John Kricfalusi (born Michael John Kricfalusi, September 9, 1955 in Chicoutimi, Quebec, Canada) is a Canadian former cartoonist, and creator of The Ren & Stimpy Show.
Kricfalusi was heavily involved in the first two seasons, where he directed, wrote storyboards and produced many episodes, and even provided the voice for Ren Höek.
Kricfalusi was fired from the Ren and Stimpy Show in 1992 for reasons having to do with constant missed deadlines and for his deteriorating relationship with Nickelodeon over the direction of the show and has not achieved the same commercial success his series had since. He is a controversial figure in the animation industry. In 2018, he was accused of sexual harassment by two women named Robyn Byrd and Katie Rice, who have reported to BuzzFeed that they were sexually harassed and groomed while underaged. As a result, he has reluctantly retired from the animation industry and will not have any involvement or financial gain from the upcoming reboot for the Ren and Stimpy Show by Comedy Central.
Early work[]
Kricfalusi first worked on projects with Ralph Bakshi, especially on Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures, and later went to work on the 1980s revival of Beany and Cecil, where he would work with many of the people with whom he would later work on Ren and Stimpy.
Ren and Stimpy[]
Earlier in his career, Kricfalusi would draw pictures of Stimpy, a "retarded cat" based on of a pair of cats in a Tweety Bird cartoon, A Gruesome Twosome, which had cats with big bulbous noses. Around that same time, he created "asthma-hound Chihuahua" Ren Höek from a postcard one sent him of a Chihuahua with a sweater on. Later on, Joel Faynor, who worked with Kricfalusi, suggested to him that he should put the two characters together, and the advice was accepted. Kricfalusi goes into more depth on the creations in "Ren and Stimpy: In the Beginning," a featurette on Disc 1 of The Ren & Stimpy Show: The First and Second Season (Uncut) DVD.
Kricfalusi, along with partners Jim Smith, Bob Camp, and Lynne Naylor, founded the studio Spümcø in 1988, and pitched The Ren & Stimpy Show around several networks until Nickelodeon picked it up. However, according to the Happy Happy Joy Joy: The Ren & Stimpy Story documentary, Kricfalusi pitched an entirely different show titled Your Gang, which was a variety show primarily featuring George Liquor and his two nephews. Ren and Stimpy were only minor characters who were pets of George. Producer Vanessa Coffey demanded that they use the pets to base the show around instead. It first aired on August 11, 1991, with "Stimpy's Big Day|The Big Shot."
Throughout the series' five seasons, Kricfalusi was only involved with the first two. He started to battle with the executives at Nickelodeon over missed deadlines and content and began to develop a reputation for behaving inappropriately as well as being difficult to work with. After the episode, Man's Best Friend, Nickelodeon fired Kricfalusi, and Spümcø, from his own series. The last three seasons were done by Games Animation, Nickelodeon's studio, with some season three and four episodes originally started at Spümcø.
Later efforts[]
Kricfalusi would go on direct several music videos, for Björk's "I Miss You" (animated by the entire Spümcø staff) in 1997, Tenacious D's "Classico" in 2006, and "Weird Al" Yankovic's "Close But No Cigar" that same year.
He would also create two Internet-only cartoons: The Goddamn George Liquor Program (the first Internet-only cartoon) in 1997 and Weekend Pussy Hunt in 1999.
Kricfalusi returned to television and directed two Yogi Bear cartoons, dedicated to Hanna and Joseph Barbera: Boo Boo Runs Wild and A Day in the Life of Ranger Smith and the animated series The Ripping Friends in 2001.
In 2019, he would release the infamous short Cans Without Labels.
Adult Party Cartoon[]
In 2002, Kricfalusi was contacted by the struggling TNN (now Spike) network to produce new episodes of Ren and Stimpy. John created Ren and Stimpy "Adult Party Cartoon", which used plots developed from the original series, but with swearing, violence, sexually explicit adult themes and extreme dialogue added, and the show aired in June 2003. However, the reboot was cancelled after only three episodes aired, due to heavy criticism and adverse reviews. These episodes and several unaired episodes were put out on DVD as "Ren & Stimpy: The Lost Episodes" in 2006 after Carbunkle Cartoons filed a lawsuit against Spümcø on July 18, 2005. Kricfalusi would later show dissatisfaction with some aspects of Adult Party Cartoon.
Sexual allegation incidents[]
In 2018, Kricfalusi was accused of sexual harassment: Animators Robyn Byrd and Katie Rice alleged in a BuzzFeed report on March 29, 2018, that they were sexually harassed and groomed for sexual abuse by Kricfalusi while they were underage. Byrd said that she was in a sexual relationship with Kricfalusi in 1997 when she was 16 but he supposedly dated since she was 15, and moved in with him when she was 17. Katie Rice said that she was sexually harassed by Kricfalusi when she turned 18 and began working at his animation studio, Spümcø.
Documents they had saved from those years corroborate their stories, and several people who worked with Kricfalusi referred to his sexual harassment as an open secret in the animation industry. Kricfalusi was also alleged to possess child pornography on his computer. Kricfalusi's lawyer confirmed that "for a brief time, 25 years ago, he had a 16-year-old girlfriend", but denied that Kricfalusi's "avid pursuit" of Rice was sexual harassment or that he had ever possessed child pornography.
In early May 2018, Kricfalusi published an apology on Facebook on the matter and his subsequent actions. Byrd referred to his apology as a "non-apology and a big pile of manipulative crap" and an attempt to deflect the blame. The apology also received major backlash from a lot of people and Ren & Stimpy fans alike.
In the Ren & Stimpy documentary, Happy Happy Joy Joy!, he admitted remorse for his actions this time, and wished he was a much better person and he later accepted the blame.
Retirement[]
In the 2020 documentary Happy Happy Joy Joy: The Ren & Stimpy Story, Kricfalusi confirmed that he had officially retired from the animation industry, though "not exactly by choice". However, despite this, he has said on Facebook that he may return to making animations again.[1]
Episode credits[]
| Ep # | Episode Title | Credit |
|---|---|---|
| Pilot | ||
| 0 | Big House Blues | director writer producer animator storyboard artist voice of Ren |
| Season 1 | ||
| *He is credited as Producer and Voice of Ren on every episode | ||
| 1a | Stimpy's Big Day | director writer storyboard artist |
| 1b | The Big Shot! | director writer storyboard artist voice of Mr. Horse |
| 2a | Robin Höek | director writer |
| 2b | Nurse Stimpy | director (as Raymond Spum) writer |
| 3a | Space Madness | director writer |
| 3b | The Boy Who Cried Rat | director writer |
| 4a | The Littlest Giant | director writer |
| 4b | Fire Dogs | director writer voice of Mr. Horse voice of Mrs. Buttloaves |
| 5a | Marooned | director writer |
| 5b | Untamed World | director writer |
| 6b | Stimpy's Invention | director writer |
| Season 2 | ||
| *He is credited as Producer on every episode | ||
| 7a | In The Army | Voice of Ren |
| 7b | Powdered Toast Man | director writer Voice of Ren |
| 8a | Ren's Toothache | director writer voice of Ren |
| 8b | Man's Best Friend | director writer voice of Ren |
| 9a | Out West | writer voice of Ren voice of Mr. Horse |
| 9b | Rubber Nipple Salesmen | director writer voice of Ren voice of Mr. Horse |
| 10 | Sven Höek | director writer animator voice of Ren |
| 11a | Haunted House | writer voice of Ren |
| 11b | Mad Dog Hoek | voice of Ren |
| 12b | Big Baby Scam | voice of Ren |
| 12b | Dog Show | director voice of Ren |
| 13 | Son of Stimpy | director writer voice of Ren |
| 14b | Fake Dad | director writer voice of Ren |
| 15a | The Great Outdoors | writer voice of Mr. Horse voice of Mrs. Buttloaves |
| 16 | Stimpy's Fan Club | writer voice of Ren |
| 17 | A Visit To Anthony | director voice of Ren voice of Mr. Horse |
| 18 | The Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksmen | director writer voice of Ren |
| Season 3 | ||
| 19a | To Salve And Salve Not | producer (uncredited) |
| 19b | A Yard Too Far | writer producer (uncredited) |
| 20b | No Pants Today | producer (uncredited) |
| 21a | Ren's Pecs | writer (uncredited) producer (uncredited) |
| 22 | Stimpy's Cartoon Show | writer producer (uncredited) |
| 23a | Jimminy Lummox | producer (uncredited) |
| 23b | Bass Masters | writer (premise) producer (uncredited) |
| 27a | Eat My Cookies | producer (uncredited) |
| 28 | Lair Of The Lummox | writer producer (uncredited) |
| Season 4 | ||
| 33a | Magical Golden Singing Cheeses | writer (uncredited) producer (uncredited) |
| Season 5 | ||
| 45b | Ren's Brain | writer producer (uncredited) |
| 47b | Who's Stupid Now? | writer (uncredited) producer (uncredited) |
| 50a | Terminal Stimpy | producer (uncredited) |
| Adult Party Cartoon | ||
| *He is credited as Director, Producer and Voice of Ren on every episode | ||
| 2 | Ren Seeks Help | writer storyboard artist |
| 3 | Fire Dogs 2 | writer storyboard artist |
| 4 | Naked Beach Frenzy | writer |
| 5 | Altruists | writer |
| 6 | Stimpy's Pregnant | writer storyboard artist |
Trivia[]
- He was very good friends with Ed, Edd, n Eddy creator, Danny Antonucci.
- Considering the fact that Kricfalusi and Antonucci are both Canadian-born animators.
- His father is Ukrainian, while his mother is Scottish.
- Kricfalusi is the first Nickelodeon employee to have been publicly fired from Nickelodeon, the second being The Loud House creator Chris Savino, who was fired from Nickelodeon on October 19, 2017 due to "sexual harassment" towards the women employees at several industries, and the third was Dan Schneider (who was known for Game Shakers, iCarly, Sam & Cat, Henry Danger, Victorious, The Amanda Show, and other shows he created from his studio, Schneider's Bakery), who was fired from Nickelodeon on March 26, 2018 for inappropriate behavior. No more details are known about the issue.
