'FAMILY GUY' REUNION ANIMATED SERIES CELEBRATES RETURN TO FOX SCHEDULE WITH LIVE WILTERN SHOW.Byline: Sandra Barrera Staff Writer Seth MacFarlane Seth Woodbury MacFarlane (born October 26, 1973) is a two-time Emmy-winning American animator, screenwriter, producer, actor, comedian and voice actor. He is best known as the creator of the animated series Family Guy and American Dad!. has just come from a college in St. Louis where students got to see the first new ``Family Guy'' episode in more than three years. The episode lampoons the 1959 Hitchcock thriller ``North by Northwest,'' except in place of a secret microfilm, MacFarlane's leading man and lady characters accidentally discover a ``Passion of the Christ 2'' video. ``So here I am,'' he says, ``screening an episode with a 'Passion of the Christ' parody in it, and we're in,'' he pauses, ``a chapel.'' It's just the sort of mixture of irreverence, sarcasm and irony you'd expect from MacFarlane's snarky snark·y adj. snark·i·er, snark·i·est Slang Irritable or short-tempered; irascible. [From dialectal snark, to nag, from snark, snork, to snore, snort adult cartoon about a blue-collar New England New England, name applied to the region comprising six states of the NE United States—Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. The region is thought to have been so named by Capt. family that begins airing again on Fox on May 1. The network canceled the series in 2002, but its legacy has continued to spawn a loyal following, the kind that showed up at a live reading of a ``Family Guy'' episode at a comedy festival in Montreal last summer. On Friday, the cast - MacFarlane MacFarlane or Macfarlane is a surname shared by:
The presentation is equal parts dramatic reading, Q&A and a song-and- dance number from the April 26 studio release of the ``Family Guy: Live in Vegas'' concept CD/DVD package designed like an old-fashioned Vegas-style show. Also part of the program is a sneak peek at the new episode, which MacFarlane also hints has a gag about Mel Gibson Noun 1. Mel Gibson - Australian actor (born in the United States in 1956) Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson, Gibson U.S.A., United States, United States of America, US, USA, America, the States, U.S. being the villain. Pop-culture-saturated references have been part of ``Family Guy'' from the start. From Cabbage Patch Cabbage patch may refer to:
``We didn't want to mess with mess with Verb Informal, chiefly US to interfere in, or become involved with, a dangerous person, thing, or situation: he had started messing with drugs what worked, because really our goal was to have the transition be seamless,'' says MacFarlane. He returns as the voice of ``Family Guy's'' Peter Griffin, a portly port·ly adj. port·li·er, port·li·est 1. Comfortably stout; corpulent. See Synonyms at fat. 2. Archaic Stately; majestic; imposing. [From port5. , dimwitted dim·wit n. Slang A stupid person. dim  witted adj. father of three who works a toy-factory job in Quahog quahog: see clam. quahog Thick-shelled edible clam of the U.S. The northern quahog (Mercenaria mercenaria), also known as the cherrystone, littleneck, or hard-shell clam, is 3–5 in. (8–13 cm) long. , R.I. ``Both visually and personality-wise, he's very much a melting pot of every tactless tact·less adj. Lacking or exhibiting a lack of tact; bluntly inconsiderate or indiscreet. tact less·ly adv. , loudmouth New Englander that I grew up with,'' adds MacFarlane, who comes from Connecticut. ``His heart is in the right place, but he just has no sense of what and what not to say in any given situation.'' Fortunately Peter's got a wife like Lois. Borstein, who some may remember for her Bjork-like Miss Swan character on the Fox comedy series ``Mad TV,'' is the nasal voice behind Lois Griffin, whom she describes as a ``wonderful, doting dote intr.v. dot·ed, dot·ing, dotes To show excessive fondness or love: parents who dote on their only child. [Middle English doten. mom who's also got a dark, dirty past and likes to mix it up a bit.'' When the high-school cool kids invite her flag-girl daughter Meg - the Jan Brady of the bunch, voiced by Mila Kunis of ``That '70s Show'' fame - to a party and then humiliate her by tricking her into kissing a pig, Lois helps her get revenge. ``You'd never see the dark, evil side of a mom on a regular network show, but somehow in animation you can buy things back easier than live action,'' Borstein says. ``You can have your characters slip into a crazy reality and it's OK.'' Also part of the family tree is Chris, the 13-year-old slacker voiced by Seth Green, who, among other things, is known for his movie role as Scott Evil, Dr. Evil's son in the ``Austin Powers'' flicks. MacFarlane says that when he was auditioning actors for the part of Chris, most were coming in with surfer-dude voices. ``And then Seth came in and did what he describes as an impression of Ted Levine from 'The Silence of the Lambs,' '' says MacFarlane, who, in addition to the family patriarch, also offers up voices for baby Stewie - a sexually confused evil genius bent on world domination and matricide mat·ri·cide n. The act of killing one's mother. mat  ri·cidal adj. - and Brian, the family's talking dog full of sound advice despite his insatiable craving for martinis. The sharp-witted loopiness of the show may have helped distinguish ``Family Guy'' from other adult cartoons about families, including ``The Simpsons'' and ``King of the Hill.'' But the network still canceled it in 2002 due to poor ratings after several air-schedule reshufflings resulted in ``Family Guy'' going head-to-head against NBC's ``Friends.'' Fortunately, the series never lost its audience - especially on college campuses like the one MacFarlane has just come from. ``There are no more 'Seinfelds' out there in the sitcom world designed to be hysterically funny, and so that's job 1 for us,'' he says. ``When you're in college, I think that's what you respond to.'' Young adults have followed the show via reruns on the Cartoon Network, which has included ``Family Guy'' in its late-night Adult Swim block of animated programming. It now frequently beats both David Letterman and Jay Leno's shows among men 18 to 34. The reruns not only draw top ratings, but the DVDs of the first three seasons have sold a combined 3.5 million copies, making it the fourth-largest TV series seller ever. ``The show has continued to only get bigger in its various afterlives,'' says Craig Erwich, executive vice president of programming for Fox. ``And I think we all just looked at each other and said, 'There is still something here.' '' Fox took the unprecedented step of reinstating the show as part of its Sunday night lineup, beginning at 8 p.m. May 1 with back-to-back ``Simpsons'' episodes followed by the season premiere of MacFarlane's ``Family Guy'' and the series premiere of his new show, ``American Dad.'' MacFarlane hopes the same zany intelligence that attracts so many ardent fans to ``Family Guy'' will serve him in his new project about the Virginia-based Smith family headed by a CIA CIA: see Central Intelligence Agency. (1) (Confidentiality Integrity Authentication) The three important concerns with regards to information security. Encryption is used to provide confidentiality (privacy, secrecy). agent. Described as an update of ``All in the Family,'' ``American Dad'' reflects the divided nature of the country today as far as politics are concerned. It stars MacFarlane, Wendy Schaal, Rachael MacFarlane (Seth's sister) and Scott Grimes. Sandra Barrera, (818) 713-3728 sandra.barrera(at)dailynews.com FAMILY GUY LIVE! Where: Wiltern LG, 3790 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles. When: 8 and 11 p.m. Friday. Tickets: $53.50 and $68.50. (213) 480-3232. www.ticketmaster.com. CAPTION(S): 4 photos Photo: (1 -- cover -- color) It's `GUY' thing `Family Guy' makes a comeback with live readings, comedy album and new episodes of Fox (2) Canceled in 2002, ``Family Guy,'' which grew in popularity with reruns on the Cartoon Network and via DVD DVD: see digital versatile disc. DVD in full digital video disc or digital versatile disc Type of optical disc. The DVD represents the second generation of compact-disc (CD) technology. sales, returns to the Fox network on May 1. (3) The May 1 season premiere of ``Family Guy'' features a parody of Alfred Hitchcock's ``North by Northwest'' and also skewers Mel Gibson's ``The Passion of the Christ.'' (4) Seth MacFarlane, on his Peter Griffin character in ``Family Guy'' Frazer Harrison/Getty Images |
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