The Space Stars

The Space Stars is an Australian-British-Canadian animated children's fantasy-musical television series featuring directors and staff affiliated with SD Entertainment as well as The Wiggles. The series aired from 2002 to 2006. The series also spawned 2 specials and 1 live show. The Space Stars became quite popular with the demographic through the early and mid 2000s and had since its release gotten a small cult following.

SYNOPSIS
''“This animated musical Sci-Fi fantasy series that all young kids will enjoy takes place in outer space! There is a magical planet of many domains called “Stardom”, a sparkly kingdom ruled by stars. Particularly King Orion and Queen Ursula, who keeps all of the stars in order, leads the pack of stars and looks down upon the earth to light up the sky and give the people of the world lovely dreams. Joining them are the 12 stars that help the king and queen do their job by making sure the galaxy and their home is kept safe and filled with magic, maintaining their powers and domains and sometimes visiting earth to learn more about its wonders. This colourful group of stars not only does that, but they also have magical, musical and fun adventures, get into all sorts of hijinks and are always the best of friends, even if there are ups and downs!”''

- From The Official Website

CAST AND CHARACTERS
Andy Aries (Voiced By: Samuel Vincent): The ruler of the Aries star. Andy is daredevil material, and always loves to take a risk. He’s extremely brave, bold, daring and loves competition. This attitude helps him in many galactic sports and games. However, he can also prove to have a competitive and hot-headed attitude due to that, and sometimes does not know how impulsive or reckless he is as a result. His favourite colour is red, his favourite hobby is playing asteroid ball and his ability is super strength.

Teresa Taurus (Voiced By: Emma Tate): The ruler of the Taurus star. Teresa is a hardworking, independent and generous star who also is ready to help anyone in need. She’s a wise star who knows just how to give her friends the help they need, as well as the motivation to do what they need to do, serving as a mentor figure to the other stars. She has her own intergalactic shop and garden where she sells “Space plants” and space remedies as well as growing and brewing her own to use to her and other’s advantage. However, she can prove to be too stubborn and too dependent on helping everyone, even if they don’t need it more than she does. Her favourite colour is green, her favourite hobby is creating remedies and growing plants and her ability is restoring materials.

Garrett Gemini (Voiced By: Ben Small): The ruler of the Gemini star. Garrett is a prankster. He’s very witty, humorous, expressive and energetic. He loves to tell fun jokes and prank his friends. But most importantly, he loves to spend time with his best friends to let loose and be full of surprises. He has a bundle of ideas and assortments of jokes and pranks whenever he needs to get himself an idea. However, his humor can sometimes be irritating to other stars. Alongside being unpredictable, he can also be too dismissive and restless, but he isn’t to the point of being mean. His favourite colour is yellow, his favourite hobby is pulling off jokes and pranks and his ability is being able to create duplicates of himself.

Cameron Cansir (Voiced By: Morgan Crowley): The ruler of the Cancer star. Cameron is a shy and quiet, but kind-hearted, empathetic and imaginative star. He loves to dream of wonderful stories, and loves writing galaxy stories about fairy tales and types of magics. He can even when given the chance tell wonderful stories himself, if he’s not too shy that is. He has also proven to be protective of his friends, and hates when one of them gets hurt. However, he can still be easily scared, too quiet and sometimes other stars can’t understand what he’s trying to do without having to be blunt, putting him in a bit of a bad mood. His favourite colour is sky blue, his favourite hobby is writing stories and his ability is to stop time for a short period of time.

Lilly Leo (Voiced By: Kathleen Barr): The ruler of the Leo star. Lilly is the diva of the stars. She’s an extremely proud, confident and charismatic star who loves to feel like she belongs with her friends. She is not only an extreme fashionista who is in the know about all of the latest fashion trends and styles, but also loves to feel as if she’s the star. Especially if she is singing or acting, mostly when she’s performing on stage. However, her pride can develop into being too vain and boastful if she’s not careful, as well as caring a bit too much for her looks. This can also result in her loving the centre of attention too much. Sometimes it can develop into being overdramatic when something goes wrong. Her favourite colour is orange, her favourite hobby is performing on stage and her ability is bending and manipulating light.

Victoria Virgo (Voiced By: Candice Moll): The ruler of the Virgo star. Victoria is regarded as a huge bookworm and academic. She’s extremely smart, responsible, observant and resourceful. She’s also very calm and knows when to keep herself and her friends out of trouble. She never goes anywhere without a quill pen nor a book and loves lots of studying and reading. From math to science to geography. From time to time she can also conduct her own science experiments with space materials. However, she is also critical of others' confusions and can be too overbearing of knowledge. She’s also a bit too judgemental. Her favourite colour is pink, her favourite hobby is experimenting and her ability is to read someone’s thoughts.

Lucas Libra (Voiced By: Sam Moran): The ruler of the Libra star. Lucas is a cheerful, charming and thoughtful star with a love of art. Lucas is always looking out for his friends and hopes that they are all happy and safe. He shines the most in his creativity. He has his own relic room where he paints, crafts and does all of his artistic duties. However, he’s not the brightest star when it comes to smarts as he can be a bit too gullible, indecisive and easily confused by what he has to do sometimes. But he does get there. His favourite colour is lavender, his favourite hobby is art and his ability is to summon projections of walls and shields for protection.

Shane Scorpio (Voiced By: Matt Hill): The ruler of the Scorpio star. Shane is a very interesting star. At first he’s a bit mysterious, but once you get to know him, you’ll see he’s quite an indulgent star with a “Deep” personality. His personality is similar to that of gothic archetypes. He’s a serious star who cares about being by himself most of the time. He can also be pessimistic and very sarcastic, getting annoyed when he can’t be alone. When that happens, he can resort to a few tricks up his sleeves to make sure he gets what he wants. However, he is actually a very good friend with a sense of compassion and will get his friends out of trouble when it calls. He loves the rock n roll life, and loves shredding on his guitar. His favourite colour is crimson, his favourite hobby is playing his guitar and his ability is to turn invisible.

Sophia Sagittarius (Voiced By: Ashleigh Ball): The ruler of the Sagittarius star. Sophia is Shane’s sister who is almost the complete opposite of him. Sophia is a tomboy who loves an adventure and wants to make sure everyone is in the mood for one. She’s very optimistic, outspoken and always looks on the bright side. She is also very brave and always takes the scary with a smile, in her words. Because she loves to go on adventures, she loves to travel and be an explorer. However, she doesn’t think before she acts and can jump to conclusions a lot. She can also prove to not be organised and hasty at times. Her favourite colour is purple, her favourite hobby is exploring and her ability is to use super speed.

Connor Capricorn (Voiced By: David Holt): The ruler of the Capricorn star. Connor is the king and queen’s advisor. He’s very organised, practical, reliable and helps keep his friends in line. He is also very mild-mannered and classical, desiring for the other stars to be mature enough to understand the rules of their duties. He is a wonderful collector who loves to collect artefacts of space and earth. However, he can be very critical of the way certain stars act and can get overly stressed by the events unfolding. He’s also very cautious and overly observant, but he means well. His favourite colour is turquoise green, his favourite hobby is collecting artefacts and his ability is supersonic hearing.

Antonio Aquarius (Voiced By: Keith Wickham): The ruler of the Aquarius star. Antonio is a quirky and idealistic inventor. He is a clever, independent and unique star who always has the perfect idea for an invention to use to help out other stars. His innovation shines the most as he has the perfect materials and ideas needed to create his next big thing. Unfortunately, they don’t always turn out a success due to him not realising at the last minute, mainly because of his excitement. He can also be too aloof to criticism and though despite his quirkiness, thinks it’s best he is distant from others. His favourite colour is blue, his favourite hobby is inventing and his ability is to change size.

Penelope Pisces (Voiced By: Robyn Moore): The ruler of the Pisces star. Penelope is a very sweet and innocent star who is always kind and friendly to everyone she meets. She is a very loyal friend who never lets anyone down. Dancing is her favourite thing to do, especially ballet as well as loving very sweet and sparkly things. However, she’s easily emotional and sensitive, and is prone to being easily worried about her friends, showing her emotions a lot. But that’s her way of showing how much she cares for everybody. Her favourite colour is light cyan blue, her favourite hobby is dancing and her ability is to have an enhanced jump boost.

King Orion and Queen Ursula (Voiced By: Mark Oliver and Carolyn Ferrie): The rulers of Stardom. King and Queen duo Orion and Ursula are very well-meaning, wise and compassionate rulers who always look out for the other stars. Though they can be strict and over-protective, the rulers always know what's best and how to operate their planet. King Orion is described as the more light-hearted, humorous and optimistic of the two while Queen Ursula is the more strict, calm-headed and sweet of the two. Their favourite colours are silver and their abilities are to watch over constellations and move them around.

DEVELOPMENT
The earliest The Space Stars was in production was in 1999. This was when ideas were beginning to be pitched by staff and primary members of popular Australian children's music group The Wiggles as an attempt to branch into different media. According to Paul Field, one of the creators of The Space Stars and the managing director of the band:

"The Wiggles has always been our biggest effort. It has been our biggest dream for a long time. But we were for a while very tempted to branch out into new territories of... Showcasing our experience with early childhood education through other mediums. That's why producing an animated series based off our works was always an interesting thought. It didn't have to be solely for boys or solely for girls like a majority of others for very young kids. That is never our biggest concern, our biggest concern was how we would approach what we always strived to do for young kids and if it went well. We wanted kids to learn, but to also be entertained."

Throughout 1999 to 2000, ideas were drawn for what the premise of the series would be, with a few artists being brought in to showcase their ideas for the premise and theme. Eventually they would be approached by animation director Davis Doi, who had previous experience with directing for Hanna-Barbera productions. Doi had just finished TV work for Cow And Chicken and was looking to find a new studio once he would complete his job as producer for the Scooby-Doo direct-to-video movies, since he wanted to continue working in some sort of art medium. Sometime in December of 1999, Doi would meet with former MGM Animation employees Paul Sabella and Jonathan Dern, who were looking to form their own company. Sabella and Dern had previously heard of Doi's work to use as basis idea's for their productions. The three will soon be acquainted and eventually would meet with Robert Winthrop, a former film producer for Dreamworks. Winthrop would assist the three in forming their company, and eventually, Sabella Dern Entertainment (Or SD Entertainment) was founded. However, they would still need to find a workplace and work so they can properly be a studio. Winthrop had been informed by Sabella and Dern about how The Wiggles were looking to develop a new animated series and needed idea pitches. Given that Doi had the most experience in that medium, he was encouraged to try out for the company. According to Doi:

"It was through Paul, Jon and Rob that I was introduced to The Wiggles. We had just formed and yeah we were a studio, but we didn't have a proper workplace and we didn't have a project either. The guys seemed to have been familiar with them (The Wiggles) as they told me they were really popular and had a big following. The US seemed to have just gotten involved with them, and with their new concept it would be a great opportunity to showcase our efforts and upcoming original plans. The moment I heard that we would finally be given a new original project to work on I immediately asked in excitement "So do we go to them or do they go to us?". One of the best New Year's Eve's I experienced I'll tell you that."

In February of 2000, Doi would book a flight to Sydney, Australia to meet the Wiggles at their formal studio from 1997 to 2004 Electric Avenue Studios to discuss the pitch for the animated series concept. Prior to the flight, Doi had spent a month developing his pitch bible for the series. Doi's vision of the series would be a Sci-Fi themed children's oriented musical series called "The Space Stars", it would be set in space and revolved around stars living among the galaxy. His inspiration for the theme was due to the rise of the "Y2K" aesthetic of the late 90s and early 2000s, that sparked an interest in futuristic art and the intergalactic imagery of that time. Not only would the target demographic be extremely interested in those themes, but also be invested with the settings, characters and premises. After looking through the pitch bible to see if it's what they were looking for, Paul and Anthony Field were extremely pleased with the concept, especially the premise and theme, as well as the extremely focused detail on how the series would interact and target it's demographic. In Doi's words "This was the one!". With the confirmation that the pitch had been green lighted and would be used for the series, the crew would if they could take a flight later in April to California to further be acquainted with SD Entertainment's work, which Doi happily agreed to. When he returned to California and broke the news that the studio had been green lit to work on the project, they celebrated. According to Sabella:

"It felt like we were celebrating Christmas all over again! We couldn't thank Doi enough for helping us. We went for dinner and we couldn't stop talking about the series pitch!"

2 months later, The Wiggles crew would fly to California to be introduced to Doi's studio. The meeting was to be acquainted further with those involved as well as to go over the pitch to make sure everything was set. Realising that the studio didn't have a workplace, The Wiggles opted to give the studio a share of money so they could find their own studio to use for their projects, giving them enough time before production began to get settled. Dern would go on to state that the Wiggles personalities exceeded his expectations highly, describing them as: "Just nothing but extremely positive and kind. Now I see why everyone loves them so much." Eventually they found their studio at Warner Center Lane in Woodland Hills, California. Before production, the studio would begin to look for more in the animation and television medium to be appointed to their studio and find work. They would manage to find additional animators, designers, writers, composers and producers to be appointed for future projects. It wouldn't be until August of 2000 that production would begin on The Space Stars. This is due to the workload the Wiggles have been receiving for concerts, video recordings and album recordings. Production would be occurring in two different studios, each having communication with each studio. One would be at Electric Avenue Studios in Sydney, Australia and the other would be at SD Entertainment's headquarters in California.

Work would begin on a test pilot showcase to present to TV networks during production. This showcase would also feature concept art for settings and characters, early episode premises and an introduction to staff involved. The pilot was intended to be 5 minutes long, would feature animation from SD Entertainment as well as composed music by Anthony Field. The test pilot would not feature any voice actors, as the pilot was only supposed to be a test to see how well it did with investors and networks. As a result, the pilot would be fully narrated by Field himself. Winthrop would also introduce the rest of the crew to American Toon Disney writer Jymn Magon, who previously worked on Disney television shows such as Talespin and Ducktales. Jymn was brought into SD Entertainment to work in the writing department. This would be Magon's first writing role for an animated series outside of America. Since the Field brothers were also working in the writing department, they helped assist Magon in what would need to be used in the script as Magon would present his way of writing to the brothers. The test pilot would finish production in November of 2000, once editing had been completed. At the time, the team would not have their pilot licensed by ABC Kids in case the pilot did not get green lit. In January of 2001, the presentation would be showcased to western investors and network producers. According to Winthrop about how the pitch went:

"The test video only lasted for 5 minutes, and we still had to present the rest of the concepts. But already a minute in I could see a few of the audience just gawking with interest at the screen. Then I whispered to Anthony "I think they wanna put this to TV!" A way too obvious response but all I could care about was those faces."

The test pilot and presentation was a success for the team, with the manager in charge telling the crew that they would green light the project, finding a suitable network looking to air the first season once production was completed. The test pilot would later be shown at MIPCOM 2001 to further attract investors. With the series green lit for Season 1 production, the studios got to work later in March. A new director would be brought in to manage the show alongside the Field Brothers, Jenifer Watts. Watts had just finished working on her trio of home videos from her own franchise The Fairies, a passion project inspired by her young daughter's interests. While her remaining videos were at the time awaiting sales and popularity enough to continue her franchise, she would wait for confirmation by working on further children's projects at the time. Watts had been familiar with the Wiggles and the group became friends, with Watts helping advise the Field Brothers on the approach of the series. Other companies and sets of staff would also be hired to help assist in composition, animation and writing as well as to help manage the workload many of the other staff members were dealing with. Hong Kong based animation studio Colorland Animation would provide additional animation services for SD Entertainment, sometimes taking over for their company in case of a work overload. All animation, storyboards and backgrounds would be completed digitally hand drawn. British investors from Playhouse Disney would also accompany work and budget for the series, bringing in their own voice actors. Main character voice actors would all originate from Australia, Britain and Vancouver, Canada. Many of them veteran voice actors. The voice actors auditioning were required to not only have capturing vocal ranges and a wide variety of emotion, but would also require a background of professional singing. If they did meet those requirements they would be casted, and would also be given a singing instructor to help assist them in vocal range and pitch. Voice actors confirmed before airing were Vancouver veteran voice actors Sam Vincent (Andy Aries), Kathleen Barr (Lilly Leo), Matt Hill (Shane Scorpio), Ashleigh Ball (Sophia Sagittarius) and Mark Oliver (King Orion), British veteran voice actors Emma Tate (Teresa Taurus), Ben Small (Garrett Gemini), David Holt (Connor Capricorn), and Keith Wickham (Antonio Aquarius) and Australian veteran voice actress Robyn Moore (Penelope Pisces). Introduced in her first voice acting role would be Australian actress Candice Moll (Victoria Virgo). Actors and singers affiliated with the Wiggles would also be cast in the series. These included Irish singer Morgan Crowley (Cameron Cansir), Australian actor, singer and Wiggles cast member Sam Moran (Lucas Libra) and Australian actress, singer and Wiggles cast member Carolyn Ferrie (Queen Ursula). New song composers would also be brought in collaboration with Anthony Field to compose the score and music for the series. These included Australian composer Sue Scott and American singer, lyricist and songwriter Lorraine Feather. The three would guide each other with composing the correct instruments, lyrics and melodies for songs and instrumental soundtrack.

Production on most of season one would be completed the next year in 2002. Though the staff were successful in having ABC Kids license the production and it's future development, the series still needed a network to broadcast on. In mid March, investors would confirm that global kids networks have picked up the first season of the series and each Network would air the first episode next month on April 5th. The series was set to air on the Nick Jr block in Australia, Treehouse TV in Canada and Playhouse Disney in both The United Kingdom and The United States. With confirmation that the first season was finally set to air, an interactive flash operated website was placed in development to be expanded on when the show was beginning to air. Before the season began to air, the website only had an about page of the history of production and a 3 minute preview video made by The Wiggles and SD Entertainment, which introduced the series and showed a sneak peak of the series. The networks The Space Stars were set to air on would also broadcast promotional commercials for the series.

RELEASE
The first season of The Space Stars would be broadcasted on its respective networks on April 5th 2002. New episodes of the first season were broadcast once a week every Friday at 4pm, while re-runs of older episodes aired on other certain days at the same time to wait out new episode releases. Each episode was 30 minutes long and consisted of 2 12 minute story driven segments. All of the segments would have one song each. The first segment would be followed by a 6 minute interactive interstitial program that would play in between the main 2 segments. 6 different interstitials would be played in between the episodes and would have a rotation on which one's would be aired. These interstitials would be:


 * Dancing On The Stars (With Cameron Cansir and Penelope Pisces)
 * The Galaxy Band (With Shane Scorpio and Sophia Sagittarius)
 * Starry Sing Along (With Lilly Leo and Connor Capricorn)
 * Comet Crafts (With Lucas Libra and Antonio Aquarius)
 * Moon Jump Exercise (With Andy Aries and Garrett Gemini)
 * Celestial Smarts (With Teresa Taurus and Victoria Virgo)

Audience and critics reception was positive. Adults and critics praised the series for it's effective use of education as well as communicating and interacting with it's target audience, the effective use of the musical numbers and sequences, it's quirky and original characters, premises, script, voice acting and animation, going on to state that not only the background and character designs were unique, vibrant and nicely detailed but also saw the effort of transitioning choreography for musical sequences and dance into animation. One critic would state:

''"I have a 4 year old niece, and when I had her over to babysit she turned on the TV to Playhouse Disney. That's when I saw the show. When it came on she was dancing to one of the songs that they were singing. She was full of energy! Jumping up and down and trying to mimic the dance moves. I had a bit of a background in music and I heard of kids TV that had songs and premises that were just painful to sit through. Usually this song would be a really irritating ear worm. It was but it was the good kind. In fact the song was really catchy and at some point I was bopping my head to it! The next day the episode was re-airing on the channel, so I decided to give it a watch to see what was so riveting to me. This show aimed for kids surprised me because of how much effort was put into it. The animation followed choreography and design well, the characters were all unique and had personalities that didn't feel over the top, the premises were nice enough to be captivating towards the young demographic and the music was very catchy. It was a musical so there were gonna be songs that the characters would sing. And I also gotta mention that the voice actors seemed to be really well instructed. They had emotion and good pitching and vocal ranges that made their singing voices nice to listen to! But after I saw the credits I realised why there was so much effort to begin with! If you ever wanna make a show for young children that would help them learn but get them on their feet to be entertained then whatever you do, you gotta hire The Wiggles!"''

Another critic would state:

"What surprised me about this show was its effective use of communicating to its target audience. At times the show would dive into educational routes and even interact with the audience. But it never felt like they were talking down to them, but instead they understood how children could properly understand and communicate through learning. In a way it was like they were caring and helping them. They also got to the point quickly enough so the demographic wouldn't get annoyed and I must applaud the people behind the series for the effort they put into this series. If I had a child then I would definitely show them this!"