February 11th, 2022 
Jackson Murphy 
Another beloved book brand from the creators of Curious George gets the animated TV series treatment. Pretzel and the Puppies premieres today on AppleTV+. Executive Producer Caroline Fraser, head of HarperCollins Productions, hopes families declare this the best [in] show.
Jackson Murphy: Tell me about the impact that the books have had on your life as you were developing this.
Caroline Fraser: These books are by the famous authors of Curious George, Margaret and H.A. Rey. I was a huge fan of Curious George and had grown up with that. And I had seen the Pretzel books. They were published a long time ago. The books were finding a hidden jewel in a treasure chest of something from these incredible authors with a huge history and a huge fanbase. Everyone knows Curious George. Here’s another property that they created that some people know but now is the chance for everyone in the world to know and enjoy it at a very, very large scale.
Caroline Fraser: Something that’s important to us and our strategy, being a production company within a publishing company, is that we really think of total alignment between our publishing program and what we do on screen. We’re really bringing the books back in a major way. We’re re-publishing the two Pretzel books that were from 1940, which inspired this great series, and then we have new publishing — several books that will come out over the next couple years. They will build up a new publishing program at the same time that we’re building up the presence of Pretzel and the Puppies on Apple. Hopefully one will push to the other and it’ll be a magical combination. Young kids and their families will be able to enjoy Pretzel in lots of different ways.
When we saw this book in our back list, it was very clear to us immediately that it had the core of something very special. At the core of it, it’s this story about a family and these incredibly sweet and funny relationships between the dad… who knows how to have fun with his kids. What are the dynamics when you have a really large family? There are five puppies. And the mom is this incredibly strong, smart female character. (From 1940 you didn’t always see.) She has a combination of this really important job in Montgomery [the mayor] as well as being a really loving and supportive mom.
The first Pretzel book really sets-up the relationship. It is the story of how Pretzel met Greta. It was not love at first sight for Greta. It was for Pretzel. Pretzel really had to work hard to win Greta over. Eventually he did things that only he could do with his incredibly long and special body to save the day. And they fell in love and had five puppies. The other book is Pretzel having fun with his five puppies in really humorous ways. He uses his body as a bridge for them to climb over to get to some place. He uses it for a big slide for them to come down. And for us it felt like these are the magical elements: a family dynamic that we haven’t seen… and that was the core of what we tried to build on and stay true to when we translated it into screen.
Caroline Fraser
JM: You have a lot of fun with the body movements of Pretzel in these episodes. And I think families will want to read the books as companion pieces. One of the themes that’s really strong about these characters is their innocence. How was it bringing out that innocence? In the first episode with the paintings, I see that. All of them paint and then vote for each other’s [paintings]. It’s just so sweet. They’re so innocent.
CF: Yeah. The five puppies… we really worked hard from both a visual perspective and a writing perspective to make them feel like preschoolers, with really clear preschool points of view. We really worked closely with the education team at Apple, and our writers really worked hard to give five puppies five unique voices and personalities. You have to be able to tell who is who from the moment you hear them speak. Getting across the world of a preschooler is multifaceted. It’s what they look like and how we draw them all. What are all the different ways preschoolers express themselves visually? And working really hard at the voices. There are real, little kids playing these puppies. We’re casting young kids to play preschoolers, and that’s the magic of what we tried to get across. We hope that they feel like your real four-year-olds that you know because that’s how they’re designed and written to feel.
JM: I have a four-year-old cousin and it’s so sweet watching him grow up and be amazed and be curious about various things. When you were young and reading classic books, what were you most curious about and how do you see that in this generation’s four year olds?
CF: That’s interesting. Well I have three children. There are many things that are the same in the things that they love about what they watch and read. It’s still and always has come down to characters that are memorable and original that you love and want to spend time with — and that you feel like you can relate to. When you feel like they’re your friends. They’re your friends in the books… and on screen, and you wanna go on endless adventures with them. That is still true. There’s much more visual sophistication in the way things are depicted on screen than when I was young. Animation is stunning today. I think kids care about the quality of the way things look on screen. Animation is much more visually sophisticated than when I was young, and that was a huge piece of this project — creating a visual world that is stunningly beautiful but most importantly feels immersive. Feels warm and a world that you want to spend time in. It’s a big part of hopefully what will attract you to watching the show again and again.
JM: And one of the reasons why I want to keep watching it is for the jazz music. I love hearing that. It’s kind of laid-back and makes you at-ease but still fun and playful. Why did you want to take that angle with choosing the jazz music for the show?
CF: (laughs) I’m so glad to hear you say that because we had a lot of debate and looked at a lot of different styles. We were very lucky to collaborate with Apple’s… best in class, best in the world music team, to help us find the right style and the right musicians to bring it to life. Why jazz? Because we felt there was something about Pretzel’s body and this cool character that felt jazzy to us — and the physical humor of the show. And we also felt like it was a style that was somewhat original — that we hadn’t heard in a ton of preschool shows. And we wanted to make something unique that when you would walk by, you would hear it and in two seconds you’d say, “That’s Pretzel and the Puppies”.
JM: I have been watching Mark Duplass on Apple’s The Morning Show for the past couple years. Him and Nasim Pedrad are Pretzel and Greta in this. Was there a casting process? Did Mark get the role because he’s already in the Apple family?
CF: Apple has an incredible casting department. We came in with a vision, even when we pitched it, of what the mom and dad would sound like. They had to have a combination of a very humorous dynamic and also a really warm dynamic. This is a fun family. We always go through our dream lists. Mark Duplass was really at the top of our list. We were lucky because obviously Apple has a pre-existing relationship with him, so that might’ve helped us secure him. He’s a tremendously successful and popular actor. He’s incredibly funny and endearing in the role. And then you’re looking for the female actress who can play the mom who can work off of that dynamic together? We wanted someone who was very funny and had the warmth. The mom is the mayor of the city. She’s got a big-time job but she’s also a loving and caring mom. Greta can do it all. We found that voice in Nasim Pedrad. Her voice is amazing and she has incredible comic chops — a big star at Saturday Night Live. That was the perfect fit.
JM: You have Play, Passion, Purpose expert Tony Wagner involved in this. People in the education world see firsthand what’s going on with kids these days. What was Tony’s direct involvement?
CF: We had created a curriculum in collaboration with Apple, which is “Making Your Bark”. It’s really fundamentally about the concept of: kids as young as preschool can make a big positive impact in their world. It could be on their siblings (the other puppies), their neighbors, the whole town and how it functions. It really gives agency to little kids that you too can make a difference in your world. We look at how you would integrate that into storylines and how you would back that up with research of how kids think and learn and what they’re capable of doing at four years old. That’s where Tony Wagner was really helpful. We showed him potential storylines. And when you have a curriculum, you want it seamlessly integrated. He was really helpful in giving us feedback on certain stories. And a big piece of it was to have our puppies learning to make their bark by doing things actively instead of just hearing about it. That’s how kids actually learn. They learn by doing. He gave us great notes and helped us achieve the level of storytelling that we were able to get to.
JM: Good. And I was gonna ask you about “Make Your Bark” because I feel like it’s a very strong campaign / motto / slogan / theme that you could use with this show and maybe Apple overall for years to come. Do you really envision that?
CF: It’s one of the most important things that I try to tell my three kids. You are a member of every community that you touch. You are a member of your preschool community… and your neighborhood community and your family community. And you can have an active voice / an active opinion. You can ask questions and explore and try to make a difference. A lot of it is empathy and learning to feel and understand other people’s perspectives. Probably one of the most important things you want to teach young kids is that they can make a difference in the world and that’s what we try to get across with “Make Your Bark”. So if this becomes a motto for kids and parents, I would be thrilled.
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