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The Chimp Channel aired on TBS for 13 episodes beginning in June of 1999.
The Chimp Channel resembled Saturday Night Live played by Chimps. It was set at a cable network called TCC ( The Chimp Channel), where everyone from the executives behind the scenes to the stars were costumed chattering chimps. Ford Carter ( voiced by Richard Doyle), was the Tycoon owner, Harry ( Maurice LaMarche), his cultered network President ( complete with a British accent), and Timmy ( Richard Steven Horvitz), an intern. In front of the cameras were studley superstar Brock ( Daran norris), talk-Show host Murray ( Eugene Roche), stately anchorman George , and screaming diva Marina( Jennifer Hale), among others. Their shows depicted in skits, included such favorites as NYPD Zoo, Touched By An Anvil, Treewatch, Ally Mcsqueal, Buffy ( she killed everyone), and America's Most Uncomfortable Videos.
This mercifully short-lived sitcom was spun off from the short " Monkey-ed Movies" parodies previously seen within and between regular TBS films.
An Article from Time Magazine
The Chimp Channel
Monday, Jul. 05, 1999
By JOEL STEIN
Sure, you love talking chimps. But do you love the creatures enough to watch a full half-hour of them? More than once? Sober? The idea and execution here are adequate: chimps run a network on which they parody current TV shows and make fun of Hollywood. Just in case Ted Turner could resist talking chimps, the creators have the fake network run by a mean, stupid Australian mogul to mock Turner's rival, Rupert Murdoch. The real fear is that TBS's Turner might turn this show into an actual channel. Chimps all day may sound appealing, but you probably need some midgets and bikinied women to round out even 30 minutes of entertainment.
A Review from The Post Gazette
TV monkeys around with 'The Chimp Channel'
Sunday, June 06, 1999
By Rob Owen, Post-Gazette TV Editor
PASADENA, CALIF. - First there was J. Fred Muggs on the "Today" show.
Then came "Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp" on Saturday mornings, followed by the "Bear" of "B.J. and the Bear" in prime time and even the short-lived "Mr. Smith."
But for the past decade, monkey TV stars have been limited to guest spots by Marcel on "Friends," nature specials and Animal Planet. That changed with TBS's "Monkey-ed Movies," a 1998 series of shorts starring an all-simian cast in pop culture parodies.
Their popularity led TBS to create a regular series, "The Chimp Channel," premiering at 10:05 p.m. Thursday. The show is set behind-the-scenes at a television network run by monkeys. Yes, this could be a true story, but it's fiction since TCC doesn't exist - yet.
"The show is basically half behind-the-scenes like 'Larry Sanders,' half TV sketch comedy," said creator Tom Stern in a January meeting with TV critics. The sketches are clips from TCC shows, including "Treewatch," a city park spoof of "Baywatch" that stars the network's No. 1 bombshell, Marina.
"She's a cross between a Madonna and a Pamela Lee," said co-executive producer Tim Burns. "Marina is sort of like consummate sex, if your idea of sex is a chimp with long blond hair and clingy gowns."
Other media figures parodied include Ted Turner rival Rupert Murdoch (TCC's owner is an Australian media tycoon) and CNN's Larry King (he's aped by Murray Price, TCC's celebrity interviewer).
"[Murray] is a consummate ladies' man, in his mind, which is probably the reason he's been married eight or 12 times," said producer Skot Bright.
"If you get close to him, you can actually smell the Viagra," Stern said.
While "Monkey-ed Movies" spoofed big-screen films, "The Chimp Channel" will go after movies and TV and sundry other aspects of pop culture.
"We like to create our own concepts and combine things," Stern said. "Like, 'Armageddon: The Series,' where there's always a comet every week."
"Every week it's the size of a different state," Burns added.
Stern said the slight difference in human and simian DNA gives humans a primordial connection to the hairier species.
"When you get with a chimp in a room, there's an intense connection that everybody gets that's not like a dog or a cat or anything else," he said. "They're just barely on the edge of consciousness, and it's fascinating."
For the purpose of creating laughs, Stern said chimps are a comedy writer's best friend. "Something that sounds lame coming out of an actor's mouth, can often be quite funny coming out of a chimp's mouth."
It's not all fun times making "The Chimp Channel." The American Humane Association is on the set at all times and animal trainer Denise Sanders monitors the monkeys.
"We know when they're tired, we know when they're getting bored," Sanders said. "So we'll say, we need to move on and do something different."
Sanders said the animals are trained to open and close their mouths to approximate the human speaking voices that are dubbed in later.
"We'll break everything down into little steps," Sanders said. "We put it in terms they can understand and then we add it all together."
Bright said animal trainers read scripts for "The Chimp Channel" in advance to determine whether scenes that are proposed are achievable.
"Specific training for the chimps or the orangutans is they understand what we're saying because it's all through repetition," Sanders said. "Usually they like to work because it's very stimulating for them. However, they do have short attention spans, so if they've done it for 10 takes and they're just burnt out on it, we move on to something different."
Even when the chimps get tired, there's one sure-fire movement they can make, Stern said as he slapped the palm of his hand on his forehead.
"If nothing else, we end the skit that way."
An Article on the Chimp Channel from Scram Magazine
Monkeyin' around on the set of The Chimp Channel
There�s a fine line between the sublime and the stupid, but only occasionally does there come along an entertainment vehicle brilliant enough to straddle it. For every Cabin Boy there�s 1,347 Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolos. But one lowbrow equation is a proven theorem: Monkeys = funny.
Having long considered Lancelot Link Secret Chimp the peak of quality television entertainment, I was justifiably giddy to learn that TBS would be producing a half-hour weekly series called The Chimp Channel. Since the �sit� in this �com� would revolve around apes running a TV station, viewers would get both a window on backstage showbiz hijinks and a satire of boob tube offerings. Like SCTV, only simian.
Co-creator Tom Stern, a writer with a specialty in chimp-specific work, helped popularize the primate parody concept for a series of 1998 promos for TBS�s stable of classic films. In �Monkey-ed Movies,� apes re-enacted scenes that ran the gamut from Gone With the Wind to Saturday Night Fever to Braveheart. The interstitials proved so popular�America, after all, loves a monkey and a clothed chimp all the more so�that TBS subsequently aired an all-Oscar revue. TCC was green-lighted on the strength and ratings of these shorts.
But soon after production began, Stern found himself at odds with TBS suits regarding the direction of TCC. The fuse blew on the set, when a blotto Stern reportedly flipped out, stripped nude and antagonized the station�s top brass. In his version, this was not a drunken display but �performance art� to protest creative differences. Whatever it was, Stern was canned, lawsuits followed and The Chimp Channel went on without its prime visionary at the helm.
A few months into its run, I managed to procure a visit to the TCC set. While thrilled at the prospect, I didn�t realize what a coup it was. Even a fly buzzing by, I was told, could be a major scene-wrecker for a curious chimp thespian, so this was a closed set. Because of the apes� limited working hours and desire to interact, I was briefed on �taboo� behavior such as touching or feeding them, making gestures or even eye contact. However, none of this advice proved necessary, as the simians hardly co-mingled with crew members, let alone me.
While getting a tour through the scaled-down-to-monkey-size set�walking through it was a bit like visiting Being John Malkovich�s 7 and 1/2th floor�an announcement rang though the unassuming warehouse buried in the Burbank foothills. �Attention: Chimps are entering the building! Everyone take your place!� Five minutes later this was followed by �Chimps are now walking through!� Only the trainer and cameraman were allowed in the actual performing area, it seemed. Those not essential to the up-close action, including the director, viewed from monitors 50 feet away.
In the scene being filmed, the show�s female lead�a Pamela Anderson actress-type named Marina�would hysterically wave a gun at TCC�s general manager. But before she could fire, another chimp was to emerge from a door that would open to knock the gun out of her hand. This 15-second scene was rehearsed several times with a trainer, as it required the female chimp to react to the door�s bump and toss the gun as if it were accidentally flying out of her hand. To ensure that her mouthing matched up to the cadence of the dialogue, the trainer �hand-talked� to a recorded tape and the primate aped.
This is a lot to remember, especially when one is wearing an uncomfortably hot wig and itchy, ill-fitting dress. Many times, the scene wasn�t performed to completion because the actress tugged her hair off or chewed the weapon. In order not to expend any additional monkey energy, the role of opening the door was relegated to a human during the lengthy rehearsal. The chatter, bump!, toss the gun sequence was repeated ad infinitum.
Finally, it became time to film, and the chimp was placed behind the door. Everything was going well: the actress mouthed her dialogue and held the gun at the proper angle. Then, right on cue, the other chimp bumped her with the door, but she detected a subtle difference. The Pamela Anderson chimp flipped around, saw that the culprit was another monkey, interpreted his action as an attack and clocked him over the head with her gun. Much shrieking ensued. I saw the director glance down from his monitor and rub his temples in a �how the hell did I get into this racket?� motion.
I have no idea whether this was the last straw, but a few weeks later TBS announced it was ceasing production on The Chimp Channel. I don�t know if the episode I watched was the last to be taped; it was the last to air.
It wasn�t like TCC was the funniest thing to hit the airwaves, but its presence is sadly missed in a TV environment sorely lacking in chimp antics. Perhaps some brave, bright soul will pick up the gauntlet. Until then, at least we have MoJo JoJo.�
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