Sesame Workshop Preps New Version of The Electric Company

NEW YORK, May 13: Sesame
Workshop will begin production on a new, updated version of its classic ’70s
kids’ literacy-focused series The Electric Company, for premiere throughout the U.S. on PBS KIDS in
January 2009.

Targeted at 6- to
9-year-olds, and with funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and
the Department of Education, the new version of The Electric Company carries the same goal of the original series to
combat the literacy crisis facing America’s second graders. However, the
updated series will be supplemented with an interactive online environment, as
well as community-based outreach activities taking place in 20 cities across
the country. The refreshed The Electric Company series aims to be a multimedia, multiplatform
literacy campaign that will reduce the literacy gap between low- and
middle-income families. The Electric Company platforms will focus initially on TV, outreach,
and broadband, but will extend over time to include books and other print
materials, portable media, hand-held and console games.

The Electric Company is centered on a group of do-gooders who keep the
neighborhood safe with their literacy super-powers, and who solve problems
often created by a group called “The Pranksters.” Stationed from their home-base, The Electric Diner, the team
consists of four core members: 13-year-old Keith Watson, played by Ricky Smith,
who is able to turn words into graphics/animation; 13-year-old Jessica Ruiz,
played by Priscilla Diaz, who possesses total aural recall, allowing her to
replay and display speech as text; teenager Lisa Heffenbacher, played by Jenni
Barber, who has the power to solve any word problem at super human speed; and
20-year-old college student (and older brother to Jessica) Hector Ruiz, played
by Josh Segarra, who has the power to visually recall things he’s seen, even if
only peripherally, and accurately note them with text.

The Electric Company is brought to life with a narrative storyline,
music videos, sketch comedy, animation and short films. Tony Award-nominated
writer Willie Reale (A Year With Frog and Toad) leads The Electric Company’s writing team and has brought in other writers like
the Cox Brothers (Blades of Glory)
and Jerome Hairston (Law & Order: Criminal Intent, am Sunday) to create 26 half-hour episodes of the series. The series’ executive
producer, Karen Fowler, tapped members of the team behind the Broadway musical In
The Heights—Chris Jackson,
Thomas Kail and Bill Sherman—to serve as The Electric Company’s musical directors and bring urban beats and
rhythmic tunes to the literacy objectives of the program.

“The literacy crisis today
is as pervasive and alarming as it was in 1971 when we created the first
version of The Electric Company,”
stated Scott Cameron, the director of education and research for Sesame
Workshop. “We know that if struggling readers don’t get the literacy help they
need by the end of second grade, they are in danger of never catching up.
Children in low-income families are particularly at risk, because they
generally start school with a significantly lower vocabulary than those in
middle- or high-income families. And without a strong vocabulary, it becomes
increasingly harder to read school materials and succeed academically. So, our
goal with The Electric Company is
to reach the kids who are struggling, and who might think that reading isn’t
cool or isn’t useful, and we hope to do that by creating compelling and
high-quality television, web and outreach materials.”

—By Irene Lew