Aaron McGruder and the Cartoon Network bringing 'The Boondocks' to cable
By Ed Bark
The Dallas Morning News
(July 19, 2005) Putting its money where his mouth is, the Cartoon Network is giving voice to Aaron McGruder's "The Boondocks" comic strip – N-word and all.
"It astounds me that good, responsible white people are going to pay for the show. I've been just totally amazed," McGruder (above) said in an interview.
Scheduled to premiere Oct. 2 under the network's late-night "Adult Swim" banner, "Boondocks" regularly tackles racial issues head-on while twitting black celebrities. Addled singer Bobby Brown's Bravo cable reality series and Oprah Winfrey's tiff with Paris, France's luxury Hermes store have been recent targets.
The TV version of "Boondocks" will be less topical, more story-driven, though. And its vocabulary, as demonstrated in a brief clip, occasionally will be peppered with a divisive, hot-button word.
"I think it makes the show more sincere," said McGruder, 31. "At a certain point we all have to realize that sometimes we use bad language. And the 'N-word' is used so commonly, by not only myself but by a lot of people I know, that it feels fake to write around it and to avoid using it."
The series will feature all of the principal characters from the strip, including "junior revolutionary" Huey (right), his younger brother Riley, cantankerous Robert "Granddad" Freeman and Uncle Ruckus.
McGruder earlier developed a TV version for Fox, but the network rejected it after seeing a six-minute presentation tape.
"Adult Swim's" senior vice president, Mike Lazzo, said the early incarnation "felt a little flat and a little network-y." He encouraged McGruder to be more controversial and truer to the strip, which was launched in 1999 and is now in more than 300 newspapers.
The strip usually deploys "asterisks sometimes or 'profanitype'" as stand-ins for the N-word, McGruder said. "I try to use it more and more. It's tough in newspapers. They're really not thrilled about it, but I keep trying to push them."
"Adult Swim" is heavily viewed by young males, who feast on an eclectic lineup of bizarro cartoons including Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Harvey Birdman.
McGruder said he's not worried about making it seem "cool" for them to imitate some of the vocabulary in "Boondocks." "Fifteen, 16 years after the advent of gangsta rap, young white kids have heard the word [N-word] before. And they've said it maybe a few times. So if they start saying it all of a sudden on Oct. 3, I refuse to take responsibility."
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Tuesday, July 26th 2005 at 1:33AM
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