Animaniacs was just one of the classic TV cartoons Romano worked on.

 AR: I know! So, I managed this by staying on staff at Hanna-Barbara and one day a week I would go over to Disney and direct Duck Tales. That would never be allowed now because I was on staff at HB, not just doing freelance. I did 65 episodes of Duck Tales with the wonderful Russi Taylor and Allen Young, who is an angel, and Terry McGovern and all these wonderful actors that I got to work with -- it was just a joy. I continued doing a lot of work at HB and a lot of my friends who were execs at HB decided to split off and form Warner Bros. TV Animation. It was the thing of the day. Everyone was forming the major classic studios TV animation because it really didn't exist.

There was no way that I would move into directing there. So in order for me to direct full-time I was going to have to move on. I left HB and became a freelance director in 1989 and ever since then I haven't had a staff position anywhere but  knock on wood (knocks) I have been working steady ever since. 

The first series that we did for WB was a little thing called Steven Spielberg Presents Tiny Toon Adventures, which was a huge success and then we made Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain and then we started getting into the more action shows, like Batman.

I still do very cartoony shows: SpongeBob SquarePants, Ben Ten for Cartoon Network; Batman, The Brave and the Bold for WB. I do all the DC comics direct-to- home video, which includes Green Lantern, Justice League, Wonder Woman, Batman and Superman, and then several video games. On video games I only do special ones because video games tend to become recording 150 different "Oofs," 20 different strangulation sounds… they aren't challenging to me and they are tasking on an actor's voice, but every once in a while you get something like Blizzard. I do their Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3, huge titles, very successful games with very theatrical scenes within the game so it's almost like directing a feature film cartoon.

NC: It's become that technical-- artistically technical.

AR: Absolutely, they are wonderful to look at, the music scores are scored by a full orchestra, they are stunning. So I do a couple of those, but not many of them as I said because I just don't have time. I literally am booked everyday of the week. But I love what I do so it's fine I just don't do much sleeping. I am in the recording studio from 9:00-6:00 almost every day and by 7:00 at night I am toast. My brain is gone. I have to get up at 4:00 a.m. to do my prep so I can be in the studio at 9:00 and start recording all day long. Fortunately, I have an assistant who helps me get the calls out during the day when I am in the recording studio because I can't be casting and calling agents when I am in the studio. I have to be focused on directing.