Red Ranger Came Calling by Berkeley Breathed. © Little, Brown.

In recent years, books have been the fodder for a herd of animated series and films. The past five years alone have brought us animated adaptations of literary works, other than comics, from authors such as Roald Dahl (James and the Giant Peach), Victor Hugo (The Hunchback of Notre Dame), Kenneth Grahame (The Wind in the Willows), Astrid Lindgren (Pippi Longstocking), Jean & Laurent deBrunhoff (Babar), Else Holmelund Minarik (Little Bear) and most recently, Marc Brown (Arthur), Paulette Bourgeois (Franklin), A.A. Milne (Winnie the Pooh) and William Joyce (Rolie Polie Olie). These days it is widely recommended that startups first pursue publishing a book or comic to establish an original property before trying to pitch it as an animated concept.

As the trend towards creator-driven content is catching on in the animation industry, an intrepid, relatively new player is entering the field, literally armed with shelves of original book properties. Storyopolis, a multi-faceted company that started as a concept to showcase art by children's book illustrators, was founded in December 1994 with the financial backing of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and the creative vision of founding principals Dawn Heinrichs and Fonda Snyder. A symbiosis of a bookstore, art gallery, artists' management company, development think tank and production company, Storyopolis bridges both publishing and visual media.

Storyopolis' production arm currently has a first-look deal with Warner Bros. where they are producing three features including a live-action adaptation of Steve Seagle's best-selling comic book House of Secrets, and two animated movies. The Iguana Brothers, is an animated feature based on the book by Tony Johnston and Marc Teague, and is described as a road movie featuring two iguanas who travel to Rio for Carnivale. The Sorcerer's Apprentice is based on Nancy Willard's female version of the classic story. For this film Storyopolis is partnered with Geena Davis, who is attached to voice the main character. Other Storyopolis projects in development include a live-action/computer animation feature Red Ranger Came Calling, a "'90s style Christmas story" based on a children's book by cartoonist Pulitzer Prize-winning Berkeley Breathed (Bloom County) and Sign of the Seahorse, an underwater action adventure based on the book by Graeme Base. Gracie Graves and the Kids From Room 402 is an animated television series based on the book by Mickey & Betty Paraskevas, which is being developed for Fox Kids Worldwide, and is described as "Seinfeld for third-graders."

The Iguana Brothers, a tale of two lizards by Tony Johnston, with illustrations by Mark Teague. © Scholastic Inc.

I spoke to Fonda Snyder who heads up Storyopolis Productions to shed some light on the process of developing children's books into film and television properties.

Wendy Jackson: What is the mission of Storyopolis' production arm?

Fonda Snyder: The promotion of literacy is very important to Storyopolis. Most of our projects are based on books because not only is it our primary business to sell both illustrated storybooks and the original art from those books, but it is also proven that in this electronic age, children and adults are more likely to read a book that they have seen adapted to film or television. Fortunately or unfortunately, a visual adaptation is more likely to reach the largest audiences. Even an author with the highest renown like Maurice Sendak has been said to comment that in a lifetime of touring and reading to audiences, he would still not be able to reach the number of children that a television series does.