John Kricfalusi

Animator

• Born: September 9, 1955
• Place of Birth: Chicoutimi, Quebec

Contribution: John Kricfalusi, a Canadian-born animator, is best known as the creator of The Ren & Stimpy Show, which ran from 1991 to 1996 on Nickelodeon. Known for pushing boundaries, Kricfalusi revolutionized the content and style of cartoons and was the first to produce an Internet Flash cartoon, developing Flash animation techniques that are widely used today. After he was accused of sexual abuse, he said he was forcibly semi-retired by the entertainment industry.

Early Years and Education

Michael John Kricfalusi, nicknamed John K., was born September 9, 1955, in Chicoutimi, Quebec. Raised in a military family, Kricfalusi spent his early years on air force bases in Germany and Belgium, with weekends spent watching movies, especially European-style cartoons.

When Kricfalusi was seven, his family returned to Canada, initially to Montreal and, a year later, to Ottawa. After graduating from Ottawa’s Brookfield High School, he was accepted to Toronto’s prestigious Sheridan College, well known for its animation program.

Career

After only one year at Sheridan, Kricfalusi moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in animation. Initially, he worked on low-budget Saturday morning cartoons such as The Jetsons revival and Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. In 1987, he was hired by animator and former colleague Ralph Bakshi to serve as supervising director of Bakshi’s new series Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures. The series, however, was cancelled in 1988 after only a few episodes, due to a perceived reference to cocaine use.

In 1988, Kricfalusi and like-minded artists created Spumco, an animation studio based in Los Angeles, and began pitching offbeat cartoon series to the networks. One such series was The Ren & Stimpy Show, which Nickelodeon bought in 1991. The series featured a neurotic chihuahua named Ren Höek and a cat, Stimson J. Cat, engaging in antisocial and off-color antics. Despite its reputation for rude sound effects, gross humor, and strange images, and in spite of heavy parental criticism, the show was tremendously popular and influential. Nickelodeon executives, however, concerned with the tone of the show, battled with Kricfalusi over script content and control, and fired him and Spumco after only one season.

In the late 1990s, while still with Spumco, Kricfalusi changed his focus somewhat, creating web-based cartoon products, including the first Internet Flash cartoons—mainly aimed at adults, this time free of network control. Kricfalusi’s work in this area raised the sophistication of Flash animation standards.

In 2001 Kricfalusi returned to Saturday morning television with a Fox Kids cartoon, The Ripping Friends. In 2003, he was hired by Spike TV to produce Ren & Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon. His career in the twenty-first century largely consisted of sporadic television episode work, such as The Simpsons, and animation for music videos and television specials. In 2020, he created the opening animation for the docudrama Utopia Means Nowhere.

According to Kricfalusi, he was forced into semi-retirement in the late 2010s. In early 2018, two women accused him of sexual abuse in the 1990s. According to artist Robyn Byrd, he groomed her for a sexual relationship when she was in her mid-teens. She and Katie Rice provided media with messages from him. Byrd lived with Kricfalusi in Los Angeles and became an intern at his animation studio when she was a minor. According to Rice, he began propositioning her while she was a minor and hired her when she turned eighteen. She said he continuously sexually harassed her on the job. In a statement released by his attorney, Kricfalusi said he had struggled with mental illnesses for many years and had self-medicated with alcohol. No charges were filed as the accusations were made beyond the statute of limitations. He was not involved with a planned reboot of Ren & Stimpy in the 2020s.

In addition to his numerous animated series, Kricfalusi has created characters for award-winning and popular Internet and television commercials for such brands as Old Navy and Nike, as well as animated videos for such popular musicians as Björk, Tenacious D, and Weird Al Yankovic.

Toys and Merchandise

Kricfalusi is also a respected toy designer, creating and producing a number of dolls and other toys based on his own cartoons as well as on Hanna-Barbera characters and the Three Stooges. He has produced comic books, T-shirts, and other merchandise featuring his characters.

Honors and Awards

For his contribution to the art of animation, Kricfalusi has been the recipient of numerous awards. In 1992, he was honored with the ASIFA-Hollywood Annie Award for outstanding individual achievement in the field of animation. In 2007, he received the prestigious Winsor McCay career achievement Annie Award.

Bibliography

Amidi, Amid. "Billy West Says 'Ren & Stimpy' Reboot Still on at Comedy Central." Cartoon Brew, 1 Jan. 2021, www.cartoonbrew.com/tv/billy-west-says-ren-stimpy-reboot-still-on-at-comedy-central-200451.html. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

Boyd, Kevin A. “SDCCI Special Guest: John Kricfalusi.” The Joe Shuster Awards. Joe Shuster Awards, 9 July 2009. Web. 19 Aug. 2013.

Bromwich, Jonah Engel, and Liam Stack. "'Ren & Stimpy' Creator Accused of Sexual Misconduct with Teenagers in the 1990s." The New York Times, 4 Apr. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/04/04/arts/ren-stimpy-creator-misconduct.html. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

"John Kricfalusi." IMDb, www.imdb.com/name/nm0471136/. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024.

“John Kricfalusi.” NNDB. Soylent Communications, 2013. Web. 19 Aug. 2013.

Kricfalusi, John. Interview by Tasha Robinson. AV Club. Onion, 4 Mar. 2001. Web. 19 Aug. 2013.

“Kricfalusi, Michael John.” Who’s Who in Animated Cartoons. Ed. Jeff Lenburg. New York: Applause, 2006. 186–87. Print.

Persons, Dan. “This Is Your Life, John Kricfalusi.” Cinefantastique 24.1 (1993): 35–37. Print.