Dec 2, 2018

'Rocko's Modern Life' Creator Joe Murray Reveals Tragic Episode About Life on the Show

This week's Best Animated Feature is Vanity Fair magazine's story on the making of Rocco's Modern Life series. [It is full of production secrets from a handful of people involved in the making of Nick's classic series, including creator Joe Murray and screenwriters Jeff "Swampy" Marsh, Dan Povenmire, and Martin Olson. They talk about the freewheeling atmosphere of the production - "controlled anarchy," in Olson's words - and Murray's efforts to keep management out of the production (he had written in his contract that Nickelodeon executives could not visit their offices unannounced).

When the episodes got too long, screenwriter Dan Povenmaier, who grew up in Alabama learning to throw knives, would throw a letter opener over his back onto the storyboards to edit them. (The scene of the stabbing would be cut.) Another member of the team set up his office like the set of a late-night talk show. Says Povenmire, "You come in, he plays a canned round of applause, tells you to sit in one of the seats, and then interviews you for the imaginary camera." 'You'd say something kind of funny, and he'd have another tape with the canned laughter on it. When other guests come in, he has them move one seat down so the next guest can interview you."

But the film also takes a somber turn when Murray reveals an episode that he seems not to have told publicly: his first wife, Diane, took her life just months before production began in 1992.

"It's hard to watch Rocco and not think about that whole thing in your head," he tells Vanity Fair. 'Part of me wanted to do this show, and part of me didn't want to do it. It was like blaming Rocco. Even if it was suicide. But at the time I thought, if I hadn't done Rocco, she wouldn't have done that. If that's what caused this, Rocco should be more pissed off. This must be good."

The article went on to provide details of Murray's upcoming one-hour Rocco special for Nickelodeon and his new PBS Kids social studies oriented educational series, Let's Goalna, aimed at children ages 4-7! continues to provide more details.

There is also new information in the piece that is not Rocco related, like Murray's personal opinion on why Cartoon Network canceled his series "Camp Laszlo". He said that the show was canceled shortly after he turned down the network's request to appear in a McDonald's commercial, adding, "There were a couple of times when I didn't play the game, and they didn't like that."

We would be remiss not to mention that this amazing history was written by Darrin King, a former contributor to Cartoon Brew.