Welcome to Butler Street Studios, where everything is bright, friendly, and painted in colors that make your eyes sit up straight. We have happy little songs, big smiles, cardboard clouds, and enough lights hanging overhead to roast a Thanksgiving turkey. If you stand still too long, you might also notice the smell of warm tape, stale coffee, and whatever mystery cleaner Smeezy says is “industry standard.”
Our whole gang works very hard to make every day feel fun, safe, and educational for the boys and girls at home. Wendy keeps us organized, Mr. Whiskers keeps things moving, Squirrelly keeps the lights on most of the time, and I do my best to stay cheerful even when somebody is shouting near the prop table. That is the magic of television, because if everyone keeps smiling, the children never have to know how much sweating is involved.
I love my friends very much, and that is why this show means so much to me. We are all doing our best to make something warm and wonderful for children, even if some of us have made a few mistakes in life, in business, or around open flame. So come on in, meet the gang, and have a look around Butler Street Studios, where the lessons are good and the problems are usually kept just off camera.
I used to have a movie franchise where I bit people heads off, and for a while that was considered very glamorous. Now I am here in Butler Street Studios trying my absolute best to teach life lessons under lights hot enough to cook a pigeon. I teach safety, friendship, and honesty now, which is nice because nobody gets their head bitten off. Well, almost nobody, and the one time does not count because it was more of a warning incident.
Wendy is my rock and the smartest person in the room, which is not difficult in this room but still very impressive. She is the kindest person you will ever meet, even when she is carrying the whole day on her back and looks like she has not slept since the Reagan administration. She tells me when to stop talking so we do not get sued, and she stares at the exit sign a lot, which I choose to interpret as healthy situational awareness.
Grime is a bad guy, and not just on the TV show where bad guys are supposed to wear it on the outside. He is my absolute worst rival, and he is always lurking in the shadows trying to ruin my life, my work, or whatever remains of my blood pressure. He smells like old milk, wet wool, and tunnel water, and I am pretty sure he is hiding from the police in a sewer. I do not trust him at all, which is why I keep checking the vents when the room gets too quiet.
He is my best pal, and I love him very much even when he is vibrating so hard he makes the C-stands hum. He is the gaffer or a grip or maybe both, and I still do not know the difference because every time someone explains it to me there is yelling and a forklift involved. Squirrelly is very paranoid and vibrates a lot because he loves booger sugar, which I am told is not a food despite the fun nickname. Sometimes his nose bleeds right on the equipment because he is having so much fun, and then we all just hold tight until he runs out of energy and starts apologizing to the extension cords.
The calmest voice in the swamp! While Wally and his friends were busy teaching lessons, Mr. Whiskers was the one capturing it all on film. As the show's announcer and camera operator, he was the steady hand that kept Butler Street Studios running. The voice you know and the friend you trust! Mr. Whiskers is always behind the lens, making sure every lesson is picture-perfect.
He is from The Network and he loves paperwork more than he loves oxygen. Edwin wears a suit that always looks freshly steamed, and he makes us sign thick stacks of papers saying that if we get hurt on set it is completely our own fault, even if the thing that hurts us has the network logo on it. He counts the pencils, times the breaks, and says words like “exposure” and “liability” with the same warmth other people reserve for prayer. Thanks to Edwin, we are all very, very safe from lawsuits, which is apparently different from being safe in general.
He made me a star back in the day, or at least a marketable problem with good teeth. Smeezy wears shiny polyester suits, smells like cologne poured directly onto a radiator, and keeps a phone full of favors from scary people who never seem to blink enough. He is the Producer, which means he would do absolutely anything for a dollar, although mostly he makes us do it and then keeps the dollar for himself. Still, when the lights come on and the chaos starts rolling downhill, he is smiling at the bottom with a contract in his hand.