The Fairly Odd-Blog

Tonight, don’t forget to watch the premiere of the brand new, one-hour Fairly OddParents special, “The Fairly Oddlympics”. The episode, featuring guest star Scott Hamilton, starts at 8:00 p.m.

Speaking of the Olympics and FOP, my mind goes back through the mists of time to 1996 when I was working in Hanna-Barbera’s animation art department. We were getting ready to head to Hotlanta for the 1996 Olympics, where the department would set up some retail space in the CNN Center, selling all sorts of priceless collectibles to discriminating tourists. At that time, Fred, then president at H-B, was really pushing us to promote new talent at the studio by asking them to contribute to the animation art program. This didn’t pan out, as the studio was sold by the end of the year. However, we were lucky enough to get two pieces from Butch Hartman (there almost was a Quick Draw Limited Edition Cel from Pat Ventura). Butch created the first-ever Hong Kong Phooey cel, as well as the sports-themed sericel above. He actually designed it much more specific to the Olympics for our selling in Georgia, but, at the very last minute, he had to go back and change it to keep the I.O.C.’s lawyers off our back (besides not being able to include the five copyrighted rings, we were barred from using the word ‘Olympics’ and even from showing a torch - ha!). Of course, now this sericel is worth millions, what with Butch’s 2004 crime spree and all.

– Eric