Dean provides the voices of Tyrannicus the tiger and Herry the biker warthog in the new 40-episode animated television series based on the classic alphabet book Animalia by Australian artist Graeme Base. Tyrannicus is a sly, smooth talking tiger who always puts his own interests first. He wants to get visiting humans Zoe and Alex out of Animalia. Herry the warthog and his partner Horble are motorcycle dudes with Cockney accents and about one brain between them.

"Animalia is an extraordinary television series and ... will be one of the first children's series to launch virtually simultaneously in all four of the major English speaking countries of the world," said PorchLight Entertainment president and CEO, Bruce Johnson. Animalia will be broadcast on PBS in the United States; Network Ten and Nickelodeon in Australia; the CBC and CBBC in Canada; and the BBC in the UK.

The series features two contemporary kids, Zoe and Alex, who visit the extraordinary land of Animalia, a spectacular place inhabited by talking animals from the pages of Graeme Base's classic book. Mysterious events have undermined the very fabric of Animalia's civilization and Zoe and Alex and their new best friends, G'Bubu and Iggy (a huge green gorilla and a small but heroic iguana) will do everything they can to restore peace and order to Animalia. The series combines elements of humor, adventure and mystery and will also offer an interactive website to accompany the show.

"Animalia is a many-layered world of detail, imagination and humor," said author Graeme Base, who is an executive producer of the series. "Capturing the spirit of the book has been central to our efforts, and seeing it come to life on the screen is tremendously exciting."

The series features animation of the quality employed in films such as Shrek and Happy Feet, a level of technical sophistication previously unseen on television, and received an enthusiastic reception when previewed to major international broadcasters in New York and London. The series was officially launched in Cannes, France, earlier this year.

A team of international designers, 3D animators, editors and directors based themselves in Queensland, Australia specifically to work on the project. “We had to find a way to rescale a highly creative, technologically complex process to realise a project of such unprecedented ambition,” said Ewan Burnett, managing director of series developer Burberry Productions, describing how the visual effects artists and animators digitally refined the characters from 3-D models, providing surface texture, lighting, movement, expression and other nuances to re-create the layered, painterly look of Graeme Base's original artwork.

From Porchlight Entertainment press release and Catalyst online issue 22.

CAST

Dean O'Gorman : Tyrannicus and Herry
Brooke 'Mikey' Anderson : Alex
Kate Higgins : Allegra
Christopher Hobbs : Livingstone and G'bubu
Peta Johnson : Reenie
Robert Mark Klein : Iggy
Katie Leigh : Zoe and Fushia

CREW

Director : David Scott
Voice Director : Tom Ruegger
Writer: Tom Ruegger
Executive Producer : Graeme Base
Executive Producer : Ewan Burnett
Executive Producer : Bruce Johnson
Executive Producer : Murray Pope
Executive Producer : Tom Ruegger
Story Editor : Tom Ruegger
Score Composed by : Christopher Elves
Supervising Art Director : Brad Greenwood
CG Supervisor : Janie Levesque
Post Production Supervisor : Pippa Anderson
Production Manager : Kate Pappas
Production Co-ordinators: Nick Russel and Chrissy Melge
Production Accountant : Carolyn Oliver
Casting : Sabrina Young
Editor : Alicia Gleeson
Assistant Editors : Courtney O'Brien-Brown and Alex Fitzwater
2nd Assistant Editor : Bill Collis
Prints Siupervisors : Mark Evans and Louise Harbvey
Prints Artists : Heidi Villafane, Sheldon Whittaker, Florent Kevel
  Adam Waddington, Gareth Young, Hailey White, Russell Ludewig
  Jason Gilholme, Anthony Church, Juani Guiraldes, Mark Purnell
Technical Assistant.Modifier : Brendan Carmody
Photon Animation
Animation Supervisor : Stan Steinmuller
Animation Director : Brad Noble
Line Producer : Shereena-Lee Van De Berki
Production Manager : Lena Scanlan
Animation Leads : Andy Cadzow and Jonathan Clarke
Lead Animator : Aaron Barlow
Modeling Lead : Stefan Litterini
Rigging Lead : Oyvind Nostdal
Texturing Lead : Isobelle Rousselle
Lighting Leads : Elisa Estaban and ANshul Dayal
Opening Theme by Graeme Base and Yuri Woronschak
Sound Engineer : Michael Miller
Sound Design and Mixing : Digital Sound & Vision
Title Design : Box Communications
Mastering and Duplication : Cutting Edge
Special Effects : Digital Pictures Iloura
Special Effects : Photon VFX

PRODUCTION COMPANY

Animalia Productions
Porchlight Entertainment
Burberry Productions