Read more about Laura at: Wikipedia Official Site: Soup2Nuts Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist is an American animated series that originally ran on Comedy Central from May 28, 1995 to February 13, 2002, starring Jonathan Katz, Jon Benjamin, and Laura Silverman. The show was created by Burbank California production company Popular Arts Entertainment (Tim Braine, Kevin Meagher, David Pritchard, Executive Producers), with Jonathan Katz and Tom Snyder, developed and first made by Popular Arts for HBO Downtown Productions. Boston based Tom Snyder Productions became the hands-on production company, and the episodes were usually produced by Katz and Loren Bouchard. The show was computer animated in a crude, easily recognizable style called Squigglevision (a device Snyder had employed in his educational animation business) in which all persons and animate objects are colored and have constantly squiggling outlines, while all other inanimate objects are static and usually gray in color. The original challenge Popular Arts faced was how to repurpose recorded stand-up comedy. This is why all of Dr. Katz's patients are stand-up comics for the first several episodes. The secondary challenge was how to afford to animate on cable TV at the time. Snyder (a boyhood friend of Braine's) had Squigglevision, an inexpensive means of getting animation on cable, which could not afford traditional animation processes. A partnership between Popular Arts, Tom Snyder Productions and Jonathan Katz was formed and Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist was born. The show focused on the title character, Dr. Jonathan Katz, who was voiced by, and visually based on, the comedian of the same name. Dr. Katz was a professional psychotherapist who had famous comedians and actor as patients, usually two per episode. The comedians' therapy sessions generally consisted of them doing their onstage material while Dr. Katz offered insights or simply let them rant. Meanwhile, therapy sessions featuring actors and actresses offered more interpersonal dialogue between Katz and his patient to better suit their predisposition. Dr. Katz is a very laid-back, well-intentioned man who enjoys playing the guitar and spending time at the bar with his friend Stanley and the bartender, Julie. Interspersed with these scenes were scenes involving Dr. Katz's daily life, which included his aimless, childish 24-year-old son, Ben (Jon Benjamin), his uninterested and unhelpful secretary, Laura (Laura Silverman), and his two friends: Stanley (Will Le Bow), and the barmaid, Julie, voiced by one of the show's producers, Julianne Shapiro. In later episodes, Todd (Todd Barry), the video store clerk, became a regular character. |
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Laura