With ‘Pride’ Problems, NBC Finds It’s a Jungle Out There

Scripts had been written, voice tracks recorded and millions of dollars spent on DreamWorks Animation’s upcoming TV comedy about the animals in Siegfried & Roy’s Las Vegas show. Then tragedy intruded.

Roy Horn was mauled by a 600-pound Siberian tiger and dragged off the stage during an October performance. He was near death, his prognosis uncertain.

Back at DreamWorks’ facility in Glendale, executives were confronted with a delicate but inescapable decision: Should production continue on the computer animated show “Father of the Pride”?

“We honestly didn’t know what to do,” said one of the show’s creators, Jonathan Groff. “We were really shaken. We didn’t know how this thing was going to turn out, but we were in this zone: ‘Let’s just keep going.’ ”

“Father of the Pride,” believed to be the most expensive first-year TV comedy ever created, arrives Tuesday night on NBC -- but not without a slew of questions over taste, content and decisions made by executives who pressed ahead.

“We’ve had all kinds of challenges and hurdles along the way and setbacks and disappointments,” said DreamWorks partner Jeffrey Katzenberg. “But we love the show, and we’re very proud of it.”

More than a few laughs are riding on the outcome.

The General Electric Co.-owned network needs new hits as it faces a fall TV season without its signature comedies “Friends” and “Frasier.” NBC is spending more on “Father of the Pride” than on any of its other new shows: $1.6 million for each half-hour episode.

DreamWorks has even more at stake. The company is banking on the show’s success to help entice investors to buy shares of a spinoff animation company that would be headed by Katzenberg, who came up with the idea for the program.

Some advertisers aren’t certain that two of Hollywood’s master performers -- Katzenberg and NBC entertainment chief Jeff Zucker -- can pull this one off.

“They’ve got their work cut out,” said Stacey Lynn Koerner, an executive vice president with ad-buying firm Initiative.

Besides sensitivities surrounding the mauling, many advertisers thought the show featuring cute lions was aimed at family audiences, an impression reinforced by early clips and ads. But the first few episodes are laced with drug references and sexually suggestive humor meant for adults.

“These are cute, cuddly characters, and you just want to wrap your arms around them and take them home,” Koerner said. “But then they open their mouths, and you don’t know what to think.”

Zucker, president of NBC Universal Television Group, conceded in an interview that NBC had failed several times in trying to bring animation to prime time. But, he said, the network needs a breakout hit comedy. “We have to take some swings, take some risks,” he said.

Zucker first approached Katzenberg in 2001. At the time, “Shrek” was a monster box- office hit for DreamWorks. Zucker wanted to make the green ogre a TV star. But Katzenberg said no. Among other reasons, Katzenberg did not want to diminish the value of “Shrek” sequels by creating a television show. About a year later, however, he came up with an alternative.

After watching the Siegfried & Roy show for “something like the 14th or 15th time” in Las Vegas, Katzenberg said he started toying with the notion of a show based on a troupe of animals living in elaborate enclosures at the Mirage Hotel.

“What would it be like to be one of these animals and to raise a family, and live in the Jungle Palace and go to work every day at a place where the CEOs are these two eccentric guys, Siegfried & Roy?” Katzenberg said.

Zucker loved the idea, and by the end of last September stars including John Goodman and Carl Reiner had recorded several episodes, which had been shipped to a Hong Kong facility for the animation process.

Then came the Oct. 3 attack.

In Burbank, most NBC entertainment executives figured they should pull the plug. They worried that the mauling would make a satirical look at Siegfried & Roy and the animals seem in poor taste. Zucker, however, continued to champion the project, as did Katzenberg.

“Siegfried kept encouraging us not to stop,” Katzenberg said. “He would say, ‘Roy would want you to keep going.’ And during Roy’s recovery, this show suddenly became really important to them.”

Horn and Siegfried Fischbacher are executive producers of the show.

As Horn’s condition slowly improved, Zucker negotiated an exclusive prime-time special focused on Horn’s recovery called “Siegfried & Roy: The Miracle.” Hosted by Maria Shriver, former NBC news anchor and California’s first lady, it’s scheduled to air Sept. 15.

For a while, NBC executives considered running the Shriver special on the same night as “Father of the Pride.” They changed course after hundreds of advertisers were left cringing in their seats during NBC’s presentation of its fall lineup in May.

At New York’s Radio City Music Hall, the network showed clips from “Father of the Pride,” along with excerpts from an interview with a scarred and partially paralyzed Horn on a huge video screen.

“It really gave people the creeps,” said Shari Anne Brill, programming director for ad-buying firm Carat USA. “You know, the public’s memory is very fleeting, but then they put that guy up there and they remind you that [he] was almost murdered by the cartoon characters this show is based on.”

Zucker acknowledged that NBC “did a bad job” with the clips. Network executives said they probably were trying too hard to assure people that Horn was on the mend. In numerous test screenings, they said, no one was turned off by the show because of the tiger attack.

“It was one of those things that we over-thought way too much,” Zucker said. “All the audience wants to do is laugh.”

But for advertisers, the age of that audience has been a puzzle.

Initially, many thought the show’s content would be kid-friendly, especially because NBC received money for the show from the Family Friendly Programming Forum. The mission of the advertising group is to support prime-time programs parents can watch with their children.

But in an opening scene of Tuesday’s episode, for example, the John Goodman character, Larry the lion, hurries home to his wife, who is in heat. He swivels his furry hips and announces: “Big Daddy’s home.... It may be 9 o’clock in New York, but right here it’s mountin’ time.”

Sensitive to the growing criticisms, NBC last month amended its on-air promotions to include the disclaimer that the show is “an adult comedy.” Despite reservations, advertisers have purchased commercial time in all 13 episodes that have been ordered from DreamWorks.

Katzenberg, Zucker and others involved in the program insist that “Father of the Pride” was always intended to reach NBC’s target demographic of 18-to-49-year-olds. “This show is edgy, subversive and a little irreverent,” Katzenberg said.

These days, he suggested, that’s the only breed of animated program that can claw its way to the top.

Times staff writer Maria Elena Fernandez contributed to this report.

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Prime-time toons

With the exception of Fox, the major broadcast networks haven’t had much luck with prime-time cartoons since “The Flintstones.” A sampling:

The Simpsons

Network: Fox

Premiere: 1989

Status: Still airing

King of the Hill

Network: Fox

Premiere: 1997

Status: Still airing

The Flintstones

Network: ABC

Premiere: 1960

Status: Ended in 1966

Futurama

Network: Fox

Premiere: 1999

Status: Ended in 2003

The PJs

Networks: Fox, WB

Premiere: 1999

Status: Ended in 2001

Family Guy

Network: Fox

Premiere: 1999

Status: Ended in 2002; new episodes slated for next season after DVD sales and reruns create new interest.

The Critic

Networks: ABC, Fox

Premiere: 1994

Status: Ended in 1995

The Jetsons

Network: ABC

Premiere: 1962

Status: Ended in 1963

The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo

Network: NBC

Premiere: 1964

Status: Ended in 1965

Stressed Eric

Network: NBC

Premiere: Aug. 12, 1998

Status: Ended Sept. 2, 1998

Family Dog

Network: CBS

Premiere: June 23, 1993

Status: Ended July 28, 1993

God, the Devil and Bob

Network: NBC

Premiere: March 9, 2000

Status: Ended March 28, 2000

Clerks

Network: ABC

Premiere: May 31, 2000

Status: Ended June 7, 2000

Sammy

Network: NBC

Premiere: Aug. 8, 2000

Status: Ended Aug. 15, 2000

Sources: Baseline, Times research