Tuesday, February 16, 1999

A helping of VeggieTales

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Popular kids' videos serve main course of Christian values, with fun as dessert

BY JULIE IRWIN
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Larry Boy stars in a lesson in telling the truth. | ZOOM |

        They are curious candidates for cultural iconhood — a chirping cucumber with one centered tooth and his sly, hopping tomato buddy.

        But in certain circles — namely video-watching, jingle-singing little people — Larry the Cucumber and Bob the Tomato are it. As in watch-a-million-times, know-all-the-words-to-the-songs it.

        For the uninitiated, Larry and Bob are the stars of a series of 11 videos called VeggieTales that have crossed over from Christian-bookstore favorites to mass-market successes. Using humor and sophisticated graphics, VeggieTales manage to entertain children and adults as they slip in biblically based lessons about forgiveness, gratitude and God's love.

        Kids love the hairless, armless figures, their jokes and the tunes that warble out of their quirky figures.

        “I like the songs and the characters, how they look and how they tell their stories,” says Ryan Shaver, 8, a second-grader at Cincinnati Christian Schools in Fairfield. “I learn from the stories sometimes, things like when you do a lie you get caught.”

        Parents love the cultural references that range from Madame Bovary to Gilligan's Island, and especially the moral lessons that their kids walk away with, often unconsciously. Christian educators appreciate the combination of wholesome message and first-rate entertainment, something the creators call “Sunday-morning values with Saturday-morning fun.”

        “It has enough adult interest that you can draw in an older child and a younger child and give the same message,” says Diane Ervin, a lead teacher for child care at Vineyard Community Church in Springdale, who watches over kids ages 4 to 9. “I've even seen some teen-agers stuck in front of them. I've never heard anyone say they didn't really care for them.”

        VeggieTales are the creation of Phil Vischer, a Chicago father of three whose background includes Bible college and computer-animated advertising. Weary of using his talent to produce flying breakfast pastries and swirling beer logos, Mr. Vischer worked in a spare bedroom on characters who would teach children about God's grace.

        By 1993, he and two art-school graduate helpers had produced the first full-length VeggieTale, Where's God When I'm S-scared?

        Why vegetables? No statement about vegetarianism or anything else in the decision: Vegetables are simply easier to draw than people, and Mr. Vischer feared the wrath of parents if he stuck with his first idea of animated candy bars.

        There are standards: Jesus will never appear as a vegetable in any VeggieTale. But nearly everything else is fair game. In one episode, a chocolate-bunny factory owner Nebby K. Nezzer feeds workers Rack, Shack and Benny junk food, then tries to make them bow down before a 90-foot bunny — a modern spin on the the Biblical story of King Nebuchadnezzar's battles with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.

        Another features a commercial for the Ronco “Forgive-o-Matic,” complete with a special offer that includes Ginzu 2 steak knives. There are Monty Python references, a Grapes of Wrath take-off and a retelling of David and Goliath in which Junior Asparagus slays the Giant Pickle.

        “We take the heart of the story and the spiritual lesson very seriously,” Mr. Vischer says. “But once we figure out what's sacred, nothing else is.”

        The biblical verses presented at the end of each story originally turned off mainstream stores, and the VeggieTale phenomenon grew in Christian bookstores throughout the country. They remain the most popular children's item in many stores, with no let-up in sight.

        “We can't keep them in. We had VeggieTales Valentines this year and they went like crazy,” says Barbara Smith, manager of Family Bookstores in Florence. “People are getting so they wait for new releases. We have to take their names when a new one comes out.”

        Last year, mass-market retailers such as Wal-Mart, Kmart, Target and Kroger began selling the videos. The wider exposure has helped boost sales to about 7 million copies — 4 million of those in 1998.

        Although Big Idea Productions has grown to 70 employees, it remains a family affair. Mr. Vischer provides the voice for Bob the Tomato, whose sign-off is “God made you special, and he loves you very much!”

        His wife, Lisa, serves as a creative consultant and the voice of Junior Asparagus, and Mike Nawrocki, a close friend of Mr. Vischer from Bible college, is a writer/director and voice of Larry the Cucumber.

        While other parents fret about the abundance of sex and violence on television and in movies, Mr. Vischer says VeggieTales are proof of the media's possibilities — if people would stop complaining and create better alternatives.

        “The very media so often used to dispirit can be turned inside out to spread Biblical values,” he says. “Values like thankfulness, forgiveness, loving others and sharing — and the undeniable benefit of doing things God's way instead of our own way — are very strong messages for kids.”

       

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