The Duck Factory

NBC aired this sitcom in Spring 1984 produced by MTM Productions set in an animation studio. Ran for 13 episodes.

Starring Jim Carrey in his first tv series role as young naive animator Skip Tarkington who travels to Hollywood to work for the Buddy Winkler Studios which is a small struggling operation now owned by Buddy's ditzy widow/former mistress Sheree played by Teresa Ganzel.

The Winkler studio only has one cartoon show in production titled "The Dippy Duck Show" as Buddy was a notorious cheapskate. The other employees of the studio include veteran animator Brooks (Jack Gilford), young animator Roland (Clarence Gilyard Jr.), gag writer Marty (Jay Tarses, who later created the dramedy "The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd" and co-created the sitcom "ALF"), tight-fisted business manager Aggie (Julie Payne), stoic film editor Andrea (Nancy Lane), and voice actor Wally Wooster who had played so many cartoon character voices that he forgot how his natural speaking voice sounded like (Don Messick in his only live action tv acting role). Stories revolved around the work lives and personal lives of the Winkler studio gang with young Skip trying to rally the group creatively and professionally with his enthusiasm and trying to keep Mrs. Winkler happy so she won't shut down or sell the studio. Short animated bits with Dippy Duck in action were shown during the mostly live-action half hour episode.

Some notable cartoon voice actors guest starred on the series including Frank Welker as a not-too-liked temporary replacement for Wally Wooster when Wally pursued an short-run Shakespearean play role, Bill Scott as himself who led a singalong of the Super Chicken theme song during an awards banquet, and June Foray.

Created by Allan Burns (who wrote for Jay Ward's "Rocky and Bullwinkle" cartoons and wrote Emmy-winning episodes of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show") and Herbert Klynn (who produced the 1960s "Lone Ranger" cartoon series).

Any thoughts or memories? Episodes are on Youtube. The first couple of episodes were released on MTM Home Video video cassette in the 1990s but no official DVD release yet.


Pilot episode:

In a way...I wish it would've stayed on TV for more than the summer, but then again..."The Duck Factory" would later become a lost gem that would later be found!