy, "Let's--

let's explore this." Jamie first approached ME. "How would you like to have Batman? What if we did this overall deal with Warner Brothers?" and very quickly it escalated to where Jean and I were talking about the creative. Y'know, the great thing about Batman was nobody had seen anything like it before. And so, it was-- it took a lot of people aback. That's not what was allowed by any network... ...not since "Johnny Quest." It's not something like that hadn't be done before a bit, but "Johnny

Quest": that was a big deal. I think that the glue that tied everything together was Bruce and Eric. So, at first Bruce and Eric were handling all the production angles and they were getting some stories under way. Bruce and I were complete novices to being in producing roles so, we were learning what producers were as we were: producing. The excecutives at FOX were questioning that. They were wondering if Bruce and Eric could handle ALL the aspects. Out of this relationship between me and Jean

and Jamie's relationship with Warner Brothers (the one he built), we were able to come together with this terrific deal and WE ended up (FOX) being the beneficiary of getting some excellent shows that we didn't pay for. Warner Brothers put a lotta money into them. We shared with them advertising time. FOX was-- was pretty good to us. They didn't-- they didn't mess with us too much. And then, of course, it also had to go through the higher-ups. It had to go through Jean MacCurdy and Tom Ruegger.

No, I loved it. I mean, I loved it from the beginning. I was a good passionate... champion for the show, I think. When I was around and available, Jean would call me into the "Batman" meetings. And when she couldn't do them, I would do them and basically... it was just to keep up with what was going on. And we would occassionally take calls from FOX when FOX was unhappy with maybe the way a story was going. The suits would say, "Oh my God, it's so dark." [ laughs ] And then you'd go, "Yes, th

at's the whole point!" [ laughs ] So, it-- it was that kind of a balance. I mean, we were working on "Batman" in the early '90s and that was when Batman was in the-- the post-"Killing Joke" era where everything was dystopian, y'know and, DARK y'know and Batman was sort of like this neurotic, angst-filled teenager. We didn't have Robin there at the beginning. We wanted this solo hero... kind of a-- a loner for sure. If you see Batman, if you actually see him: you're in big trouble. They basically

asked us, (Jean specifically), if we would put together some sort of presentation and I think Bruce and I just both said, "Why don't we do a piece of animation? 'Cuz that's the only way you're really gonna get a sense of how this might play." To present to FOX Television and say, "Hey look! Here's this TV series and we're-- we're prepared to make this thing if you'll prepare to buy it." They produced a sizzle reel. The best way would be to showcase Gotham City. Just the mysterious factor and th

e vigilante factor of Batman. And this was the sales pitch. Tim Sarnoff was the Vice President of production, so he ran the budget and schedule, reported to Jean... Went in, talked with him, gave him a general idea of what we thought we were going to need because I got a-- an estimate from the studio somewhere in the range of about $90,000... ...and that's all-in. Eric promoted the idea that we would be a good-- studio to execute this idea, and in hand he had these Zellers Batman commercials tha

t we'd done. So, we'd "done a Batman", right? Done in Canada which y'know, it's not Korea. Which Korea-- If we had done the same thing in Korea at that time, it woulda probably been half that cost. And whatever channels he had to go through to make it happen...he DID. Greg Duffell was the artist. There was no management hierarchy to any great extent. They'd been given this little job to do or this project to start fleshing out and-- and they were doing it. There was literally no digital assist

. All the effects were hand done. So, $90,000 is a drop in the bucket these days. Y'know, I woke up in a start and I looked over at the clock and it was at four-o'clock in the morning and I go, like Batman, "I gotta go to work." [ laughs ] You know? "Batman" owes a, y'know, incredible-- debt of gratitude to him and his studio because he-- he took it on and he knew what we wanted to do and he had the facility to do it. And everybody was wowed by it. That had made its way all around the industry.

It was like everybody was like, "Oh my gosh, this is amazing!" It's a thing of beauty. It's a thing of beauty! It wasn't lame it was like, "Oh my God, this is SO COOL!" Y'know the timing was crisp. The drawing was beautiful. From that moment I saw that I was like, "Oh my God... These guys are doing a serious, Fleischer Brothers-style Batman. I HAVE to be on board. I-- I HAVE to be on this show." [ chuckles ] And you think, "Oh, I could have done a much better job on this if we'd just been gi

ven some time." And I wouldn't have charged a penny more! I think one conversation with-- Margaret Loesch at FOX KIDS and it was sold. Jean and I got on the phone agreeing what we wanted to do... ...and BOOM, we got the deal done. And I said, "Well how did it all go?" "Oh, we sold the show!" Says, "But we never had to show the video." They sold the thing with a video sight unseen. They ended up buying 65 episodes right out of the gate. And then we realized, "Well, now we've gotta make this thing

." And "Batman" was an entirely different show with entirely different goals. We set out to do a drama. And we're gonna make it really dramatic. We're gonna push the envelope on dramatic. We're gonna have parents writing us letters about, "Wait, this isn't for kids. This is too dramatic." So many of them there are these sort of mind trips that the different characters go on. That was NEVER for kids. There was alotta concern about how dark it was. There was alotta concern about how adult it was

. It's absolutely gorgeous... Dark and mysterious... It's got the pacing of a '30s movie. So, it was trying to not only explain why we felt that was important, but defend it. But you know what happens in our business? Once something comes-- becomes a hit: the criticism stops. Focus! Focus! FOCUS! We started on Batman in, like '90. Well, when we started FOX KIDS, that was in 1990. That audition was in 1991. Boy, these are names I haven't uttered in-- in 20 years. This is 30 years ago you under

erstand. We knew we had something special. We KNEW it. They didn't KNOW that it was gonna work. They didn't know "Batman" was going to be (in 30 years) the-- template by which all dramatic animated series... ...measured. Okay, here's the story... I heard from Brad Rader who I had worked with... Bruce was already well aware of Kevin. ...and he told me that they were doing a-- "cool version of Batman" over at the new Warner Brothers Animation that was formed. How this worked out is: I kinda new B

ruce from DIC we-- I worked on Ghostbusters, he worked on some stuff there. And I had worked with Kevin Altieri for years. I was a New York theatre actor who happened to be in L.A. doing a pilot for a series. I was booked by my agent to go in and do some incidental voices on that particular episode. OK, that was "Pretty Poison." He said, "It's animated." and I said, "Oh, Man, I don't know ANYthing about animation." And a really wonderful casting director who's a friend of Andrea's who worked in

the theater in New York, said, "You should look at Kevin Conroy. He's a good classically trained actor and... ...you're doing a heroic role." Jean and I were executive producers on the show. Jean MacCurdy, who ran Warner Brothers Animation and I had met at Hanna-Barbara and we had gone over to Warner Brothers. She brought me over to do "Tiny Toons." Tom was a busy guy at that time because Tom... was running "Tiny Toons"... And with that success, y'know she kept giving me things to do. Tom was t

he head of Warner Animation (the creative side) Chief Creative Officer of-- of Warner Brothers Animation and I don't really know what that means, but I I tended to get dragged into meetings now and then. Jean ran the business side-- it was Jean MacCurdy. I was the one who tried to bridge the gap between the people doing the drawing and-- and all that and the suits at the studio: the money guys, the-- the big bosses trying to keep them happy, and/or the Network. And it's not that they always had

horrible ideas, or unrealistic concerns, but it was trying to figure out what THEIR concern was and translate it back to the-- to the people on staff. And I walked in and I had no idea - unbeknownst to me - whatever actor they had / actress they had chosen to play Poison Ivy was either: unable to do it, was sick OR the producers didn't like her performance as much as they thought they would. And so, here we were, to record the first thing and Andrea said to me (Romano) said to me, "You think y

ou can do this? Would you like to audition for it?" And I said, "Oh, SURE!" because, of course, every actor says "YES!" right away. I didn't even know it had never been an-- an animated show. That's how-- that's how naïve I was. I had no idea, NONE. I didn't read the comics. I had no idea who Poison Ivy was. I was not a big comic book reader as a kid. Said, "Didn't you ever read the comic books when you were a kid?" and I said, "No, I-- I never did." and he said, "What kind of childhood did you

HAVE?" [ laughs ] He loves telling people that story. He said, "Can you believe this guy never read comic books when he was a kid? What's the matter with him?!" And I went up there and it was lunch time. And everybody was gone including the receptionist. So, I just went down to the producers (y'know, Barbara Simon was there), I went down to the producer's office and I just laid my script right on her desk so that when she came back from lunch it was like sitting right there. So, I went over an

d I met them. I-- I had no IDEA what I was getting into. I'd NEVER done an animated voice. I'd never AUDITIONED for an animated voice. At the same time we were making "Batman," we were making "Tiny Toon Adventure" episodes and we were starting to develop "Animaniacs." So, I was thinking, "Oh yeah right, this'll be another goofy... ...version of Batman. Just what we need." So, I get a phone call from Kevin, "Hey, Dan! How'd ya' like to work on Batman?" I'm like, "YES! I-- YES, I DO!" I mean, I

really owe my entire career to Sidney and-- and to-- and to Margaret too for letting me do it while I was an employee of FOX KIDS Network. Which, I don't think you can get away with doing anything like that nowadays. What I recall was just that they went, y'know, "Would you like to write for this series?" "Yeah!" They give me the script. They did show me what she looked like and I went, "Oh...a kind of a sexy Tinker Bell." Right? 'Cuz that's how she looks. Y'know, "Tinker Bell with hormones" I

have liked to say. I never really felt he looked like me but-- but then again, I'm just not that handsome. And Andrea Romano had for five months been casting this show. They couldn't find the right person. And then she gets on the phone and she goes, "RANDY!" Man, she knows my name! That's a good sign! "I read your script, I loved it... ...and I gave it to the Producer of the show, who's coming in." (That would be Alan at the time) And she said, "And HE liked it and he wants to meet you." And

I said, "Well, you're telling the-- the Hamlet story." I said, "That's Hamlet!" And he laughed. He looked at Andrea, he said, "Well, no one's made THAT comparison." [ laughs ] "That's a new one in OUR audition!" I have a friend that worked at DC and his name was Bob Wayne. And he was the one who first showed me this opening to "Batman". You know the: [ ♪ sings "Batman" theme ♪ ] ...And then all that. And I said, "Man, that's fantastic." I said, "I'd love to work for something like that." And

then I just went home, y'know and then later DC called me up and said, "Would you like to do this?" And I'm sure Bob-- y'know, I KNOW Bob put a-- a bug in their ear about it. I went, "Okay...yeah. Alright." I do my-- my "cosmetic voice" which I had learned-- earned lotsa money doing my cosmetic voice. OK? And then, but however, she's a PhD. "Oh! So, she has brains." [ as Poison Ivy ] So, my cosmetic voice with a little edge to it. Because she can THINK. And I said, "Well, let me just use my im

agination and-- and see what happens." So, I just put myself in the head of that child who sees that happen. And what kind of a man would that develop into? [ as Batman ] And I went to this dark, husky [ normal voice ] place. It worked out well for-- for everyone. FOX liked having someone that THEY knew writing for their shows, and the studios liked having someone who had the Network's ear (and could get things approved) writing for their shows. So, it-- it was kind of a-- a win-win in that sit

uation. So, I grabbed whatever I had portfolio-wise and I brought that to show Bruce. And Bruce went through it: [ imitates smoking ] "Well, uhm... I really need a character designer." "Uhh-- Okay! I'll do that!" Y'know, I-- I wanted to be a board artist but, "Fine! I'll do-- I'll do character designs!" And everyday after school it came on and we all sat on the couch: my wife, my-- my kids and-- and me. And we'd watch Batman! Hot Damn! Y'know, I really enjoyed it already. I mean, I though

t it was great. But when they asked me to do it I was really excited and my kids: I-- I was their hero for a little while. Walking into a Hollywood audition for the ONE superhero who is NOT a superhero. And he said, "I like this script. I'm gonna buy it." Like at the end of that first meeting Bruce handed me a script. They hired me on the spot. They said, "That's it! That's the sound. That's the character." And I auditioned and they went, "You got the job." And when I need you, I'll call. Bru

ce and Eric had done the promo and then they staffed up. So, there were three or four (basically, I call them "units"), but teams. Kevin Altieri had his own team with storyboard artists and designers. I was actually the first director to be hired. Oh! Kevin's the best. Kevin's the freakin' best! Kevin is possibly my favorite director that I've worked with throughout my career. I've worked with him multiple times and it's always-- well, not "always", but-- usually, a really good experience. Yea

h, actually I did work with Kevin the most because he, y'know we were friends for years already and so, we really-- we were fairly tight. "This is" y'know "This is BATMAN!" it's like, "And I get to do BATMAN!" Is he Mr. Cool? Surfer, biker, and an unbelievably good artist. He bonded with the Batman series that it became very much, probably the most of all the directors. There was Boyd Kirkland, Frank Paur... Boyd Kirkland I really liked. Yeah, I worked with Boyd a lot. At FOX we kinda had a bi

as toward the Dick Sebast episodes. We just thought that he really directed very, very well. We all have similar influences, but we have different approaches and each show had its own kind of style. But, keep in mind, the designs were often coming from Bruce and the backgrounds often coming from Eric. You visualize these things that will make the audience y'know, feel and live the moment. Really, the directors had their hands full just creating these cinematic storyboards which were a TON of wor

k. The storyboards are beautiful. I mean, they-- they were works of art. There was an overall look and overall mandate. But if you look at each individual show, they all have their own personalities and their own quirks. Kevin Altieri's work: by far, I mean just...brilliant. Most directors at least do some-- generally do some clean-up and-- and sometimes will restage things. And that was-- that was a lotta work to oversee. Not only storyboarding, but-- but all the layouts. Which was like key ani

mation, poses basically, the placement of the characters. It's really important. ALTIERI: It was one of the first times (one of the few times) that you really get to exercise your individual style as a director. Hey, you wanna take extra time to plus the stories? Have fun! [ laughs ] Batman is why I'm a writer. People tend to overlook how well written the show is. The-- the scripts were just remarkable. I have enough trouble approaching one character and figuring it out. But they'll, they'll

have half a dozen in their head at the same time, orchestrating them. I mean, I was always watching the episodes. They brought in the best writers. They-- they had the best artists. They had the best stories. If you don't have a good story, and-- and, and mix that also with-- with great dialogue and great performances and actors you're gonna fall short no matter how good it looks. And the real issue at the beginning was: the stories. It was never really aimed at kids as a show. The characters a

re WAY too complicated, the stories are complicated, the psychodrama... Y'know, you have these psychodramas where you have these characters who have all these y'know psychological maladies. People like y'know, The Riddler, Harley or whoever. In beginning, these are villains that all are rooted in the natural world. When you write stuff you're supposed to be honest. You're supposed to be writing about real things even if you're writing about Batman. The team they had hired wasn't quite getting it

. And they were kind of doing a-- a childish Batman, like a little kid's Batman. It was not going in a good direction initially. They were kinda like theme villains where it's like, "Well, the Cat's Eye Diamond is in town. I wonder who's gonna try and steal that." The scripts were used because we-- we really had no choice. We had to keep things cooking. I know Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski had much, y'know-- had a much grander vision. I was certainly trying to stay on top of where we stood with i

t regard to the schedule and what-- making sure we were gonna meet the demands. You would get the green light y'know, sometimes as late as January and you had to have 65 episodes in the can by September. In one of the very first story meetings we got together, it was an all day thing. We're all around the table. We had a tape recorder on and people recording and everybody was throwing out ideas and Tom was at that meeting and-- and he was throwing out lots and lots of ideas. Tom was obviously v

ery involved in the early stages. Y'know, he wrote a couple of the-- the earlier episodes: the ones that-- that actually WERE working. Which wasn't the plan but we-- we were behind and we had to get going. If the show doesn't show up on time, you're losing money. Y'know, there were air dates that had to be met so, you couldn't really stop the-- the moving train. One show doesn't make it then another show HAS to be done so that the schedule is filled. You've got new shows being written and concei

ved, and you've got shows in edit that are being finalized, and everything in between. Yeah, it was crazy. It was crazy. That's why you would have multiple story editors, and multiple writing teams and... ...it was just chaos. At that point, Jean MacCurdy said, "Tom, help organize some of the writing." There's a thing called a bible, which I think probably Tom worked on, too. I-- I rewrote a bible. ROGEL: What the environment is, the kinda stories we wanna do. It gives you the tone of the sho

w and who's and that way, y'know: there's a guy named Commissioner Gordon. There's a y'know, girl named Barbara Gordon, y'know. And it tells you who they are... Sidney's a purist. He's very, very creative and he wants excellence, and he's not very tolerant of anything less than excellence. And he was the one who fairly demanded that they bring in Alan Burnett. Who had worked on some of the Super Friends from the Hanna-Barbara days and knew that he DIDN'T wanna do THAT again. Alan Burnett is th

e godfather of "Batman." "Batman" is what it is because of Alan Burnett. Now, Bruce Timm's artwork is seminal too. I think on THAT side HE'S the godfather and certainly with Eric too (Eric who moved on to Marvel). But, in terms of the stories, and putting the staff together, and running the whole thing. You know, what are the characters? What are the animation? Where does it fit? Alan... And he interfaced with DC, he interfaced with Warner Brothers. It was his vision, it was his watch... ...an

d all of the stories, everything went through Alan and he was just like Mr. Zen/Mr. Cool. And I looked back-- I was talking with him and said, "You must be pretty proud." 'Cuz he doesn't like, y'know. 'Cuz he's done-- he's produced so many shows, y'know. And he's very-- he's very modest about it, very humble. Alan Burnett and-- and Paul Dini, (who are truly experts in Batman) if I ever went astray, they would bring me back to the right path. Once Alan and Paul were in place, the writing just to

ok off and it became fantastic and Bruce and Eric were delighted. The Network was delighted. Everybody was happy. But, yeah, you would have to change the scripts quite often because there would always be that discussion of like, "We can not afford to do this." No, that never happened to me. Every script I wrote was perfect! No, you have story editors too. They themselves because of the preferences they had for the kind of stories they wanted to tell, inherently made the series have a variety of

stories from the get-go. Michael Reaves, who was my editor, who was an AMAZING editor, I never-- I always feel like he never gets the credit he deserves because he-- he shaped that show so wonderfully. I know he shaped the things I worked on just because we had some of the same interests. I was kinda close with Martin Pasko 'cuz he was a comics writer and I wanted to break into comics. There were some changes, of course. I mean, nothin' comes out just like it is. I mean, you got a bunch of guy

s on the other end with some paint, and and they interpret things differently. But, you know what? They were kind-- kind to me, and I-- I think that it was one of those wonderful experiences where they really said, "You know what? This guy's written a good script: we're gonna be kind to that script." I changed the livin' hell out of "Feat of Clay pt. 2" and Marv Wolfman was like, "Oh Man, I LOVE what you did with the show! That's great! That's a great idea." So, the first one was with Marty,

the second one was with Michael Reaves, and the third one was Paul Dini. And each of them was a unique episode and each of them had a unique kind of tone. I wasn't like a consistent writer for Batman. I wasn't working every week on an episode or something like that. They just came to me when they had somethin' they thought would suit my personality. I was sort of the gang writer there y'know, for everybody and they just had me working one script after the other, which was great, they trai-- and

then y'know, Alan would bring me in and go, "No. This is bad. This is terrible. This is awf--" [ laughs ] I want to work with villians who help us understand Batman better. I sort of brought what I thought of was a '60s Detective Comic mentality to a sort of '50s-vibe. And it really also had a '40s-vibe. I wasn't even in the Union. When they found out I wasn't in the Union, they freaked, Man. They said, "You gotta get in the Union right now or we're gettin' s-- y'know, we'll get in trouble!"

[ ♪ "On Leather Wings" Sub-Main Title ♪ ] RUEGGER: "On Leather Wings" which was our first to air in the primetime slot. We started talking about a primetime airing and trying to do all the bells and whistles to get it the attention that I thought it deserved. Yeah, they ran it for-- for a quarter (FOX did), on Sunday nights at 7-o'clock up against 60 Minutes. It didn't do very well but it was on in primetime. [ laughing ] We were trying to get more exposure, more ratings, a larger audience and

it was a good, promotional strategy. One of my favorite episodes. I did cleanup on the Man-Bat show. I did the transformation sequence. It started out very encouraging with "On Leather Wings." It felt like that pretty much was working. Yeah, well, I-- I thought one of the reasons it was chosen as the first one was 'cuz actually it was like an unfamiliar character. Man-Bat: y'know... Whatever the reasons were, it was like Man-Bat: was first. The answer to that question is, quality. Quality! Bec

ause you want to put your best foot forward. You take your best shows and put them up front so that you get people hooked into the show and-- and into the series, so that if you have a clunker, they kinda forgive you. "On Leather Wings" was the most gorgeous episode we had at the time of our premiere. I think he likes bats better than people. I can't imagine. Everything that is Batman is in it. [ ♪ Batman theme plays ♪ ] SKIR: I was nuts about it. I mean, it's visually stunning, it's beautiful,

it's a character that we hadn't seen before in animation. As an introduction to all of the characters - the essential characters - that one really covered it. The one aspect that the Network wasn't entirely comfortable with was the-- Batman was being treated TOO much as a vigilante. I want my own tactical squad for the sole purpose of throwin' the net over this 'Batman.' - Commissioner? I've already denied the request. Nobody's taking a vigilante force onto my streets. Your Honor, any nutcase t

hat dresses up like a bat sooner or later is gonna snap. He wasn't as sanctioned by Commissioner Gordon in that episode and it's the-- you can still see traces of that but it was even more like, the police are chasing him. At least, in one iteration of it. Just make sure the D.A.'s office can give me an airtight case, sir. If you catch 'em, Harvey, I'll put 'em in jail for ya'. 'Gotham Police Declare War On Batman'... So, that was one thing they dialed back on. But, the third act of that episode

, where the dirigibles in the sky over Gotham-- I mean, talk about a brilliant and unusual and unique set piece. That was our-- we were going for third act set pieces in a lot of the episodes where something big and extravagant and expensive would be produced. It's the reveal of The Batcave. It's the reveal of how secretly he gets in and outs-- of The Batcave. Which is a direct swipe from "Bulleteers" by the Fleischer Brothers. I-- I always loved that drawbridge that the Bulleteers' car comes ou

t of. And they did all these little things that-- that told you you were watching something that was as sophisticated as a 1940's Bob Clampett cartoon. One instance that I'll say that I did: where Kirk Langstrom is walking over and talking to Batman. He says, "He's really quite brilliant." My God, Marc Singer! I was looking to him to guide me. It just shows you that we're all brothers and sisters under the skin. The Beastmaster! I got to meet The Beastmaster. [ laughing ] It's a funny thing, Th

e Beastmaster, y'know one day you're walking along the street like anybody else and the next day you're The Lone Ranger. It's like you could've staged that with him just standing on one side of the room and do some rapid cutting back and forth. But it's much more enjoyable I think, that he walks... SKIR: And you're seeing him through a series of beakers and colanders and things. And they're all being distored as they walk. It's like, okay, they're putting all the extra oomph into this. You're j

ust making things interesting. That episode features something that we never see at-- ever again. After the fight, Batman has a little trickle of blood down here. No. We're not-- we're not doing that again. If we had had a-- a different episode that was equally gorgeous and dynamic and brilliant it would've been a tough choice, but it wasn't. ♪ Jingle Bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg! The Batmobile lost a wheel and the Joker got away! ♪ "Christmas with the Joker" was, of course, much go

ofier. No one had seen a script. So, the-- it came into the-- to the Network as a storyboard. ♪ Crashing through the roof, in a one horse open tree, busting out I go, laughing all the WHEE! ♪ [ laughing ] And the Network went ballistic because the original story for "Christmas with the Joker" was that he kidnapped a random family, and held the random family hostage: including the kids! Rumor has it, Christmas is a time to share with family. [ crowd cheers & applauds ] And since I don't have o

ne of my own... [ crowd aahs ] ...I decided to steal one. [ crowd cheers ] ISENBERG: The Network says, "We cannot DO that." And Warner Brothers is like, "Yeah, but we're already so far down the line in the production of this." So... so they came to the compromises: "Well, what if they kidnapped y'know, the authority figures? What if they kidnapped Commissioner Gordon and-- and Bullock?" ALTIERI: But that atmosphere of that is much different than Man-Bat. It's never easy with The Joker. After t

hat, there were just-- there were-- the episodes were just not hitting the mark. They were either too-- too violent, they were too dark... Preachy, a little bit too many lessons, a little bit too 'Saturday Morning' in that sense. I think at the Network we couldn't describe it either as what it was that felt like, y'know the Goldilocks-version of-- of "Batman." And in a sense they redeveloped it to say, "OK, it's more about Batman helping people who need help." That's when you got episodes more l

ike "I've Got Batman in My Basement" y'know, basically they were throwin' stuff at a wall and just seein'-- seein' what stuck. What am I doing? I'm not old enough to drive! And it still wasn't working and it really wasn't until Paul Dini did "Heart of Ice"... Paul's a great story guy. I've been friends with Paul for over 40 years. I mean, we are real tight, we-- I-- I love him like a brother. Paul Dini - you could always talk to him. "Oo, wait! I got an idea: can I do this?" "Oh, that's a good

idea!" or "Nah, I don't know" y'know, there was always that back and forth. 'Cuz he was GREAT at digging under y'know, the skin of the bad guys and he would give people origin stories. He's the reason that Mr. Freeze became a great character. ROGEL: Paul wrote the first one, it was just terrific with that "Heart of Ice." MACCURDY: One of the most powerful scripts that we had. It was REALLY dark. It was probably darker than anything and more tragic than anything that had come before but it wa

s well-written. It had heart to it. Very moving and very touching and really showed the depth of-- of the potential of those characters. And Freeze is a really interesting villain too 'cuz he's-- he's a-- a sympathetic villain. Oof! OH! Get out. GET OUT! Nora! Nora... [ hand squeaks on glass ] [ white noise static ] My God... ISENBERG: It had a lot of action but it wasn't violent. It's my concern now. Since you ally yourself with my enemies you leave me no choice. [ freeze weapon blasts ] ♪

It was more fantastical because you had the freeze weaponry. [ man screams ] Y'know, it's not gunplay it's not bullets. I put Mr. Freeze at the bottom of the pile because y'know, MR. FREEZE. I mean, I wanna read a Joker story y'know, I wanna read a y'know-- what's Catwoman got to offer? Y'know, I finally got to this last script which was "Heart of Ice" and I'm like, "Okay, well let's read the Mr. Freeze script." As soon as I'm finished reading it, I-- I call my then writing partner Marty Isenber

g who was working at FOX KIDS... As a receptionist at the same time as-- as writing on "Batman", I had access to everything that was coming in. He was the reason that I was able to get the scripts, 'cuz the two of us were-- were trying to pitch for the series: which was never gonna happen because we were comedy writers. We had done "Beetlejuice" the "Batman" Folks weren't gonna wanna know from us. I would see the storyboards for my episodes when they came in and I'd, y'know, bring out the Xerox

and I'd bring a copy to Bob. So... I called Marty and I'm like, "Who's Paul Dini?" [ laughs ] I don't know who this guy Paul Dini is, but he's got it. He's the Writer who can write the most amazing "Tiny Toons" and then turn around and write the most amazing "Batmans." This is the mix. This is what it needs to be. This guy's AMAZING. How did he do that? [ laughs ] He made it look so damn simple. How can WE do that?! ROGEL: Then they had a sample script which was "Pretty Poison." And I-- I be

lieve Tom wrote that with-- with Paul. RUEGGER: And it starts with Harvey Dent and the gal who will become Poison Ivy having dinner. And it was such a terrific script. And that's another thing I LOVED about it, was: Harvey Dent is the D.A. for quite a while. The continuity is wonderful. Harvey Dent's talking about his pal Bruce Wayne. And Bruce is supposed to join them for dinner and, "Where is he?" and, "Oh, he's probably home napping." We cut to these shots of Batman having this horrible figh

t on a rooftop with a-- a terrible thug. And then we go back to the dinner, says, "Well, what kinda guy is he?" "Well, he's-- he's kinda BORING." And then we cut back to Batman. That little cinematic intercut sequence: I was very happy with that. And when I read it immediately I go, "Oh! I get THIS. I get-- I get how this worked." Randy was just starting on the show and he-- he read that script and he said, "I finally got-- got the show when I saw that sequence." I said, "Oh, we're making li

ttle movies." and he said, "Yeah, that's the idea." ♪ Batman was almost an incidental figure moving through three other people's story. It was written as a show about teamwork. About Bullock now wanting to play with the other cops. Hey, I'll tell ya' who's to blame: Batman. You saw The Batman too? C'mon, Harvey, Batman's fault? Then whose fault is it, Officer? I don't know, but I'm sure it wasn't Batman. The way the script was originally written, it was a flashback to his childhood. He's been t

aught as a child not to follow others and to take and to lead and to charge and to not work with others. And this was this entire like five-minute insert and-- and while he's being interrogated where he's remembering this. And it was like, "Oh my GOSH! This is CRAZY!" 'Cuz Kevin's just like, "BOOM! Out this goes! I-- we can't do this. We don't have TIME for it." Either you start coming up with some answers or hand over your badges. ALTIERI: The Lieutenant. The guy who's causing all the trou

ble. Who's like, "One of you is LYING!" I wanted HIM to be the bad guy. So, that's kind of why that design was there and it's like, when he comes out of the shadows it would be revealed that it's like, that it's him. It would've fit the whole "P.O.V." m-- motif. Well, it turns out there's no way that they could do that back then because part of the edict for Saturday Morning was that we could never show a police officer in a bad light; that was one of our rules. The collar belongs to all three o

f us. It was a TEAM effort. Gee, thanks, Partner. [ Bullock grumbles ] What was that, Bullock? ♪ I said, thanks a lot, Montoya. And yet, y'know, the show came out pretty good regardless of those issues. ♪ CONROY: "Perchance to Dream" where Batman goes into his childhood and deals with Thomas Wayne, his father. What they did with me is they had an idea that they couldn't whip for whatever reason so they said, "Let's get Lansdale. I think this is in his wheelhouse." So, I got a pages and it said,

"We want a story about The Mad Hatter... Bruce Wayne - his double life", it was very general. And so, then I would sit down and start playin' with it 'til I made a script out of the idea. (Thomas Wayne) Son? You sound upset. Is something the matter? ♪ No...no, it's impossible. No! It can't be you...it CAN'T be! LANSDALE: That's the only one that I ever did like that and that was-- that was Michael Reaves idea. ♪ If you watch, "It's Never Too Late" and then... turn off that and go get a copy

of "Angels with Dirty Faces." You'll see that I didn't have a lot of creativity [ laughing ] in my story because it's basically-- it's very similar to "Angels with Dirty Faces." It's sort of a tribute to that. ♪ [ train rushes by ] ♪ It kinda showed that we could do these sort of semi-serious stories that didn't have a flashy villain but still had some meaning. If you wanna know who Batman is; watch the end of "His Silicon Soul" where this robot who for all intent and purposes has become Batman

realizes he has taken a life, and takes his own life in return. And sacrifices himself to save the world because he cannot allow himself to take people's lives and he cannot allow the world to suffer because of him. ♪ [ punch lands ] [ cape rips ] [ Batman screams ] NO! I've taken a LIFE. My city, my people, what have I done?! [ SCREAMING IN AGONY ] [ duplicant Batman grunts ] [ computer explodes ] ♪ [ duplicant hits Batmobile ] [ electric zap ] ♪ [ electric whirring ] One of the things that-- f

rom Bruce to Eric to-- [ laughs ] to Alan Burnett. I just said before-- y'know, even before I was hired, I said, "Just promise me that when Ra's al Ghul shows up; I get to do him." That was a conversation that happened and Kevin again, did it justice. I think he was in his glory making that. Ever since I was 13 and I first read the Ra's al Ghul stories in the Denny O'Neil / Neal Adams comics. I don't know why it was that. Maybe it was that was the first time that you really saw a globe-trotti

ng Batman. I don't know why but-- it was like the love interest of Talia was another thing about it. I just wanted to do that as a cartoon. From when I was 13. ♪ ALTIERI: Bruce and (with the blessing of Alan Burnett), Bruce and I came up with like a different concept. We said, "What would we wanna do?" y'know, and everyone says, "Oh! It's a Spielberg movie!" and it's like, no, it's not a Spielberg movie it's a Hammer film. And then we'd said, "Oh, yeah, and if it's a Hammer film; what would the

y do with the mummy?" y'know, it's like well, you have the Christopher Lee-style mummy... "Oh, no! It's a beautiful like-- it's a beautiful Nefertari pharaoh. Which is actually this hideous creature that sucks your soul outta your y'know, out of your face. [ laughs ] Y'know we just made it into a Hammer film. And so, that opening; there was no script for it. That was pretty much us pitching to Mike Goguen 'cuz Mike Goguen drew that. That's the reason why we did it specifically so that there i

s no dialogue necessary. And Talia is pretty much his soulmate. I have to go after him, Talia. Will you help me? You are so like him making me choose between the two of you. Oh, Beloved, why has he forsaken me? Does he think I've betrayed him? I can't pretend to know what Ra's thinks, Talia. The only thing he and I have ever agreed upon is our feelings towards you. ALTIERI: He talks about his feelings for her and he really does have them. But, some of the poses of Ra's al Ghul, heavy shoulders

and the look; that was - and to this day - is a Kevin stance. [ laughing ] That's the way when Kevin wants to be Kevin, he will stand with that proud sort of Greek God / Superman attitude, and it's just natural to Kevin. SKIR: What makes Batman different from the villains that he fights? What is it that makes Batman: Batman, and not the person that people seem to think Batman is? Lock-Up initially came from Paul Dini. He came up with the idea for the character. I wasn't even going back to cr

ime this time. I just had to get away from; HIM. ♪ [ Scarecrow gasps ] OK, imagine if you could find somebody who could actually keep people locked away in Arkham Asylum. But imagine if he was crazier than THEY were and Batman had to take him down. You should all be locked up in a cage without a key! I'm all about this. This is great. This is fantastic. And what's brilliant in the episode (I mean, it's utterly brilliant) is that the character designers put him in Batman's colors. Everything he

's wearing is blue and grey and black with just a little yellow in it and it completely emulates Batman's costume and it's completely subtle. Like, I didn't realize it until like the second time I watched the episode and I'm like, "Oh my God, look what they did here. This is brilliant." He's Robert De Niro in "Taxi Driver." And there's a gag in it where he's watching a TV and he-- he just pushes it over, and that comes right from "Taxi Driver." I've seen how you treat your prisoners; forgotten

and scared, without hope or compassion. Can it be you actually CARE for those creatures? You're just as crazy as THEY are! [ metal chain slams ] They had done an incredible set of storyboards and it all paid off with this final scene in Arkham Asylum. And Dan Riba: went back and re-boarded it. Like it was really, really good but he-- he went home and he's like, "I know how to make this BETTER." I wanted to really nail that idea of him being-- that locked up in that-- that little slot and I real

ly wanted to evoke that mask that he's wearing. And I wanted to make sure that worked right. And we weren't doing animatics back then. We had to like, kind of like, really read it in the board and kinda guesstimate what this is gonna feel like. And it was all like stop watched and old school. [ electricity buzzing ] [ explosion ] [ body thuds ] HARVEY! [ Batman runs ] Harvey... no... Y'know, Harvey Dent wasn't who he was except for this tragic accident. Y'know he was in love with somebody, he wa

s a good guy, he was a D.A. ALTIERI: Alan Burnett and Randy Rogel's script for "Two-Face" part one and two was pretty tight. It's like one of those really good scripts that you don't have to DO anything to. We got to see Two-Face as a really sophisticated character. (Big Bad Harv) Harvey Dent... NO! Keep away! Leave me alone! ROGEL: Alan liked the way I wrote and he liked the stories I came up with. So, he said to me, "I'll tell you what, Youngster: I'll give you a shot. Here's what we're go

nna do... I have already written the outline to a Two-Face episode which I wanna do. I was gonna write the script. Why don't I let YOU write the script 'cuz I got a whole bunch of other things to do. And we'll bring you on and we'll try you out and if you screw this up, then I'll have to, y'know re-write the script, right?" And-- and so I REALLY paid attention to it and worked hard on it and when I came in he was re-- he says, "This is terrific. This is great." [ Harvey screams ] ♪ [ thunder cr

ashes ] Harvey! What happened? ♪ Because it was Two-Face it was a two-parter. Y'know a-- y'know... So, I went BACK to Alan and I said-- (I think he remembers this too) 'cuz it went into production and people were liking it. I said, "Do you have an idea for the second one?" [ immitating Alan ] "No, actually, I don't." I said, "Well I do." He said, "What is it?" So, I told him this idea, he goes, "No, I really hate that." I said well how 'bout THIS. And I had another idea. He went, "Well, now TH

AT I like." And that's when he said "I'll tell ya' what: how would you like me to bring you on staff?" I go, "Oh! I would LOVE that!" I mean, the thing that made the-- the climax fight scene of "Two-Face part two" was; the emotional part of it. And then where he flips the coin and Batman turns over all the coins that lands and he can't find the coin-- Alan said, "Oh, THAT'S a good idea." The fact that Batman was seriously injured during the whole fight scene and I got to use that in the action

blocking. And usually they'd come up with just a-- a much easier way to do it. I would sometimes call a shot and it-- where they-- they go "The camera would be better over here." or y'know so-- And they allowed me to make (as much as possible) every composition symmetrical. Either diagonally symmetrical, or cut in half, they were all symmetrical. It was all black against white. Poor Harvey, so filled with anger. Do ya' think there's any hope? Where there's love, there's hope, Commissioner... ♪

...but a little luck wouldn't hurt. [ coin flips ] [ coin plops in water ] For you, Harvey. ♪ The fact of the matter is we each have an almost got 'im Batman story. I know mine's the best but let's hear yours anyway. The only thing that we did that didn't get made was that me and Michael Reaves and maybe Paul Dini (I don't remember for sure). We put together a thing called "Batman Escapes" I think it was. And it was a series of Batman episo-- well, it was one episode, but a series of events with

in the episode. Where he was trying to escape from all these traps. And we wrote this proposal for it. I said, "Damn, this is wonderful. This one's gonna be there." [ laughing ] No, it-- it wasn't. I think we all-- I know Michael and I, we felt confident, Man. We-- we were already saying, "This is gonna look great on screen. We're gonna cash that check." [ laughs ] But we-- we got paid for the idea and for coming up with it but they ended up not using it. And I think it was a mistake! I thin

k it was a really good episode. There's a story that I wrote a script called "The One and Only Gun Story." I remember it well. Yeah, we thought we were gonna do it. We liked it. Batman is in the city, facing off against criminals... ...and you see a gun (a pistol) and it comes out of the corner and it clicks and the bullet starts to move in slow motion. We dissolve back to a point where (many years back), iron is mined and smelted and turned into a metal that can be used in the manufacturing of

guns. We go to that factory. We see the gun being manufactured and we see it getting sold at a-- at a gun store. To getting taken home and put in a drawer and then, y'know, that family moves and they're gonna-- they're having a yard sale and they sell the gun. And the gun winds up ultimately in the hands of a criminal. And finally this gun is used in a robbery and it is the weapon that kills Bruce Wayne's parents. Ultimately, Batman saves a kid from using this gun for some horrible purpose and

saves the kid's life. Melts down the gun and puts a brand new plaque on his parent's grave, y'know, to memorialize them many years after they died. Everyone loved it and thought it was powerful and the Network just said, "Ehh-- we don't wanna get letters." FOX was bold but they weren't THAT bold. "Mmm-- maybe that's a little too far. Maybe that's a little more than we wanna tackle." I remember I had this really cool shot where Batman is poised on a gargoyle on top of y'know, this HUGE building.

And, I did like this helicopter shot where it went all around into the city all around him as you would see it, y'know. [ laughing ] And Alan looked at me and said, "You realize that shot will cost a million dollars, right?" I said, "Why?" he said, "Because they draw these things in two dimensions. So, tha-- that's an animating background. They have to do every one of those back--" "Oh..." [ chuckles nervously ] Now, with CGI of course, they can build that into the computer. When you're writing

screenplays, you're supposed to write them in master scene. You don't talk about what you cut to, you don't talk about, y'know, camera angles. You don't talk about how the camera moves. You don't say "pan to" and "on this" and blah, blah, blah. If you do that, it is the sign of an amateur. If you DON'T do that in animation, you haven't done your job. Print-out comes out of the printer. Batman looks at it and he rubs the back of his neck. Now, you normally wouldn't tell an actor to rub the back

of his neck, but it gives the guy a thing like he's kind of like confused as to what's going on here. So, those are the kind of things you would lace in there. When you write in animation; you get to live the dream of directing from the page. The first two looked exactly like I imagined, the third; almost. And, well they, y'know they were really pretty good to me, they-- they didn't mess with my stuff much. That's exactly what I asked for. That's exactly what I wanted, and it's-- it's like Chri

stmas. And what's better is; when you ask for something and they give you MORE. When you would run into problems... ...like this script has too much. There's too many pages, or there is too much dialogue, or just what CAN be animated (y'know, with the limited budget that you have), you always have to fix that in storyboard. The dialogue is sacrosanct. You don't mess with the dialogue but you can change sa-- staging directions as necessary. When you were writing Batman, you were writing a-- a li

ttle feature film and we like to keep it cinematic and very visual. At one time probably about 70 artists in different capacities. I mean just terrific storyboard arti-- and funny guys too! By the way, you never wanna piss off a storyboard artist or a animator 'cuz when you come into work the next day, there'll be a picture of you on the billboard with a big hippo butt or something like that! [ laughs ] When I finally got to work on the Batman animated cartoon show, the character of Batman was t

he least interesting thing about the series to me. What I liked was everyone else. What I liked was the background designs. What I liked was it was staged in this weird kinda like 30's/90's conglomerate and that we got to do y'know, we got to do film noir. I mean, there is a certain amount of film noir that we all were looking for. But each director has his own influences or her own influences. Each artist brings their own thing to it. I've loved film noir since I was a teenager. When I was in c

ollege I-- I made a little film noir animated piece. So, I-- I've always really enjoyed the Bogart mystique, the detective stuff, the shadows, the dark... It had this stylistic aspect to it; everything with the whole "Dark Deco" look. That was Eric Radomski and Bruce. I-- I embraced it wholeheartedly because I think it was a perfect way to go and I think it's where Batman lives; in the shadows. Alfred Hitchcock, especially the Alfred Hitchcock from the '30s and '40s is what we were going for. Y'

know, it was Miyazaki, it was Hitchcock, it was Walt Disney, those were my favorite directors. Using black as your ally and... ...as something evocative, that's an individual choice. And so, if we look at, "On Leather Wings" you'll notice that there's like a-- a shadow over the screen a lot of the times to create that sort of noir thing. And a lotta times that's something that I think that the cameraman is adding that shadow to the shot. It wasn't something that an animator did or that-- that a

storyboard artist did. They actually added that. They knew that the show needed to be dark and it actually felt noir. Of course, every episode is all... ...it's all black. [ laughing ] Y'know, it's like black is ubiquitous for Batman. Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski both felt really motivated to work on this they both did beautiful design work. Eric came up with the whole concept of starting with black paper and bringing the buildings and the light and the skyline out of the black. Bruce Timm came

up with just gorgeous character designs; elegant and-- and simple enough to animate but complicated enough to be really interesting. There were no stray lines. I mean, Bruce's design sensibility was the absolute minimum amount of lines on characters that had to animate 'cuz they would have to be animated. It's almost minimalist. It's very spare and at the same time extraordinarily effective. ROGEL: The animation was a y'know, a hallmark of that series, just groundbreaking, just really helped d

efine it. They were able to do incredible magic tricks like make a series look like it was the 1940s and TODAY at the very same moment. MACCURDY: I think the look was so distinct, sort of timeless in a way. THAT'S what's helped it maintain its-- [ laughs ] its leverage within the world. So, people are driving cars from the 1940s, people are wearing clothes from the 1940s, but they're also using computers. And it doesn't feel jarring and no point do you go, "What the hell YEAR is this supposed

to be?" They look like an alternate universe that The Shadow would've lived in. That first crew; we all were on the same page as far as style-- what we wanted. So, I got to do background designs, character designs, they had me doing layouts. It was great, y'know, Kevin had me doing special effects background. Y'know like a speedboat on the wat-- "I don't know how to do that." [ as Altieri ] "Oh yeah, you just look at it and do it." "OK." And so I did and it was great. We all bonded on our lov

e for great artists like Jack Kirby and Alex Toth (especially Alex Toth). We didn't have our sea legs that we developed later. And it's like later on we got into a groove and later on I mean, one of the things I did to sort of keep up with the artistic Joneses was I started-- instead of drawing with pencil I started inking my boards too. [ laughing ] If anyone wasn't a big Alex Toth fan they sure didn't last very long. The two things that had inspired us the most was Fleischer "Superman" and Miy

azaki. Those are the two things that we analyzed like over and over again. And we all were working with Japanese studios and we were all just in love with the Fleischer Brothers and we studied it. We had like these really cheap tapes that you could only get bootleg tapes of the Fleischer Brothers cartoons back then. They just were not available. And we watched them continuously trying to figure out how these guys did this and tried to apply it to Saturday Morning animation. Alex Toth, Fleischer

"Superman" and Miyazaki were our-- our stylistic touchstone. I wouldn't say it was anime style but it was like what REALLY influenced me in animation (part of the reason I got into animation) was just my LOVE for Miyazaki. And that was Kevin too. And so like, "Yeah, okay. Yeah, this is what we're gonna do, we're gonna be the American Miyazaki." And "Archie Comics", y'know. We all love Dan DeCarlo. Eddie Fitzgerald; it's like him and Kevin were the first people I met that made me think that it

might be possible to do good, interesting work in animation. The discussions that happened between us all: me, Bruce, Eric, Dan Riba, y'know, Brad Rader. These were the-- these were kinda things that Dan and I and Brad had been discussing since we met in like 1984. I think it was '83/'84 when we all started working for DIC around the same time. "Well, of course it sucks, it's TV animation; what else could it possibly BE?" and then y'know, Kevin and then Kevin's friend Joe and Eddie Fitzgerald w

ere like, "Oh, no, no, no, NO. There's so much that can be done. They take-- Oh, there's no money? That's not money, look at the Japanese. They don't do the-- those aren't high budgets, y'know? They got lower budgets than WE do. We can DO that." I don't know of anybody else who's-- who's accomplished something, y'know quite like that. It's-- it's really, really something. I was in love with Japanese animation from when I was a kid. Y'know, "Astro boy," all the Tezuka cartoons. "Gigantor"; I LO

VE "Gigantor!" Beautifully cinemagraphed, y'know? So, it was what you could do with editing and camera work instead of actual drawing, and I found that profoundly influencing. You get to the end I go, "Ohhhh... that's done by some OTHER studio." And then you'd see another one where the animation was good again and it'd be TMS. And then-- y'know, and this was a running theme all the way through the '90s. You'd see stuff done by TMS and it'd be of a very, very, VERY high quality. Far beyond what

would normally be expected of television animation. There just weren't enough quality studios in Japan. We went to Korea. They were most known for assistant work and ink & paint and they usually were subcontracted by Japanese studios. And this was '91 so it was still when they were hand-painting cels. And people'll say, "Well, you're just y'know, rippin' off Japanese animation and stuff" and it's like, well, you really didn't have a choice because the Japanese shortcuts were necessary because t

hat's THEIR style. And if you're using Japanese studios you have to work with what you got. They'd start an action, then they'd cut in on a close-up, do a slow slide of the character coming through frame with a swish pan BG, yknow? And then, they do split screen-- sometimes three screens, right? And, they would do-- they'd save on background painting by using len flare-- lens flares to blow out the background. The way that it was Americanized. The way that it was like, an American product is tha

t the storyboards, the designs, the scripts, the voices; all of that's American. U.S. would give project to Japan, Japan would do the storyboard or the key directing, and key posing, THEY would subcontract to Korea. So, they essentially trained the Koreans. Korea would turn their work back into Japan, Japan would return it to the U.S., and Japan would get all the credit. And they were really good at one thing but they couldn't do everything. So, you wouldn't see that until the work came back and

you're like, "Oh my God. They-- they're not very good with assistant work. What're we gonna do?" And, y'know, it was a-- it was a big learning curve. And this is-- we're talkin' 2D animation. So, it's not digital. So, it's actually layers of acetate. So, you actually PLANNED what was gonna be on each layer of acetate. I was s-- very influenced by Eddie Fitzgerald's drawing-- storyboard drawing philosophy, which is: The less work the better. It's not about drawin' a pretty board. It's about c

ommunicating to the layout and the animators what they need to make this look good on screen. I do this sequence where they have to walk through this room to get the gun on the other side of the room and then they're bombarded as they walk through. The thing that made it especially challenging was; the KA-CHING at the end of the whole sequence was; Batman did it 'cuz he had his eyes closed the whole time. So, how am I gonna storyboard an action sequence where the hero has his eyes closed the who

le time, but you don't know it 'til the end of the sequence? Are you kidding me? I mean, how am I gonna do that? But then I thought of Hitchcock. I thought of how he used point of view. Do everything through Talia's point of view, so she's always looking at Batman from over his shoulder with his face turned away. It's exactly the kinda thing that Hitchcock would do and it was perfect. It-- it was like it had been written that way but it wasn't written that way. It was up to ME to do that and I

figured it out. And I was really proud of that. What was even cooler was when they come out to the other side, they're no longer in danger. Talia says, "How did you DO that?" And I consciously cut on "How did you do--" CUT "that", then we cut wide and they're safe. And I was going, "It's so cool that they let me do that 'cuz nobody does." And then I watched it and [ laughing ] they didn't DO that! They didn't cut in the middle of the line of dialogue. They cut after the line of dialogue and I

was going, "Darn!" And then there was also Broadcast Standards & Practices that would come after us if we did something kids could emulate. We were dealing with the issue of guns and weapons and violence and how to create a drama without being irresponsible or overly violent. Up until then, only ray guns were allowed. Thanks to Avery, thanks to Margaret Loesch y'know, everybody was-- was understanding that this was going to be something very, very different. SKIR: If you wanna have these superh

ero shows, you have to kinda respect what can and-- and what SHOULDN'T be done. But we still wanna have stakes. Broadcast Standards had not changed at all since I started working in uh-- Saturday Morning animation or just y'know, just animation. Y'know, we can't do anything that could be harmful to children. They were on this one, they-- they were very-- alert. This is the T-shirt: it's Batman basically strangling the Joker and there's a nude woman down there (well, Catwoman) RIBA: Henry Gilroy

made that T-shirt. Bruce did the drawing and it was-- it was a gag drawing that he did for something. I don't know where/how Henry got a hold of it to do it but, it was some party or Christmas gift thing that he did and he made a bunch for the crew. And on the BACK, there's an interoffice memo from FOX to us. It says "Batman Staff... I still have mine it's in-- it's in the other room. I've never worn mine. Anyway, it's notes like that. That's the kind of stuff we get from the Network. It isn't

actually a real memo, but it-- it is a list of things that we aren't allowed to do. All those things are Standards & Practices no-nos. You couldn't talk about DEATH. RUEGGER: A lot of children's shows have a lotta robots in them so-- so you can blow up a robot but, you can't kill someone. No punches to the face... Y'know, we could have somebody fall out of a helicopter, right? And fall-- but you had to show them land in water or land in a nice bush or something like that. Y'know, child endanger

ment, broken glass... They wanted everyone to be SAFE all the time. It's like everybody had to wear a seatbelt everywhere and-- [ laughing ] and if you were having a fight on a roof I think they'd want you to wear a helmet. Like, "That would send the kids into the hospital! They'd be traumatized!" And it's like, no we-- we had that when we were kids and we survived. We couldn't accommodate ALL their notes, we could not do that. There's a LOTTA shows where we would break the windows, it's-- it's

how you show it. They didn't interfere TOO much. RIBA: FOX let us have guns on the show, which nobody was allowed to shoot REAL guns. RADER: The guns had to look like; ridiculous. There were certain rules on how the guns were used. ISENBERG: We were creating kind of a new language as far as: What's acceptable? Batman dodging bullets was never gonna happen in the series even if Batman is say, capable of doing that. RUEGGER: If there was a gun it had to have a real great reason to be in the s

how. SKIR: So, instead they used "dark deco weapons" which were the same weapons but-- not described in a way that would get them flagged. But they're clearly recognizable weapons. ♪ [ gun fire ] [ man yells ] Thank God the-- the bad guys in "Batman" the first season were such lousy shots. They couldn't hit nothin'. No one betrays the Society. ALTIERI: The Shadow Society - basically our version of Hydra. And we're all fans of Kirby. We're all thinkin' the same stuff, we're all on board. It's l

ike they go and-- grab it and it's like, "May the Shadows live forever!" and then: "UGH!" [ mimics toxic gas release ] So, Batman can't get any information out of 'em. That's all we had in the board and then they said, "No, no... They're gonna think these guys are dead!" And I'm like, "Well, yeah, I dunno..." Says, "Yeah. Make sure we see that their eyes are open." And Brad Rader drew it and I'm like, "That is 10 TIMES worse!" When he lifts it up and they're just blank-eyed it's like, "Holy cra

p." This-- this is bad! [ laughing ] But, it-- Broadcast Standard loved it. They-- they thought that was a better answer. That's exactly what happened, see uh-- you're like, "Well, that's what you asked for." Batman and The Mad Hatter are on the tower. And so the only way that Batman can prove to himself that it's a dream; is he has to jump. And Michael s-- and I we felt, "Oh, this is great! We're gonna jump!" and then Michael calls me up later and says, "Joe, they're not buyin' it." I said, "

What do you mean?" [ as Reaves ] "They're afraid kids will jump OFF." And I said, "Oh...y'know, that sucks. What do we do?" Imply the violence with shadowplay or don't show it and it's actually, y'know, even MORE terrifying. LANSDALE: That way, we got past the censors for it and it actually came out I think cooler than we had done it the way we originally did it. Bless Jean MacCurdy and Tom Ruegger y'know, it's like they would back us up. But you would have-- y'know, I would talk to Broadcast

Standards for instance in "On Leather Wings." Part of the reason why you got such a kickass fight was because it's a big monster. Man-Bat is a MONSTER. He's a big flappin'-wing giant guy with fangs in his face. When Broadcast Standards would flag like, "Hey, he's punchin' him!" y'know and it's like, "Well, what else is Batman gonna do? He's fighting a monster." and it's like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, I guess so." And then when Batman crashes with Man-Bat into the parking structure, they said, "Oh! You

can't have blood." I mean, the first drawing, he was a MESS. He was like REALLY bleeding! [ laughing ] But then we'd said, "Well, we'll pull it back but we HAVE to show injury because you can't demonstrate to kids that it's okay to go flying around and then slam into a wall and nothin's gonna happen to ya'. We have to show consequences for physical action. And they were like, "Yeah, yeah, okay." When the guard gets tossed out of a window. "Why you have to have him thrown through the window?" I

says, "Well, the monster jumps him. Everyone's gonna think he's DEAD if he isn't tossed out that window. If he's in the room with this monster, we're gonna think he's just DEAD." And they were like, "Oh, you're RIGHT! Just make sure that he lands-- that we see that he lands and isn't killed." So, I added an extra shot of him falling into water. Of course, the water is like ten stories down and it's a SEWER. It's like a-- some runoff. [ laughing ] So, it's still impressive but y'know, but it an

swers BS&P's questions. One of my favorite projects was "Mask of the Phantasm", it's a great movie. ALTIERI: "Phantasm" was Alan Burnett's creation. He wanted to do like "Batman: Year One." RADOMSKI: When we were tailing out of the 65 which was in those days considered the first season, it was determined we were gonna do a long-form which was "Mask of the Phantasm" and they were picking up 20 additional episodes. So, at that point we had two productions going. Any of the stories that tell that

genesis, that-- that where-Batman-came-from kind of story are my favorites. And "Mask of the Phantasm" tells the whole thing. And it started out as a direct-to-video. RUEGGER: Warner Brothers Home Video wanted something they could sell, something that could bring them in cash. And they said, "Let's do a Batman movie. The show's a hit." People saw it and I think were going, "Well, let's give it a shot." It-- I don't think it did very well. Almost no marketing. That's one of the things Bob Dal

y and Terry Semel told me when we made an Animaniacs feature film. "Ya' got five million bucks you can lend me?" [ laughing ] I said, "Well, no." [ as Daly & Semel ] "That's the minimum we need to put one out." When we did the uh-- the screening on the lot, Bob Daly came and Terry Semel, they were the heads of the Studio. So, I remember getting to talk to them about whether they would do a release and he says, "Well, it's a gut check because if-- if you're gonna release it, you're gonna add a

lotta money to advertising." And then, everyone liked it so much once it was being put together they said let's-- let's rush this out into the movie theatres for a quick little legitimizing of it. [ laughs ] It was Warner Animation's first time out. It was ALAN and y'know-- they decided it would be worth it to get it into theatres... So, we opened on Christmas Day and I think it ran maybe two weeks. I think I did, I think I actually went into a-- went to some local theatre to see what was there

and there were-- there weren't many people in the audience. [ laughing ] And again it was animation on this-- on the level of television. Y'know, I mean, maybe like a $3 million dollar budget. You know, it's prints, right? Ya' gotta put out a lotta prints back then, it wasn't just digital. THAT would cost a lot and then y'know the posters. So, when you put that up on the big screen, y'know, trying to compare that to a Disney y'know, animated feature that's $100 million... Let me tell ya', wit

h the minimum you don't get a lotta action. Tim Sarnoff was there then and-- Tim was sort of my second in command. He-- he dealt with all the money issues, thank God. He got Silicon Graphics to donate to us a whole buncha computers. And this was way back in the-- in the day, I mean nobody was really doing computer animation then. He set up where we built Gotham City (what you see behind me) in the computer and so you could move around within the city and that was a big deal at the time. That w

as-- that was somethin' different. The idea that they divided up all the directors into little sections and we all kinda had our own parts that we did. And so we went to the local theatre and it was filled with kids my kid's age and their fathers and I knew a lot of 'em. And it was like Fathers & Son Day at the movies. It was like, "Hey, Kids, let's put on a show!" When you're doing Saturday Morning animation that's kind of what you dream of happening. SKIR: It's like a whole bunch of a-- y'kno

w, mafia/gangster thugs are in a room and Batman comes through the window. And he picks up a table and SMASHES him over-- and then he PUNCHES him in the face! It was a litany of everything they weren't allowed to do in the animated series on TV. ALTIERI: The only difference is now you had smoking and things like that. And you could REALLY show blood, y'know it was PG. It was like-- they were ticking off boxes. It's like, "He comes through GLASS and he hits someo--" and-- and it was just-- it wa

s beautiful to watch it because... [ laughing ] [ MUFFLED VOICE ] OOF! It was just up a notch. There was actual death. You're not watching TV now, Kids! Batman didn't cause any death but the Phantasm definitely is a murderer. Y'know, his ex-girlfriend. [ laughs ] He falls in love with Andrea Beaumont in the course of the movie. It's based on Andrea Romano. Because before each record, Kevin would do his mic test and he would go, "Oh, Andrea. OH, ANDREA!" and he would just like the-- this gush

ing, romantic voice and he would just like melt her, y'know? At EVERY record he would do-- start this way. And it was like our tradition. So, Alan just thought, "OK, this love interest has to be called Andrea so we can hear him say that-- [ laughing ] Y'know, so, for REAL! And everyone else gets to hear him say this!" Life isn't about vengeance. Life isn't about living a vow to dead parents, it's about LOVE, it's about sharing love with people. So, he goes back to his parents grave and he asks

them to please release him from this vow. I know I made a promise, but I didn't see this coming. I didn't count on being happy. He has this revelation. You are now; I'm changing the plan. CONROY: And at that moment, a flock of bats comes screaming out of the earth and they pull him back down to his fate. And he realizes he CAN'T escape his fate. It's really like a Greek tragedy. It's a classic Greek tragedy. But that scene at the grave where he's talking to his parents. I was alone in the reco

rding studio when I was doing it... ...and I opened myself up emotionally. And, I was, in my mind, I just went to a place that was a very painful place in my childhood. Where I was at my father's bed when he was close to death. And I was-- TRYING to reason with him. And I was speaking to him and he was unconscious. Because he was a very, very hard man, he was a cruel man, and he was an alcoholic. And at this moment when he was so close to death, I was pleading with him WHY he had to be the pers

on he was. And I was 15, 16? And I just WENT there. I don't know why I went there, I just went there. And I played the scene but in my mind I was there in that hospital room. And I lost it, and after the recording Andrea said, "Cut. That's it. Perfect. No more takes, Kevin. Perfect." And she came in and she put her arms around me. And she held me and she said, "Are you OK? I don't know where you just went, but it was perfect for us, but are YOU OK? [ laughs ] It was a wonderful moment that

I had with Andrea because we-- we really understood each other. We spoke to each other really well and she saw what I was doing with the role. And she saw that this had gotten very personal. So, I think acting; the more personal it gets, the better it is but the more personal it gets the more exposed you are and if people-- reject that; it's VERY painful. ROGEL: I wrote and produced with Boyd Kirkland, a Batman movie called "SubZero." Schwarzenegger had been signed to do this-- he was a big sta

r and so-- so they said, "We want Mr. Freeze to be the villain of the animated one." That's how it happened. So, I sat down with Boyd and we had to throw out Bane and completely reconceive the story. And that's how "SubZero" came about. She's got a couple of weeks at best. - What?! - Don't shoot the messenger, Victor. I'm just telling you like it is. - Nothing can save her now short of an organ transplant. - Then DO it. When the-- the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie came out, that was directed

by Joel Schumacher, it was-- y'know, the vibe on it was not good and the Studio was getting VERY nervous. And that's when I got a call. 'Cuz they were gonna release both of them at the same time. Well, they called me onto the lot (me and Boyd), and they said, "They're gettin' nervous the-- the feeling is not good on this movie." I won't leave without you! GO! We're running out of time! Ours got pushed back like ten months I remember the-- the release date of it but when it came out it did very

well. And I remember when Siskel & Ebert reviewed it, Ebert said, "The live-action movie is a cartoon and the cartoon is a live-action movie!" And he really went on and on about it so when I saw him I said, "Well, thank you for the re--." he sa-- and he said, "Yeah, y'know, animation is really growing up. You're seeing animation have really darker themes and can tell bigger stories and all that." I was particularly proud of-- of "SubZero" because of-- of how we fleshed out Robin and Barbara's ch

aracters. I remember the day Jean called me up 'cuz she was so excited about the MUSIC. Y'know, I mean, God bless the Music Department at Warner Brothers - Doug Frank and-- and Gary LeMel were running the department then. The music itself by Shirley Walker I mean, we had an orchestra for every-- every episode, I mean the whole episode. It wasn't like we were, "Oh, let's take a piece of music that Shirley wrote last week and plop it in here." She was writing a new score for each episode. It was

REALLY a blast. I-- I loved doing it and I loved working with Shirley. Oh, I loved Shirley. Oh, God, now you're gonna make me cry. [ Laughs ] She was the nicest person. Shirley Walker was-- was SO wonderful and SO humble and-- and so incredibly talented. She was amazing. She was just a-- I mean esp-- I mean, looking back on it now too... There she was a woman in VERY much a man's milieu. Shirley was like, she was part of the team. The theme and all that, you heard it and you just went, "Oh my

God. It's fantastic." I think when I saw the main title with Shirley's music I said, "This is why we're doing this show." [ laughing ] Everything was hand-copied, all the-- the music was. You'd have to get it to the copyist and they have to write out all the parts for the the third clarinet and the second horn, every-- everyone had a part. You know, I was involved with all the steps. We approved the voices, we approved the music but, how could you not approve that music? It was a slam dunk. Po

werful in her talent, I mean she was SO strong. And those-- those players are among the best in the world, y'know that play in these orchestras. They-- they can sight-read music and-- it'll sound like they've rehearsed it and been playing it for weeks. We had proven ourselves with "Tiny Toons." We had spent a lotta money on the music and it had paid off. So, OK, we're gonna do that with "Batman." Warner Brothers changed all of that. Original scores were being done. When NOBODY was doin' that. An

d I was like, "I don't think we can do that." [ laughing ] It gave so much more-- production value and human subtlety. So, then when it came around to "Batman" it was kinda like, "Well, this is what we do now. This is, y'know, we-- we have full orchestras like everybody does." [ laughing ] and they were like, "Oh, OK. Uh!" If I was working on an episode, she'd just sit there and-- talk with ya' - have a conference. She looked like your Sunday School teacher and she had so much goin' on in ther

e, it was crazy! It wasn't just based on tambor or-- or musical technique or-- physical aspects of the instruments but The fact that she knows how people think when they're-- when they're playing their instrument... ...ther're subtle things in her orchestration that were based on human behavior and the human mind, that are a little cut above the way most people think. She worked in this sort of dark genre. Y'know, I mean she started out with Danny Elfman. It's like, woo-hoo! [ laughing ] Shirle

y Walker was already on board and had already created what we (Bruce and I, Alan) wanted for the show. But we had to take that to Danny for his blessings as it were. And he wrote his piece, Shirley orchestrated it and performed it; that is the "Batman" main title that you hear. We actually thought that you could probably make some of these episodes without any dialogue. So that they would really play around the world. You wouldn't have to know any particular language. And just tell really great

visual stories - very cinematic. But the music can pull us in to-- to more specificity of emotion and-- and detail action. So, it was great. I think-- I think Shirley probably fought for that as she fought for many things and-- and it was greatly to the-- to the benefit of the show. ALTIERI: "Deep Freeze" for instance. The Freeze robots come out of the ocean, y'know, come out of Gotham Bay and go walking up to the prison. Bust through the walls, all that stuff. Music, music, music, music, musi

c, music... but then, you cut inside of his cell, and I go, "Then NO music." They're like, "What? What're you talkin'a bout?" "The music box. Until the explosion sets the-- the snow globe off, then music. You just-- you want to hear that snow globe." [ ♪ snow globe plays ♪ ] And Shirley's like, "YES! Yes, exactly!" I think that she also fought to have a staff of composers at the beginning. [ laughing ] I think that she wanted to include different approaches, different people. And I think ever

y-- it was interesting 'cuz I think everyone-- brought a little different angle to it. When I did "SubZero", I talked to Shirley. I said, "Shirley, c-- y'know... I want you to score it for us." and she said, "Well, Randy, I will do it for you, but, I'm busy on these other projects so I won't be able to give you my undivided attention." I said, "Shirley, I want your undivided attention. I NEED your undivided attention." She said, "I know. So, here's what we're gonna do." She says, "I have a guy

who works for me named Michael McCuistion and he's terrific, and y--" So, we brought Michael in, he showed me a couple cues, we started going and VERY quickly... I just said, "I have no notes for you Michael. Just go do what you're doing. Just keep doing what you're doing." And he did. And he-- he really stepped up. But I thank-- after when we-- we premiered it on the lot and Shirley was there. I smiled at her and she said, "Did I tell you, huh? I told you." There's all this world of writing

and creating that goes on and then they bring in the actors [ laughing ] like a herd of cattle to-- to give it voice, you know? We have our part of the world and they have theirs. We're the last people involved. I always said I do my best work when I'm lost or when I'm just having too much fun to pay attention to directions. I remember the feeling of joy after every single session. I show up like a kid who's thrilled to-- to be given a chance to play in the sandbox with the best. It ain't just

a paycheck. They're INTO the character. I LOVE doing voice-overs and I believe firmly in giving the client who has hired me the very best product that I can. I've always found it very liberating... You don't have to memorize it, you don't have to do blocking, y'know. ...when you're not aware of people looking at you, when you don't have to have that physicality. I would leave there with a-- a high that was just purely spontaneous and natural because: wonderful scripts, marvelous actors, great pe

ople to work with, WONDERFUL direction by Andrea. One of the nice things was we didn't record alone, it was a gathering. And, you're in a room with all the-- y'know, Bruce and everybody and everybody decides which take is the right one, and this and that. And, you're there in case you wanna, y'know, they wanna know: Gee, how close are the characters? Is the helicopter going to affect their voices? Should they be yelling? So, I didn't understand when I first started that I would be in the room w

ith those other people doing a radio play. [ as radio announcer ] And now we bring you to Mary Worth as she turns the corner and says to Sally... Y'know, you're doing that kind of drama. The joy of doing it in-the-round with everybody there in the studio instead of y'know, just having to do one line, one line, one line. Y'know, Hollywood's a small community. Word got out in the business that there were these INCREDIBLE bookings going on at Warner Brothers, these INCREDIBLE two-hour recordings w

here you saw amazing performances out of people. And Andrea said, she could get any actor in L.A. she wanted in there. I love line readings. I'm one of these people will sit down and go, "Wait a minute, show me what you want--" y'know. "I see what's going on but what you really looking for?" I LOVE hearing it! Then I could do that or something like it, or my version, y'know? I love drawing within the lines [ laughing ] when it comes to acting. Andrea was doing her homework every-- every show get

ting up at four in the morning going over the show and-- and every line trying to figure all that stuff out. So, that when we do a read through, she would go over it like a radio show but she would explain to the actors then, "This is this, this is this, this is this." But they know that if they give the line reading to the actor, it's always gonna sound like the actor was imitating somebody. You know what I mean? You want it to sound organic, so the way you get them there is by guiding them emo

tionally to what would lead the character to say it the way they want to. The joy was we were all actors. We could inhabit our characters and look at each other. And that-- we would feed off that. It was-- it was perfect. We take our inspiration from our colleagues and-- and everybody has something to-- to offer. Well, the ones that are the most fun to record are the ones you get to work with the most interesting actors. I always loved, y'know, walking out into the studio and finding out who was

there that day. Ron Perlman and Efrem Zimbalist Jr. Mary Kay Bergman. And Bob Hastings, of course, was SO GOOD. That guy's from this show and that guy's from-- that lady's from that show! I mean, EVERYBODY who was on the show was just an incredible cast. ANNOUNCER: Those with evil hearts, beware! For, out of the darkness comes, The Gray Ghost! [ woman screams ] I like that I insisted having Adam West come in and do the voice of the Gray Ghost as young Bruce Wayne's childhood hero. Ahh! God, w

hat a wonderful man. Y'know, there was a great moment though in the Salt Lake City Airport-- y'know, you run into people at the weirdest places when you're actors 'cuz you're always careers crossing-- I ran into him at the Salt Lake City Airport. And we're sitting there y'know, sharing coffee at the airport, and these people, "Wait a minute! It's Batman and Batman!" [ laughing ] So, all these people started wanting to take their pictures with us. It was a great moment. Well, if it isn't the Da

rk Knight himself. The really good idea for this whole show is Bruce Timm being the toy villain because Bruce's office is packed with toys. And then, I knew that Bruce and I both loved the "Batman" show when we were kids and Adam West was sort of our hero. And I said, "And we have to get Adam West to play Bruce Timm's hero." Oh! [ laughs ] That was again, one of those dream-come-trues that-- couldn't believe he's in the room. CONROY: He was an echo of a lost Hollywood. A gentler time when peop

le were respectful and gentlemanly. He was just such a wonderful, classy guy who had SUCH respect for actors and writers and the whole creative process. And couldn't have been kinder, y'know he could have come in with a lot of attitude. Y'know, "Wait a minute, I was the real Batman", y'know? But he didn't! I-- I approached him with a certain degree of trepidation the day he came in to do "The Gray Ghost" and I said, "God I" y'know, "I grew up with you. I'm a fan of your work. Y'know, I feel li

ke I'm treading on your territory." And he said, "Oh my God!" he said, "It's YOURS now. Run with it, have fun with it. It's such a great character to play!" RADOMSKI: And again, another opportunity where he could've been insulted by the fact that he was playing sort of a caricature of y'know, a guy whose career was waning and y'know, from a kid's show, etc. He-- he was nothin' but professional and he did a brilliant job. He was really good. So, when you're dealing with those kind of actors, it

just makes you BETTER!" You know, as a kid I used to watch you with my father. The Gray Ghost was my hero. Really? And he still is. ♪ The best part of-- of what we do for a living is we don't have to give up our fan card. But we were all-- we were all very tuned in to each other. And Warner Brothers (especially with Andrea Romano), always wanted to have the full cast together. Andrea Romano is really the best in the business so you-- you really don't presume to direct voices. You-- you sit in

a room, you let her do her job, she asks you questions... That all came together beautifully. Andrea Romano was able to cast so many great actors in so many different roles for that show. She did a incredible job. Which is really complicated in Hollywood because everyone has such difficult schedules. Different shooting schedules and you record an episode of a show like this in two hours. Well, you can't get everyone to find the same two hours in a week. And there was something about-- about wh

at she brought to that-- that direction, it let down the drawbridge I think for all of us. She-- Y'know, the casting director often is-- is also like a screening agent. They know who works well together, y'know. And they don't wanna hire people who aren't gonna work well together. So, she tends to hire people for one thing with-- with some theatre background. Most of my career has been theatre and voice-overs. Those people tend to be a little more collaborative. I mean, and I think she's belove

d by the talent, which certainly helps. It's beyond just a-- a respect for a working relationship; she felt like family. Andrea and Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski (all the creators), knew that the kind of performances you get out of people is just different when all the actors are there together. I used to believe Batman was responsible for you people. But, now I see nearly everyone here would've ended up exactly the same, Batman or not. I like to play the bad guys as being people who have someth

ing within them that is lost, that they KNOW is lost. They-- they ignore that it's lost and eventually they come to actually REGRET that it's lost. I think what's unique to the series is we saw-- we saw the pain that created the villain. That's these guys. PERSHING: All the villains took turns. They'd feature one villain in the one episode and then another villain. And there was a rotating group of us, about seven of us or something. She is Poison Ivy. [ laughing ] Thank you! Dr. Isley. Dia

ne is just like a-- she's just like a lot of fun to be around and she's just like a really good friend. No, and I did think about the strength of her. I mean, Pamela Isley is a-- [ hits table ] She's a PhD. And she's strong and she's assertive. She's very assertive. For all the edge there was a-- there was a sadness in-- in his heart. Y'know, if he had a heart there was sadness in it. [ laughing ] So, I would think vocally... How do I place this? Where in my register? What attitude do I have?

and stuff. And then you sort of create a character in your head. We saw in-- in the backstories and the like, they let us into that place y'know, where we see why hurt people, hurt people. You said it yourself; 'That fat bird would never get invited to a party like this.' Not with those clothes, that waddle, those flippers... [ Laughs ] - Oswald! - Did she mention my fine, Roman nose? SINGER: But the people who have the best of intentions which are NOT for the best for everybody, have the bes

t of intentions for themselves. And this is a situation where my seeking out the inner life of this character was really pretty easy. I had, first of all, enjoyed the-- the character in different formats, y'know with-- with Burgess and-- and with-- with Danny. However distorted her thinking was, she had decided it was her job to save the planet from the destruction being done to all the vegetation. That was her through-line. I was always kind of surprised by the content of the dialogue and the s

ituations because they were very human. They were VERY human especially, I thought, for y'know, for the Penguin and being self-obsessed, y'know? I didn't look at Bettie Page or any of that stuff but I felt sensual while I was doing her. I FELT sensual... ...and I felt like a brain when I was doing Pamela Isley and I just inhabited that. I think you saw an inner life that was-- that was broken and explained of lot of their-- their mistreatment of the world around them, to balance out the way they

had been mistreated. They called her an eco-terrorist. She was for the right thing, it was good stuff, but, 'Excuse me, I'll have to kill you now because you're not letting me get away with it.' It's just the darnedest thing; I have this natural immunity against poisons, toxins, the pain and suffering of others. Go figure...Bye! [ blows kiss ] And the character of Bruce Wayne and Batman, he's the most raw emotionally. He is an open wound. Batman is who Bruce Wayne is. That's him, that's his voi

ce that deep voice. Sometimes, Old Friend, I wonder if I'm really doing any good out there. When you approach it from that way, the voice that you use as Batman; [ as Batman ] that-- that husky, y'know, dark [ regular voice ] place that he goes... ...doesn't sound artificial. It sounds organic. He has a beautiful voice and-- and you can tell somebody who has taken his craft seriously. He's the richest guy in Gotham. He's the most eligible playboy. Everyone knows this man. In the movies he has s

o many girlfriends and it's like, oh, come on, how are they NOT gonna know who this guy is? And I thought, "Well, wouldn't it be interesting if Bruce Wayne was SO distinct from Batman that no one would suspect him? What if I--" I said, "Can I play with like sarcasm...humor? You know, I actually did check this against any musical sounds. Computer still can't come close to pinpointing it. [ telephone rings ] Wayne Manor. One moment please. A call for Master Bruce from a Dr. March. [ as Bruce Way

ne ] Hey! What's up Doc? They loved it! And it-- The early episodes there's a lot more of that. As the show evolved, and it became apparent how dark it was gonna be, Bruce felt that the-- the lightness of Bruce Wayne-- I mean there was a lot of irony and humor in the early Bruce Wayne... he asked me to tone it down. He said, "We like the distinction, we still like the idea, but it's too-- it doesn't fit in the dark, noir Gotham City that we've created, so tone him down. What is amazing is the

fans. I had NO idea I had a fanbase; none whatsoever. And you don't really know how it's affecting people 'til sometimes YEARS later. [ chuckling ] I have to say, it was like somebody telling you a joke and you walk halfway across the room before you get it: HO-HOO! ...and then you hit the floor. [ laughing ] When you're the voice of a character, you give it your heart, you give it everything, but you send that performance out into the ether. And you don't get that feedback that you do on s

tage and I was originally a stage actor. Half the reason I became an actor was because of that communication with the audience. So, when I was asked to do comic cons I said, "Why?" and they said, "Because you will meet your fans and make some money!" and I went, "OK..." Also, I'm a bit of a recluse and so it wasn't until I began doing conventions that people began bringing me action figures of Langstrom and-- and Man-Bat and-- and then I began to understand that it had had an impact. Getting to

know a lot of the actors... ...now at the cons that I really didn't-- we didn't have time, we didn't socialize, we didn't do cast parties. So, THAT'S very precious to me that I've gotten to be much more friends with-- well Loren Lester I knew already but he was about the only one. I've gotten close friendship with John Glover and-- and with Kevin and y'know, it's been wonderful! The world can be rough, it's-- it's a brutal, difficult place especially for a lotta kids. And for a lot of 'em, a lot

ta people, the safe space is often an animated character. And a lot of what I get at the cons is women that were young when they watched the cartoons, coming up to me and saying that I changed their lives because they'd never seen a strong woman in a cartoon before. And they'd never-- they'd also never seen a woman who told women men do not get to abuse them. I mean, there's some pretty heavy stuff that can go on at cons: y'know conversations, tears... Hearing stories from people-- people who w

ould just come up and say, "You have no idea what you did for me. I had a really rough childhood and Batman was there for me. Batman was my safe space. Batman was my guardian. It was kind of nice to-- to meet people who told you that was something iconic. And I guess I kinda owe it to you, Batman. You probably saved my life. I'll bet you hear this all the time. Look, I'm gonna miss my bus. I'll see ya' around and thanks. ♪ [ Batman groans ] JOKER: Hey, Batman! You stink so bad, I can smell ya'

from here! Pugh! Pugh, pugh, pugh! [ laughing ] The Joker is nuts. I don't know that we really KNEW what we wanted the Joker to be other than we didn't want him to be a Jack Nicholson impersonation. Justice is served HOT, Batman! You're gonna melt just like a grilled cheese sandwich. RADOMSKI: When he came in it was like, "Yeah, sure, let's see what THAT could be like." So, Tim came with a natural theatrical sort of presence to his delivery which was something we definitely wanted, we didn't w

ant the Joker to be a bumbling, goofy idiot. [ Joker screams ] He had to have some class to him. And then the dark side was completely second nature to Tim. And almost to the point of y'know like, "I don't wanna be alone with this guy 'cuz he's really creepy." [ laughing ] He was Joker like, terrifying and lock-up-the-children and don't let them watch. OH! That's a JOKE, right? Batman finally told a JOKE! [ laughing maniacally ] CONROY: Tim was just like, a little bit like a horror movie. Just

for that, Batman. RADOMSKI: We kinda knew we were in the zone but I don't think we fully y'know, KNEW the balance of what that character should be. Service with a smile? CONROY: But Tim Curry was wonderful. Tim Curry was crazy scary and Mark was crazy funny AND scary. Mark did make it his own it's like but that first show y'know-- in the first couple he's kind of like doing his take on-- on what Tim had done. Mark found the humor and the absurdity in the character and that-- that brought a wh

ole different color to it. I'm certainly a better dresser. I thought, "Luke Skywalker? I don't get THIS." And then I watched what Mark did and I realized, there's a madman inside Mark Hamill. Him holding back his madness: so, he would deliver it very intellectually but it was on the verge of wanting to destroy who was ever in his path. But that was from the audition. But as he grew older, he grew into who he really is: and he's a character actor. He is INSANE to be in a booth with. He is SO ta

lented. He nailed it from the audition and we were just like y'know, "That's-- that's the Joker." Y'know, they-- they replace actors all for all kinds of reasons. Batman! You wouldn't let me FRY would ya'?! CONROY: You never know why someone's being replaced. I worked with wonderful actors and I've never understood why they were replaced. Tim was one of those situations. I thought he was fantastic, I love him as an actor. It definitely had the menace that we wanted. I can't say that we were co

mpletely satisfied with it but that had less to do with whether we thought Tim was delivering or we didn't really fully understand what we wanted yet. Paul Dini comes into my office-- which he would do once in a while and y'know, just-- we just shoot the crap y'know, and just talk about what we're gonna do and-- and one time Paul came in and he says, "Y'know what? Remember Cesar Romero in the Batman series in the '60s? He always had a girl in the gang. I think the Joker needs a girlfriend." [ la

ughing ] And then he's gone! And the next thing you know, y'know Harley Quinn is written into the series. Paul Dini created Harley Quinn, he created her. Comedy comes to her so easy and yet comedy and jeopardy, that's like a unbeatable combination. And she's the perfect character for that. Talk about grasping at straws! Oh well, at least I'm going out on a joke. She starts off as this therapist and ends up [ Harley screams ] being y'know, very easily manipulated. That's right outta Paul's wheel

house. [ Laughs ] And then he created this monster. She ended up y'know, [ laughing ] taking off and she's this major character now. Because it didn't have that stink of, "Oh, we've gotta make a buncha money on this and it's gonna be a great tool." It was just a purely good idea that had an appropriate place. She's kind of like Wolverine. They introduced Wolverine in-- in the X-Men comic and suddenly like, he just exploded and took over their universe. I think what happened is Paul came up wit

h a preliminary design, but Bruce took it and really made her who-- who she is, 'cuz Bruce is a frickin' genius, y'know. But that was the birth of-- of Harley Quinn was really because Paul wanted to do a-- a role for Arleen. Arleen Sorkin's performance; it's like, you just can't get ENOUGH of it. She's a wonderful actress and she was a friend of his and he-- he had great admiration for her and he wanted to create a character for Arleen Sorkin. So, it was tailor-made for Arleen. She was FANTASTI

C. We worked like-- like improv people. I mean it was-- we really-- we really connected and we are now (later) REALLY close friends. And her voice is inside my head. Y'know, when you're reading a word balloon, I just-- I just hear Arleen. You just know how she's gonna say the line. [ clears throat ] Look alive, wage slaves! Presenting: that caliph of clowns, that mogul of mountebanks, the one and only, JOKER! [ Joker laughs maniacally ] The-- the banter, the playing off of each other... Let's

face it, she was hung up on Joker. Harley just evolved and then in "Harley's Holiday" totally on her own-- I mean she held her own, easily. And she is now the most cosplay character... The most famous character that people want me to draw at conventions and stuff for commissions. Her and the Joker. And my attitude toward Harley was sort of amused (the character). She was sort of amused by her but then she had to straight. So, she was-- all of a sudden, Poison Ivy was the straight man and HARLEY

was the crazy one. I remember when I would go drivin' like this with Mister J. [ mocking Harley ] Mistuh J, Mistuh J... [ normal voice ] Oh, change the record, Harl! You wanna be some wacko's victim the rest of your life?! He created a CLASSIC character that will live on long after all of us are gone. You really put the 'fun' in 'funeral.' ♪ I'm working on a story, "Harley Quinn: Black, White and Red" right now with Paul Dini (written by Paul Dini) with Harley in Vegas where Harley Quinn y'kno

w, saves the day. So, the only color is gonna be red. That's really fun to work into the design, too. And she's the leader of a gang, her own gang. [ laughing ] Paul's scripts are just so much fun. It's like you don't have to think too hard about what Harley is gonna look like when she says this line. And it works for comics and it works for animation too. I just love drawing Harley. ♪ [ kissing noises ] MMWAH! ♪ - Call me. - Don't press your luck. Batman: The Animated Series was really unique.

It's in a class of its own. They took all the best stories, they took all the best villains, and they did them the best way possible. We were in on a secret and y'know, before it hit the air it's like, we knew what was coming. It all worked so well. I mean, we were like basically pinching ourselves going, "This is too good! When's it gonna stop?" Everyone had the sense that we were creating something new. Everybody was putting in that little extra, y'know? Everybody was like, "How do I plus thi

s? How do I make this--" And that's what-- the series is one for the ages, y'know? It really is. We kind of led the field in TV animation at that point. This was a departure to do it on-- as a television series in animation. Y'know, right away you think oh, it's gonna be silly and cartoony and they approached it with a completely different vision (not just visually but storywise too) and they pulled it off. Wanting to do that show and then actually DOING IT at some point in my life and actually

doing it with a level of quality on top of it. [ laughing ] Thanks to Warner Brothers for y'know, letting THAT happen. And it's sustained for 30 years and you can love it you can hate it you can criticize it; that's all fair game because it was allowed to become what it became. Much of the time, you think you have a winner and then you get disappointed or you don't know if you have a winner and then you get surprised. But, this was a wonderful feeling of riding on something that was just an exa

mple of excellence all the way across. The ratings were good and they continued to be solid. But the fact is, that it's really enjoyable to-- to watch the quality of the show and the way it's edited, the way it's been-- been cut together, scored, the whole deal. I do have good memories of-- of that experience and-- and I think music holds a very special place with animation and I have a lotta respect for the guys who-- who are focused on that. It's earned its place in television history because

of that, in my-- in my opinion. Because the characters are beloved and because this series understood WHY they were beloved and they were able to actually distill it and put it on the screen. EVERYONE had enormous respect for the audience. My biggest goal was to never disappoint the audience. I thought about what our kids wanted every day. There was never a sense of doing a kids show. Y'know, I LOVE all this stuff. I don't do this because it's just my job, I do it because I love it. We had the c

reative teams. We had brilliant artists, brilliant writers... Letting the creatives be creative is probably the best gift you can give them and the best gift you can give yourself if you're the boss. Create an environment which is good for them and healthy for them and supportive of them. And some who I don't think had realized their own potential at the time. I've been lucky, I've made some good decisions but I've also had a great team of collaborators. You know, there are hundreds of people th

at contribute to the success of these shows... That's why you work with brilliant people, they take your stuff and-- and make it even better. There's nothin' more fun than sittin' around with a bunch of really talented, crazy people. Well, I'm just-- I'm just really glad I got to do it. [ laughing ] Y'know, it was an honor just to be nominated. [ laughs ] It was an honor just to get the jacket y'know, and-- and be worthy of it. I was blessed to enough to get to write three of them. I was supre

mely lucky. I remember thinking, "How basic was my contribution" because when I saw the final product, how sophisticated it was, I remember being sort of awed by it. What are the chances that that actor happened to be in L.A. that week and walked in for THAT ROLE. I mean, that's bizarre that it even happened. And you don't always have full control and there are a lot of influences that come in to make decisions... Companies tend not to take the time and energy and-- and devote the funding needed

to make such a-- a show come to fruition. Every department, every aspect of the production and the support, and OUR support at FOX of the show was tremendous. FOX, who was dedicated to us / devoted to us, they wanted to have a hit series. They knew that pushing the envelope a little might bring in a-- a bigger, wider, older audience. Warner Brothers poured a TON of money into it so the production values were fabulous. They were in the $350,000 - $400,000 range per half hour. So, you're talkin'

about $20 million y'know, of Warner Brothers committing to a series they had no idea was gonna work; 30 years ago. The kind of dramatic animated series that everyone wants to make. "Oh, we wanna make it just like Batman: The Animated Series." But it's tough to do it 'cuz you don't have the brilliant leaders that we had with... ...Eric and Bruce. People always say, "Oh, we had no idea that it would last this long. We didn't-- why are people still talking about it now?" I knew and I'd said so. I-

- I'd said so in print. And this was while the show was still on the air and I knew because I knew what y'know, "Johnny Quest" meant to me. And I'm a "Star Trek" fan for crying out loud, I-- I knew that these shows would last! When you have a show that looks THAT beautiful. When you have a show with stories that are that tight and that sharp, they're gonna stand the test of time. Working on that show was the right thing at the right time for sure. And y'know, after about a hundred episodes they

said, "OK" y'know, Warner Brothers said, "That's enough. We call it off." I didn't understand why they stopped doing it. It was stopped when it was at its peak! Well, they had other characters to promote. They had Superman, so they started making "Superman" episodes. "Batman: The Animated Series" became "Batman & Robin" and that became "Batman Beyond" and that became the "Justice League" and that became the "Arkham" games. And then all the movies, "The Killing Joke"... How many Batman shows ha

ve been done since then? They're STILL doing the movies and they're still doing television shows so... obviously there's an appetite for it in-- in the general pop-- and not just from MY generation and yours but future generations too. It just went on and on and on and on and on for 30 years. Everything we did back then is finding an audience 30 years later. I LOVED "Freakazoid", y'know, I loved "Tiny Toons." "Animaniacs" was brilliant. But, that show, that iconic "Batman: The Animated Series"

show just imprinted itself on the brains, the minds, the visual memories of everyone that watched it. That's a show that I think, it makes a lotta sense to bring back. A lotta those kids loved cartoons then and still love them and would love to see re-runs of those "Batman" episodes or new ones I suspect. The fact that we got to do things that were so important to us, made us make something that was important to other people. And I think that's part of why, "Batman: The Animated Series" is going

to find new fans forever. I loved doing that series, I did. It was a party in some ways. Yeah, we had a lot of fun. You have to sort of guide it at certain points, but, the basic thing is to let them be themselves. You get the best outta people when they're-- when THEY'RE enthused. It's one of the great moments in my life, working on that series. It's-- there are a number of them, you know: y'know gettin' married, and your kids and all that, but that was one of the highlights because it was a t

rip back in time for me. To go back to my origin. So, that's MY origin story. Like Batman has an origin story, I had one too. Y'know, this wasn't a job for us, this was like a mission. This is WHY we were born! [ laughing ] It's like-- it was like a dream come true. You know, I think we were all naïve enough to think we could do what we wanted and so we did and it-- it worked out. Everyone from the writers, to the artists, to the producers, to the director, to the actors: everyone knew they we

re part of something special and had enormous respect for what we were creating. And I just-- I hope that people appreciate that. [ ♪ ] I saw Alex Toth two days before he died, before he passed away. He was in a-- he was in a hospital room. What was Alex Toth doing? Drawing. And he had Fleischer Brothers cartoons on too, that's-- [ laughing ] He had-- he actually had Fleischer Supermans on on this little TV in his hospital room and he was drawing these elegant little beautiful drawings, y'know

. Right up to the-- right up to the very end. I gue-- there IS no ending for it, y'know? In fact, I remember talking to her about my symphonic work and-- and she wanted to see some of my scores. And she didn't flip through the score, I mean she went through it page by page. And I could tell she-- she was someone who could hear every note in her head when she's looking at an orchestral score, y'know. So, and she-- she was fascinated by it and-- and gave it the time of day. I had the opportunity

to work with Arthur Miller on the last play he did. So, the lights would come up slowly on me and I felt the warmth of the light as it-- as it came up on me but what I was really feeling was the warmth of my blood, rushing through my body. And I felt like I'd come home. I was transported. I had the most wonderful experience. [ laughing ] I was back home. Well, first of all I'll tell you something they didn't like, and I did it. There's a character in the foreground and Batman walking towards thi

s character. And the character in the foreground is sort of getting his fist ready-- ready to-- Y'know, they're gonna get into a fight, right? There's gonna be a fight! And so, I animated Batman walking towards the guy. Y'know he's... ...comin' towards cameras y'know, and so on. [ whispering ] Now, mind you, no animation had ever been done on this in-- for this franchise yet. I'm taking it and I'm doing it the way I think it should be done, right? And I'm thinking, "Batman needs to look menacing

, y'know and there has to be weight." They just said they didn't LIKE it. They didn't want Batman to MOVE that way. I mean I was quite happy with it. Y'know, I thought, "Oh, that works!" In one comic-- and I don't know who wrote it, I don't know who drew it but there's-- there's a sequence where he's having a rooftop fight. He gets hit bad and he's like knocked off the edge of the roof and kind of y'know, his instinct is to grab for something and he grabs on to this neon sign. This long y'know,

sorta neon sign like a theater sign that goes all the way down the side of the building. And he basically uses the breaking glass of the neon sign to slow down his fall so that y'know, he can make it to the sidewalk alive and then he spends the rest of the issue with his hands bandaged into fists. And I like, "THAT is one tough-ass superhero!" [ laughing ] But y'know, my father was born in 1909 and my mother was born in 1914. They had been through The Great Depression and all that so, y'know, t

hey talked like people of a different era. They talked like the Ol' West, they talked like y'know, 1930's and a little bit of the '40s. And the thing is, is that my grandmother saw Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. She was born in the 1880s and as a child she saw it in one of its incarnations, I don't know which one, and she never forgot it. And then she saw y'know, astronauts land on the Moon. So, I had all of this stuff from her. She came to Texas in a covered wagon. My-- my wife's grandfather c

ame to Texas in a covered wagon. When I was at NBC and being promoted to Director, they had a freeze on hiring. So, I (instead of getting a-- a manager of the department to replace myself), I talked Jean into doing it temporarily. So, Jean worked as my manager for the department for several months. We got a temporary secretary. And of course, she did a spectacular job. [ laughs ] So, I took her, to a Mexican restaurant one night and I loaded her with margaritas and got her to accept the positio

n permanantly 'cuz I was gonna fight for that. She didn't want it. She just wanted to be a secretary. She didn't want the responsibility. Sh-- Jean is SO smart but she didn't see her potential. She didn't-- it just wasn't a priority to her and I don't think she thought it was a business she could succeed in. Can you believe that? Every year we used to hav-- it was great! We used to throw big parties on the lot, on the Warner Brothers lot for the new season. And had about 500 people y'know, 500

-600 people there it was in-- [ laughing ] usually a big-- big band and it was great! My first actual professional job was right after (literally after) graduating from college. I went on the road as a backup singer for Johnny Mathis. It was wonderful. It was a marvelous year and it-- I was on the road for a year and then I was in New York and doing things and... I mean it was-- it started my career and I made-- as I said, I made living as a singer for-- for many years. So, and then the voiceo

vers took over after I started having children and I needed to stay in the same place. Went to the con and at a dealer they had all of the original Toth uninked pages to a "Challengers of the Unknown" story from the early '80s. And they were going for $200 a page and I bought them ALL and that was like my template for drawing-- how to pencil the comicbook. AND they had Toth's address stamped on the back of every page. And so, I called up Information and got his number and called him-- cold calle

d him. And he was a fan of the series and so we became best phone friends. Bruce and I kept those drawings, he drew them on two separate pages and then we-- we argued and said, "OK, I want yours and--" or "I want this one/you want that one." So, we made copies back at the Studio and we-- we gave each other the one we didn't have. So, I have an original Tim Burton sketch. Early on, Brad was-- was corresponding and had told him that we were inspired by the-- the Miyazaki film "Castle Cagliostro" a

nd I had it on LaserDisc. So, I made a copy and I got Toth's address from Brad and I mailed him my copy. And I got a postcard back and it was really cool 'cuz I'm like, "Oh my gosh! He's my hero! Wow-- this is amazing!" And he's like, "I don't understand. What you guys did is so much better than this." And then he went on and going, "You guys did what we were hoping to do with Johnny Quest." And he went on and on and on gushing about our show. And he had criticisms (y'know, nothing's perfect) b

ut, the idea that he actually compared it favorably to Johnny Quest going, "You guys did-- succeeded at what we were TRYING to do." And I... [ imitates mind being blown ] I remember one time I got Kevin on something. What was it? Batman flies in the window of somebody y'know, he's checkin' out right; night? And they're not home. And then he-- he's searching the place, right? But, then he goes (he hears something), so he goes out the front door but the slide on the front door was locked. Yknow,

I said, "Now wait a minute" [ laughing ] I said "Kevin, how did the slide y'know...?" and the guy then he goes, "Oh, I'll fix that right now!" He does this with an eraser! "Boom, boom, boom!" he goes, "What ELSE ya' got?" [ laughs ] They NEVER (and I mean this) they never told me the budget of the show; ever. So, I suspect Eric and Bruce and Alan, they weren't being told the budget of the show. We weren't-- None of us were keeping track of how much this guy was making, how much that guy was ma

king, or how-- We were just makin' the show. And only late in the runs of some of these shows like "Histeria!" about 50 episodes into it they came to me and they said, "Oh, we've run out of money. We're not makin' any more of these." [ laughing ] They never did that with "Animaniacs" or "Tiny Toons" or "Batman" so, apparently we made it for-- within the-- the framework of the budget. Well, there was a-- there was a-- a series produced down in Australia of "The Beastmaster" and I have to say, I t

hink they did an excellent job with that. It's-- I went down there and directed an episode and also I acted in I think about six of them as a-- as a kind of a mythic mentor to-- to the younger Beastmaster. And so, I mean they are, it's-- it's a durable product, it's a durable story. And again, it's one of those mythic stories like Batman. It's one of those things where the-- where the hero fights for the institutions of peace and continuance and the-- and the-- the raiders (the marauders) are th

e ones that are trying to tear it down. And I go, "Y'know what, it shouldn't be the Mad Hatter, 'cuz the Mad Hatter's a wimp, y'know? It should be the Scarecrow 'cuz the Scarecrow is the MASTER of fear. And if-- if the master of fear is afraid of THIS guy; oh my GOD is he a force to be reckoned with." And-- and Paul Dini's response was, "Yeah, but we really like working with Roddy McDowall." And I'm like, "Oh my God... I get to write for Roddy McDowall. I get to write for RODDY MCDOWALL." Talk

about bucket list thing! And so, I wrote this incredibly great, fun scene with the Mad Hatter. Where he grabs Robin and says, y'know, "Beware the Jabberwock, my son!" and he's just like-- he's just losin' it. And-- and then they replaced him with the Scarecrow because he's the master of fear. Like, like, why did I win that argument? Why did I win that one? I-- I could've written for Roddy McDowall. [ laughs ] I've met Danny a couple times through Michael Douglass. I think we went out-- [ laugh

ing ] we went out to celebrate I think Michael-- it might've been Michael Douglass' wedding anniversary or birthday or something on a-- on a boat. And I remember the two things about that trip on the boat is Danny lyin' on the-- on the deck right up by the bow going, "Whoa, what a great idea THIS was! WHOA!" [ laughing ] It's just-- y'know, but he-- he's just-- he's SO brilliant. ♪