Channel Frederator Blog

Well, my daughter will be thrilled - she’s never seen the Smurfs cartoon but ever since finding the figurines at FAO Schwartz in Vegas she’s been enthralled by them.

They do look pretty good in those images, but I wonder if Gargamel will want to eat them or turn them into gold this time?

I tried to translate it, but please be lenient, English is’nt my native language :

50 years later, those characters are always admired and loved.
Peyo (the original comic artist) would be happy to see it (he died in 1992)

Peyo short Interview (oval shapped blue & white sequence) :

Journalist : What is the size of the smurfs ?
Peyo : As high as 3 apples.

J :Their weight ?
P: Around 100 grammes.

J : What do they eat ?
P : Salsepareille (it’s a plant : Smilax aspera)

J : Is it good ?
P : No, not at all ! I tried, I went to an herborist to buy some salsepareille, and I advise anyone not to eat that !

The documentary, beginning with pencils roughs of Smurfs :

Here are the first Smurfs, born thanks to the pencil of Pierre Culliford aka Peyo, in 1958. Those little blue gremlins first appeared in a comic book named “Johann et Pirlouit” (in france and Belgium), and quickly became the real heroes of the serie. But where did Peyo find their funny name ? (in French, the original name is “Schtroumps”)
It was during a lunch with his friend Franquin (another master of the french comics, with “Gaston”, or “Spirou & Fantasio” for example)

Franquin : I wanted to ask Peyo to give me the saltshaker, but I did’nt find the word, so I said “Give me the… smurf!”
And Peyo answered : “Here is your smurf, thank you for smurfing, it was a pleasure to smurf you the salt, etc.”
The name was born.

At the beginning, the Smurfs were published in the comic magazine “Spirou”, and, then were printed in comic books thanks to the Dupuis publishing house. A Cinema movie has even be made in 1975, and Paulette, a color artist who worked on the movie remembers :

“We were expecting a star, but Peyo was really nice, gentle with all of us. This movie was made in a really good mood, Peyo was always among us, bringing his enthusiasm and dynamism. I keep a really good rememberance of this period.”

Those characters are still living today : the 26th comic book just printed this week has been writen by Peyo’s son, Thierry Culliford, and drawn by artists who worked directly with Peyo when he was still alive. The family adventures goes on.

Thierry Culliford interview (with a lot of post-its in the background) :

“I think I learned my job writing Smurfs stories. Thanks to my dad’s rigour, his graphic quality, he was always trying to give his characters some natural feeling, humor, or poetry.
I learned so much, and ‘m still learning while I write thoses stories.”

For the news : There will probably be new characters in the comic books, and for the first time, the Smurfs will appear in 3D in a great movie in a few months !

Thanks so much for the translation! It’s nice to know the family is still very much involved in the characters and stories.