Queer Duck

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Queer Duck
A Queer Duck episode opening splash screen
Genre	Animated series
Creator(s)	Mike Reiss
Starring	Jim J. Bullock Kevin Michael Richardson Billy West Maurice LaMarche Estelle Harris Tress MacNeille
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	20
Production
Running time	ca. 3 min.
Broadcast
Original channel	Showtime
Original run	2002 – 2004
Links
Official website
IMDb profile
TV.com summary

Queer Duck was an animated series that originally appeared on Icebox.com in 1999, and later moved to the American cable television channel Showtime in 2002, where it aired as a followup feature of the American version of Queer as Folk. Although far from being the first gay cartoon character, Queer Duck was the first animated TV series to have homosexuality as its predominant theme. Like several later television cartoons, Queer Duck was animated in Macromedia Flash.

Contents 1 Cast 2 Recurring themes 2.1 Theme Song 3 Episodes 4 Other Characters 5 Trivia 6 The Movie 7 External links

[edit] Cast

The title character, actually named Adam Seymour Duckstein (voiced by Jim J. Bullock), is a gay anthropomorphic duck who works as a nurse. His boyfriend, the indigent artist Steven Arlo “Openly” Gator (voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson, in the style of Harvey Fierstein), is shy and insecure. Their friends throughout the series are Bi Polar Bear (voiced by Ren & Stimpy and Futurama actor Billy West, in the style of Paul Lynde) and the urbane Oscar Wildcat (voice actor Maurice LaMarche).

Recurring supporting characters include Queer Duck's in-denial mother (played by Estelle Harris, George's mother on Seinfeld) and the group's nemesis, Dr. Laura Schlessinger (played by voice actress Tress MacNeille).

The show was created and written by Mike Reiss, executive producer of network cartoons The Simpsons and The Critic. The animation was directed and designed by Seth Feinberg.

[edit] Recurring themes

Although each four-minute episode stands by itself rather than being part of a larger narrative, several themes and events occur through the 20-episode series. Queer Duck reveals his homosexuality to his parents in the first episode. In the course of the series, Queer Duck and Openly Gator get married, and it's revealed that Queer Duck has a lesbian sister. In another episode, he has a brother and a nephew. Queer Duck also meets Santa Claus and attends Mardi Gras.

Much like The Critic, Queer Duck features numerous cameo appearances by celebrities, whose voices are impersonated by the cast. In addition to Dr. Laura, the Queer Duck gang encounter Bob Hope, Jack Nicholson, Cary Grant, and in particular Barbra Streisand, with whom Queer Duck is obsessed, as well as noted ultra-conservative preacher Jerry Falwell. These celebrities are the only human characters. All other characters are anthropomorphic animals like Duck and his friends, except for the woman Queer Duck sleeps with in the final episode.

[edit] Theme Song

Queer Duck, he's intellectual.
Queer Duck, he's homosexual.
Please don't think that he's perverse,
he's the patient's favourite male nurse.
He's okay, he's just fey, cause he's openly gay
He's a truly queer, Queer Duck, Queer Duck! (Queer Duck interjects cliché here)

– performed by RuPaul

[edit] Episodes

#	Title	Airdate	*
1.	I'm Coming Out
On October 11, "Coming Out Day," Queer Duck comes out to his friends and family who already know.
2.	Fiddler on the Roofie
Queer Duck babysits his nephew, who finds an interesting collection of video tapes.
3.	Oh Christ
The plans of Dr. and Mrs. Duckstein, Duck's parents, to deprogramme our hero are met with fabulously entertaining results.
4.	Queer Doc
5.	B.S. I Love You
6.	The Gayest Place on Earth
7.	Gym Neighbors
After insulting Openly Gaytor's over sized derrière, and Gaytor's histrionics over the insult, Gaytor takes Queer Duck to the gym to rectify the problem. While there, Duck cruises the patrons, leaving Gaytor to suffer an accident on a weight bench. When the accident leaves Gaytor with a turned-up nose, Duck tells him it looks like Corrie Spelling's. Gaytor returns to his melodramatic histrionics.
8.	Queer as Fowl
While attending the funeral of the Possum funeral, Queer duck treats the event like a Gay mixer. Queer Duck agrees, stating that "everything is a gay pickup, Desert Storm was a gay pickup". Queer Duck gets disgusted by the funeral poetry reading, and turns the funeral into a gay disco! He, however, leaves to reminisce over picture of him & the Possum in happier times.
9.	Wedding Bell Blues
While flying home after attending a gay rodeo, Dr. Laura appears on the gang's airplane's wing (like a gremlin) and starts to take apart the wing. She is ultimately electrocuted. During the panic, Queer Duck makes a "deathbed promise" to marry Openly Gaytor. They go to Vermont to marry, by a rabbi, where Queer Duck adds a laundry list of exceptions to his vows; which are ultimately accepted by Openly Gaytor!
10.	Ku Klux Klan and Ollie
11.	The Gay Road to Morocco
In a black-and-white parody of the film Road to Morocco, Queer Duck & the troupe offer a Gay Road to Morocco musical episode. They meet Bing Crosby and Bob Hope in the desert, and are confronted by Abu Ben Dover, (Cary Grant) and his cadre, who turn out to be his harem.
12.	Quack Doc
13.	Oscar's Wild
The gang attends the Oscars; meeting Joan Rivers and Bjork (who is wearing Betty Davis's skin. The event is so boring that they all fall asleep. Upon waking, they join Jack Nicholson in a spree of destruction, tearing up the theater.
14.	A Gay Outing
While Queer Duck is watching "Drugged out has-been's week" on the Biography channel, his nephew, a Cub Scout, reminds him of his promise to take the troop on a camping trip. The boys find a copy of Out magazine, and Queer Duck tries to explain to them the contents of the personal ads. In a musical number, he makes up non-sexual meanings to the abbreviations common in contact ads such as S&M, GBM, etc.
15.	Radio Head
16.	Tales of the City Morgue
17.	Homo for the Holidays
Here Openly Gator is introduced to his sister-in-law, where we find Duck is not exactly the most beloved child of his parents. And Mr. and Mrs. Duckstein take an adventure cruise.
18.	Bi Polar Bear and the Glorious Hole
In a parody of the "Winnie the Pooh" cartoons, Gator and Duck get eighty-sixed from the Wiener Dog. Meanwhile, Bi Polar Bear gets stuck in the cave entrance of Oscar Wildcat's home, and becomes very popular in the neighborhood, really enjoying the "attention" of many of his neighbors.
19.	Santa Claus is Coming Out
Queer Duck's holiday song "Santa Claus is Gay", parodying many traditional holiday songs. Queer duck finally meets Santa, who claims that he is not gay, but "bi".
20.	Mardi Foie Gras

[edit] Other Characters

• Truman Coyote, a parody of Truman Capote
• K.Y. Jellyfish, a parody of the brand of sex lubricant K-Y Jelly
• Ricky Marlin, a parody of Ricky Martin
• Dr. Ben Swine (a psychiatrist), a parody of Ben Stein
• H.I.V. Possum, a play on HIV, the Human Imunodeficiency Virus, and the term HIV-positive, which is sometimes abbreviated “pos”
• Kangaroo Reeves, a parody of Keanu Reeves

[edit] Trivia

• The theme song is performed by drag icon RuPaul.
• The show's music composer, Sam Elwitt, produced a CD of Muzak-style Ramones songs, under the name the Nutley Brass.
• Part of the opening shows Queer Duck traipsing across a green hill, in a parody of a similar scene in the film The Sound of Music.
• Due to its adult themes, Queer Duck initially had a TV-MA rating in the US. (The series currently has a TV-14 rating.)
• Queer Duck was voted #94 in a 100 Greatest Cartoons program on Channel 4 in the UK.
• Queer Duck is Jewish. It is alluded many times in the show - his last name is Duckstein, his parents are stereotypical Jewish parents, his mother speaks with a Yiddish accent, while proposing a toast he says Lachayim and when he marries his boyfriend Openly Gator they do so under a Chuppa with a Rabbi.

[edit] The Movie

Queer Duck: the Movie, an all-new feature film, was released on DVD July 18, 2006. The film reunites the original creators and cast of Queer Duck, plus special guest stars Conan O'Brien, Tim Curry, Bruce Vilanch, and David Duchovny as "Tiny Jesus".[1] Gay-themed channel Logo premiered the film on July 16.

[edit] External links

• Official site at Showtime (for US residents only)
• Queer Duck at the Internet Movie Database
• Queer Duck: The Movie at IMDB
• Mishmash Media
• The Nutley Brass