Ovide and the Gang | |
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L-R: Groaner, Saphron, Ovide and Polo
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Genre | Cartoon series |
Created by | CinéGroupe |
Directed by | Raymond Burlet Jean Sarault |
Voices of | Fred Butter Arie Cupe Lucie de Lange Ruud Drupsteen Paul van Gorcum Tom Hartmann Ad Hoeymans Just Meyer Marianne Vloetgraven |
Theme music composer | Carlos Leresche |
Country of origin |
Canada Belgium United States United Kingdom |
No. of episodes | 65 |
Production | |
Producer(s) | Jacques Pettigrew Jacques Vercruyssen Violette Vercruyssen |
Running time | 13 min. |
Production company(s) |
CinéGroupe Celebrity Home Entertainment Film Roman Sesame Workshop |
Release | |
Original release | March 12, 1987 – 1988 |
La Bande à Ovide, a.k.a. Ovide and the Gang, is a 1980s animated TV show produced by the Canadian animation studio CinéGroupe (who also produced Mega Babies, Sharky and George and The Little Flying Bears) in association with Belgium's Odec Kid Cartoons. It ran on Sociètè Radio Canada from 1987 to 1988 and also goes by the names "Ovide Video" and "Ovide's Video Show"; the series gained popularity in the United Kingdom when it was broadcast on the Children's BBC service in 1988 and 1989 in a Friday afternoon slot, while in the US, it was aired on Nick Jr. in 1992 and 1997.
The characters were created and designed by Bernard Godi in cooperation with Belgian comics artist and animator Nic Broca, who had previously designed the Snorks for SEPP.
The show stars a blue platypus named Ovide who lives on a non-descript South Seas island, where he has adventures with his friends and thwarts Cy and Bobo, the show's villains.
Television plays an important role in this series. In every episode, Ovide and his friends are watching a programme; Ovide carries a brown briefcase which contains a portable TV set; and there's a wandering TV on the island that approaches the characters at crucial moments and provides information important to the plot. Every time Cy sees the TV, he apparently becomes entranced by it.
A number of these episodes were released on VHS by Celebrity Home Entertainment for the "Just for Kids" series, hosted by Noel C. Bloom Jr. during the late 1980s and (assumingly) early 1990s.