PicoBlog

“We can sing and dance / And we don’t need pants / See, we’re just like you!

We’ve got regular jobs / Just with low doorknobs / See, we’re just like you!

Yes, we graduate from Harvard / ‘At the head of my class!’

But if you test sobriety / ‘I might not pass!’

There’s no strings attached / And there’s no hand up my ass / We’re just…like…youuuuuuu!”

Did everyone sing along? You didn’t? Well, all right, I’ll allow it, but only because so few people ever had the opportunity to enjoy FOX’s Greg the Bunny to begin with.

Greg the Bunny, which both premiered and concluded in 2002, was set in a world where humans lived side by side with puppets, although they actually prefer the term “fabricated Americans.” (If you couldn’t make any sense out of the lyrics to the theme song when you read them a moment ago, perhaps this information helps provide at least a little bit of belated context.) The series focuses on a children’s TV show called Sweetknuckle Junction, starring Greg the Bunny, Warren De Montague (he’s an ape), and Count Blah, along with human characters Junction Jack (Bob Gunton) and Dottie Sunshine (Dina Waters), and it’s produced and directed by Gil Bender (Eugene Levy). Gil’s son, Jimmy (Seth Green), is Greg’s roommate, but he’s also a production assistant on the show, and the whole lot of them perpetually find themselves having to deal with network executive Alison Kaiser, played by Sarah Silverman.

Despite being filled with a hell of a lot of talented non-fabricated Americans, Greg the Bunny failed to survive beyond its initial 13-episode order, and only 11 of those episodes actually made it to air before the network pulled the plug on the series.

Oh, sure, some of the characters managed to find new life in 2005 when IFC brought back Greg the Bunny for a few seasons worth of movie parodies, but it’s a completely different animal from the FOX series…no pun intended. It’s also worth mentioning that MTV brought Warren De Montague out of mothballs, so to speak, and gave him his own series, Warren the Ape, in 2010, but it, too, only lasted for a single season.

FOX released all 13 episodes of the original Greg the Bunny series on DVD, but for whatever reason, only the IFC series can be found streaming in any official capacity. That said, someone uploaded the FOX episodes to YouTube several years ago, and since they’ve yet to be pulled down, I guess FOX isn’t overly concerned about them being out there. Obviously, I’d still rather people were able to actually purchase quality versions of them for online viewing — and given how many more fans Eugene Levy has nowadays as a result of Schitt’s Creek, I can’t believe that Fox’s is blowing the opportunity to make a few extra bucks off Greg the Bunny — but until that opportunity is available, at least this way you can still revisit the show and see how funny it was.

In closing, while I won’t embed all of the episodes, I will offer up my favorite: “Piddler on the Roof,” which features a guest appearance by — wait for it — Gary Oldman.

Of course, when I interviewed Oldman for Bullz-Eye in conjunction with the release of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, you know I brought it up…

I know we don’t have a lot of time, but I wanted to touch on a few other things you’ve done over the years. First and foremost, I must tell you that I’m a big fan of your work on Greg the Bunny.

Gary Oldman: [Uncertainly.] On…?

Greg the Bunny.

[Suddenly comprehends, then bursts out laughing.] Greg the Bunny!

Yes, you seemed truly taken by Warren the Ape’s Shakespearean performance.

Oh, my. Whatever happened to that? It didn’t hang around very long, did it?

No, it only lasted a season on Fox. But the characters turned back up on IFC, then Warren had his own reality show on MTV! Did you enjoy the opportunity to poke a bit of fun at yourself?

Yeah! You know, you’re asked to do these odd little things that come in. I did one of the early characters for a video game, and…it was an unusual thing to do back then, and I remember saying to my agent at the time, “Really? A voice? I don’t know. A character in a video game? Isn’t it just loads of shooting?” And this is when they would just…it was the dawn of them becoming where you had real narrative and characters.

Yeah, they’re definitely more than just shoot-‘em-ups now.

They are. And it was a very kind of unique and very unusual thing to do at the time. And now I’m more famous for the voice of Reznov in Call of Duty at school than I am for Sirius Black in the Harry Potter films or any of the other roles I’ve played. [Laughs.] Who would’ve thought it?

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