The Private Life of the President
| The Private Life of the President | |
|---|---|
| Genre | |
| Voices of |
|
| Opening theme | "It's Time" (instrumental) by Infectious Grooves |
| Ending theme | "Turtle Wax" (instrumental) by Infectious Grooves |
| Composer(s) | Infectious Grooves |
| Country of origin | Gylias |
| Original language(s) | |
| No. of episodes | 30 |
| Production company(s) |
|
| Release | |
| Original network | GTV4 |
| Original release | 2 March 1996 – 3 September 2000 |
The Private Life of the President is a Gylian animated series which aired on GTV4 in 1996–2000. Produced by Anim-Activity and Gylian National Film Institute, it is a slice of life comedy about a fictional President of Gylias who is also a single mother.
Plot
The series is set in contemporary Gylias and follows a fictional President of Gylias as she both attends to her duties as President and is a mother to her two children, a boy and a girl.
The series' humour includes parodic depictions of Gylian politics and political culture, portrayals of typical childhood travails, and portrayals of the efforts required to balance a public role and private life.
Characters
None of the main characters are given names.
- The President
- Voiced by: Taðe Ziriş
- The incumbent President of Gylias. Before her election, she worked for a service club and was heavily involved in community building. One episode shows her visiting her hometown and being treated with respect and adulation by her neighbours. She has completed a doctorate, and is sometimes called "Doctor" or "Professor" by others.
- She has a bubbly and kind personality, carrying out her activities with enthusiasm no matter how trivial. She is a loving and devoted mother to her children, openly praising and encouraging them, and constantly shows affection for them. She is shown to be a popular and successful president — one episode shows her being re-elected by winning a majority of first preference votes, the first president to do so since Reda Kazan in 1961.
- She has red hair and blue eyes, and wears a single outfit: a blue skirt suit with a white shirt and red tie, plus a presidential sash that reads "THE PRESIDENT".
- The President's children
- Voiced by: Ler Nerďak (boy) and Desyé Nisa (girl)
- The President's children, a boy and a girl. Their ages are never clearly stated but they are strongly implied to be pre-adolescent.
- They are rambunctious but responsible children, causing mild mischief while obeying the hard and fast rules laid down by their mother. They enjoy playing video games, and are shown to be strongly competitive. Their two-player games often devolve into sibling arguments and fighting, which their mother breaks up. They love their mother dearly, and as a result of her easygoing parenting style, they find the idea of anything that might disappoint her to be unthinkable.
- The boy has blonde hair that hides his eyes and wears a green T-shirt, red cap, and blue trousers. The girl has red hair that hides her right eye, and wears a yellow-and-red striped T-shirt and blue shorts.
Production
The series was adapted from a cartoon short originally aired on Viva's animation showcase Liquid Television. Anim-Activity took over production of the series. Several changes were made from the short to the series, including consolidation of the main cast to just the President and her children.
Several running gags originated from in-jokes among the animators. In one team meeting, a writer asked if they had ever established names for the President and her children. When the team realised they hadn't, they chose to go without because they found it amusing to have the President always be addressed as "President". Similarly, the team chose not to create additional outfits for the President, as they felt audiences would find it amusing and charming that she plays with her children and takes part in domestic activities while constantly wearing her presidential outfit.
The series was produced by Anim-Activity and the Gylian National Film Institute between 1996 and 2000. It uses a cartoon style, with an emphasis on character animation and frequently scratchy or blurry backgrounds. One famous animation error that appears in the series is that the girl's hair is supposed to hide her right eye, but it changes based on which way she faces the camera.
Several members of the animation team would listen to funk metal while working, which inspired the team as a whole to recruit Infectious Grooves to contribute to the soundtrack. One of the producers characterised funk metal as a great fit for the show: "it's energetic, cartoony, and sounds like a party". The soundtrack includes instrumental edits of existing Infectious Grooves songs (such as "It's Time", used for the the opening theme, and "Turtle Wax", used for the ending theme) and new instrumentals and jams recorded for the series.
The writing team followed one binding rule: no matter the comedic situations or eccentricities, the President is always portrayed as both professional and a loving mother, and her children are always portrayed as good-hearted, with a healthy amount of mischief. A lot of humour in the series comes from the "part-time" nature of the presidential role, owing to its ceremonial figurehead character, and from the portrayal of Gylias' communal child-rearing — the President's children are shown to be on intimate terms with almost all of their mother's staff and security detail.
The President's children are often shown playing on an Ion together, with actual footage of games like International Superstar Football, Ultraviolence, and Sacred Sword. They are also shown watching MTV. One episode features an indirect Infectious Grooves cameo, by showing the children watching the video for "Feed the Monkey".
Several episodes show the President meeting with foreign dignitaries, giving the writers opportunities to play with Gylian stereotypes of other Tyranian nations. Ossorians are caricatured unexpectedly harshly, as cold and bullying. One of the writers commented: "Well, you had Poly-Space, which pulled punches to not look like it was mocking Filomena [Pinheiro], but I didn't see much reciprocity, so I said, 'fuck it, let's stick the boot in'. I figured there'd be viewers who'd appreciate seeing Gylians bloody Ossorians' noses for a change."
Reception
The Private Life of the President was a critical and modest commercial success upon airing. Reviewers praised its strong characters, heartwarming portrayal of parenthood, affectionate lampoons of politics, and animation.
The series began to be uploaded to Proton TV during its run, and was later released on DVD.