Histeria!

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Histeria!
Format	Animated series
Created by	Tom Ruegger
Starring	Frank Welker Tress MacNeille Jeff Bennett Laraine Newman Luke Ruegger Cody Ruegger Nathan Ruegger Maurice LaMarche Billy West
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	52
Production
Running time	30 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	Kids' WB
Original run	September 14, 1998 – 1999

Histeria! is an American cartoon series of the late-1990s, created by Tom Ruegger (who also created Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain, Freakazoid!, and Road Rovers) at Warner Bros. Animation. Unlike other similar shows by Warner Bros., Histeria!'s purpose was not simply to entertain, but to also attempt to teach history as well, a residual effect of the network having to meet the FCC's recently implemented educational/informational requirements. A regular cast of characters would visit a different period or event in history and explain the event in a humorous skit or short segment. Frequently things were made into songs, historical figures had celebrity personalities, and various segments parodied contemporary entertainment (i.e. singing a song about Theodore Roosevelt in a parody of the Ghostbusters theme song).

Histeria! aired on Kids' WB from 1998 to 2000. It was to be WB's most ambitious project since Animaniacs. Like the aforementioned, there were 65 episodes that were originally going to be made, but due to being $10 million over budget, only 52 episodes were completed before being canceled in November 1998. More recently, the show has been in reruns on Toontopia TV (part of In2TV), first from March to July 2006, and then returning in October. In January 2009, all of the episodes were taken off the site. No DVD set has yet been announced.

Histeria! may have been influenced by 1978 French TV series Il était une fois l'homme (Once Upon a Time... Man). The French series featured the familiar series cast reappears as the contemporary figures of every historical time. Another possible influence is the 1988 miniseries This is America, Charlie Brown, which featured the cast of Peanuts interspersed within various events in American history.

Histeria! has since became a cult favorite, gaining a modest fandom; fan-creations can be found on the Internet and at fansites.

Contents 1 Characters 2 Episodes 3 Cameos and cultural references 4 See also 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Characters

• Aka Pella, voiced by Cree Summer, is an African American member of the Kid Chorus who uses sassy lingo, often delivering comedically-timed insults to whoever she is currently hanging out with.
• Big Fat Baby is the egg-shaped sidekick to Father Time, frequently accompanying him as he introduces the sketches. He is known for the foul odor he carries, caused by his constant pooping in his diaper, which is constantly stated to have been unchanged since ancient times.
• Bill Straitman, voiced by James Wickline, is the straight man to the rest of the characters.
• Charity Bazaar, voiced by Laraine Newman is female lead of the Histeria! Kid Chorus, and her main personality trait is that she is usually depicted as being very depressed, as shown by her catch phrase, "I'm not happy."
• Chit Chatterson, voiced by Billy West, is an eccentric commercial salesman.
• Cho-Cho, voiced by Tress MacNeille, is a little Chinese girl who is more devious than she looks.
• Father Time, voiced by Frank Welker, is the 'host' of Histeria, allowing the cast 'travels' through time.
• Fetch, voiced by Frank Welker, is Loud's aptly-named dog, who loves chasing tennis balls and frequently asks the historical figures if they want to play catch with him. He appears to be of the same breed of dog as Hunter from Road Rovers.
• Froggo, voiced by Nathan Ruegger, is a boy from the Kid Chorus who he has a low, frog-like voice.
• Loud Kiddington is a young boy noted for the extremely loud volume in which he talks. He is voiced by Tom Ruegger's son, Cody Ruegger, and the character's personality is based on Cody because he "has the tendency to be the loudest kid on Earth".^[1]
• Lucky Bob, voiced by Jeff Bennett is a boy with a very noticeable overbite. He tends to speak with a dim-witted drawl. He usually only speaks when agreeing with something another character has said, using Ed McMahon catchphrases such as "You are correct, sir," "Yes now," and "Hi-yo!".
• Lydia Karaoke, voiced by Nora Dunn, is an employee for The WB who has been assigned as network censor for the show, and given the show's nature, this can be quite a hassle for her. Often, she interrupts the sketches to complain that what is about to be or has just been shown is inappropriate for children's television.
• Miss Information, voiced by Laraine Newman, is an aptly ditzy tour guide who leads a group of tourists through various moments in history, as if the world is her own personal museum.
• Molly Pitcher constantly offers refreshments in the form of water.
• Mr. Smartypants, voiced by Rob Paulsen, is a shy genius who wears exceedingly large pants and spouts various tidbits of knowledge.
• Pepper Mills, voiced by Tress MacNeille, is a hyperactive teenager, who is driven to adoration for any and all celebrities. She constantly gets historical figures to give her autographs, and is then shocked to learn they aren't celebrities.
• Pule Houser, voiced by Frank Welker, is an overweight kid in the show's cast who takes most of the abuse.
• Sammy Melman, voiced by Rob Paulsen, is a spoof of the smarmy and desperate television executives.
• Susanna Susquahanna is a little Native American girl with beady eyes and a large gap in her front teeth that gave her a gigantic lisp.
• Toast, voiced by Tress MacNeille, is a clueless teenager whose name comes from the idea that his brain is fried like toast.
• The World's Oldest Woman, voiced by Tress MacNeille, is a very old woman who claims to have dated every historical male in history.

Most of the real-life historical figures in Histeria were portrayed as caricatures of real-life celebrities from the modern era. The intent was to make analogies to contemporary individuals in terms of personalities and attitudes. These include appearances of Napoleon voiced by Jeff Bennett, Attila the Hun, Benjamin Franklin voiced by Billy West. Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, both voiced by Maurice LaMarche. Nostradamus, voiced by Paul Rugg often predicts the future for the cast and predicts the next segment.

[edit] Episodes

^a Two versions of this episode exist: a sketch about Custer's Last Stand—in which the kids mistakenly believe he's running a custard stand—replaced a sketch depicting the Spanish Inquisition as a game show called "Convert or Die" after a complaint from the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, who claimed the sketch "[taught] children to reject Catholicism". It has since been restored on In2TV. 

[edit] Cameos and cultural references

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Histeria!

An integral part of the program was its use of popular culture to demonstrate historical events. Among the numerous pop culture references the show used during its run:

• The Looney Tunes characters made occasional cameos:
  • Bugs Bunny is brought onto a talk show hosted by Miss Information to deliver his famous line to Doc Holliday. He also makes a cameo in a "hat shop" sketch featuring Abraham Lincoln, and he also makes an even briefer cameo in "The Invasion Song", alongside the hillbillies from the Looney Tunes short "Hillbilly Hare".
  • During a D-Day interview with Dwight David Eisenhower—who had been moved to Omaha Beach for the interview—Daffy Duck takes offense to Loud Kiddington's repeated calls to take cover (i.e., "DUCK!").
  • Elmer Fudd portrays Gutzon Borglum, the artist who sculpted Mount Rushmore.
  • Porky Pig and Foghorn Leghorn make a cameo appearance in "The Dawn of Time" where a cow falls on the latter in an homage to Earthworm Jim'. In the same sketch, the Tasmanian Devil dons a cow suit to play the role of the Aurochs. Also in that episode, the leprechauns who antagonized Porky in the Chuck Jones short "Wearing of the Grin" make an appearance.
• In "The Wild West", Father Time is shown watching Animaniacs on TV. Also, in "Really Oldies But Goodies", the kids sing to the Animaniacs theme tune when introducing Alexander the Great, and the Pinky and the Brain theme music can be heard during an offscreen mummification, specifically at the point mentioning the removal of the brain.
• An episode spoofs the Justice League with Franklin D. Roosevelt as Batman and Truman—played by Loud Kiddington—as Robin. Eleanor Roosevelt appeared as Wonder Woman, Winston Churchill as Superman, and Joseph Stalin appears as the Hulk even though he is a Marvel character—possibly a slight nod to his country's communist government versus the other countries' capitalist leaders. The Freedom League theme has the same tune as the Spider-Man television show theme.
• Superman makes cameo appearances in "The Inventors Hall of Fame - Part 2" and "When Time Collides!" In the former, his "S" emblem mistakenly has an "F" on it, though one fan commented that it may have been a reference to Freakazoid.
• The Siege of Yorktown is covered like the Super Bowl, including commentary by John Madden.
• Washington's crossing of the Delaware River is told as a poem to the tune of The Night Before Christmas.
• In the episode "The Russian Revolution", Pepper Mills confused Lenin with famous singer and Beatle John Lennon, and made a joke about Beatle Ringo Starr. Additionally, Karl Marx is portrayed as a lampoon of Groucho Marx.
• A song about William Howard Taft is sung to the tune of the Theme from Shaft.
• The "Communuts" song is a parody of "Whatever It Is, I'm Against It" from Horse Feathers.
• A musical number about Theodore Roosevelt and his anti-trust campaign was sung to the theme of Ghostbusters. Roosevelt was depicted as a 'Trust-Buster'—complete with tan flight suit and proton pack—busting various analogies for trusts, including giant piggy banks and J. P. Morgan.
• The show's theme music is the march, Manhattan Beach, by John Philip Sousa.
• Occasionally, the show's theme song is replaced by a parody of the theme song to another television show. Among those are the intros to Saturday Night Live, The Addams Family, The Simpsons and Mister Ed.
• Loud Kiddington once spoofed Green Eggs and Ham with George H. W. Bush who famously announced he did not like broccoli. In this sketch, Loud chases Bush with a plate a broccoli while trying to convince him to eat it.
• In "The Renaissance" episode, Leonardo da Vinci spoofs the 1960s Batman series under the alias "Renaissance Man".
• At the end of a sketch debating their existence, King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, and Sir Galahad opt to retreat, shouting out "Run away!" like in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Also, in the sketch about the Salem witch trials in "When America Was Young", the characters paraphrase a portion of the scene from Holy Grail where a woman is accused of being a witch.
• A sketch based on the Boston Tea Party borrows wholesale from the Cheese Shop sketch from an episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus. In this sketch, a British soldier approaches an American running a "tea stand" in front of Boston Harbor, and every time the soldier asks if they have a particular kind of tea, an off-screen splash sound-effect is heard and the American running the "stand" says that they're "out" of it, meaning it has just been dumped into the Harbor.
• In "Return to China", at the end of the Great Wall sketch, when the man freaks out when he sees the kids, he quotes some sayings from Mr. Director from Animaniacs.
• In "The Russian Revolution", Charlie Chaplin makes a brief cameo appearance in the black and white film example as his signature character The Tramp. However, he is holding a bumbershoot instead of a cane.
• In a bit about Lewis and Clark, Clark Kent makes an appearance as Clark, and the character of Lewis is modeled after comedian Jerry Lewis. In the same episode, the film Deliverance is also parodied.
• In "The American Revolution of Abe Lincoln," Abraham Lincoln spoofs the show Seinfeld called Abe-Feld with Allan Pinkerton as Cosmo Kramer, George B. McClellan as George Costanza, and Jefferson Davis as Newman.
• In "Hooray for Presidents", the song about Bill Clinton and how he became president was to the theme of The Beverly Hillbillies. In the same episode, there was a sketch about the Lincoln Bedroom that had several celebrity cameos from Steven Spielberg, Barbra Streisand, Bill Cosby, Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump, Christopher Walken, Clint Eastwood, Ted Turner, and Bill Clinton.
• The episode "General Sherman's Campsite" is a parody of Pee-wee's Playhouse.
• Larry King Live was spoofed as Barry Ding Live, complete with appearances by Kato Kaelin.
• Julius Caesar is depicted as Frank Sinatra, accompanied by Dean Martin as Mark Antony and Sammy Davis, Jr. as Cassius.
• Christopher Walken reappears in another episode, where physicist and inventor Nikola Tesla is depicted as Johnny Smith, Walken's character from The Dead Zone.
• During a sketch on Rosa Parks, Toast plays the electric guitar until he spontaneously combusts, saying "Oh man, that's the third time this week!" This may be a reference to This Is Spinal Tap, where the drummer would play so heavily that he'd spontaneously combust during performances.
• During the Episode "The Terrible Tudors" the Histeria kids sing about the "War of the Roses" in the tune of "Greensleeves".

[edit] See also

• Tiny Toon Adventures
• Animaniacs
• Freakazoid!
• Toonsylvania
• Once Upon a Time... Man

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Histeria! at the Big Cartoon DataBase
• Histeria! at the Internet Movie Database

• Histeria! at TV.com
• Encyclopedia Histeria!
• Histeria! at Animated Lust
• Histeria! Episodes which were directed by Mike Milo

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