Al Kahn of 4Kids Entertainment served on a panel of industry insiders who selected their favorite presentation in “Pitch It!”

A Place to Announce
Companies also use KidScreen Summit to make significant corporate announcements. Showcase Entertainment, for example, the Woodland Hills, California-based film and television sales company, announced the launch of its new children's label Showcase for Kids. With financial backing from Hawaii Film Partners, Showcase was scouring the summit for international co-production opportunities.

Likewise, Toronto’s House of Cool Studios made it official that it was moving into the original content production business with the animated series Betty Banner Party Planner, The Dibble Show, and El Hombre La Mancha. Also based in Toronto, Cuppa Coffee Studios used its presence at the summit to unveil its new Bruno series. Let's Go Bruno! combines traditional animation with live-action footage in a game show format that will build on Cuppa's existing two Nickelodeon preschool series, Bruno! and Bruno and the Banana Bunch.

Pitching, Pitching, Pitching
In addition to speed pitching, another annual summit favorite is “Pitch It!,” in which four producers have five minutes to pitch a kids series to an eight-member panel of industry insiders. Panelists this year included Al Kahn, CEO of 4Kids Entertainment; Julien Borde, head of children's programming for France 3; Art Roche, creative director, new media for Cartoon Network; and Jesse Cleverly, head of co-production and acquisitions for the drama and animation department at BBC Children. The pitched shows, in front of a packed house in the West Ballroom of the New York City Hilton, included Biteneck Beatniks, a traditionally animated 52x11 paranormal-musical-mystery series; Elfy Food, a 52x7 animated adventure series with an emphasis on healthy eating; and a live-action multi-platform game show called Are You Game?

But the winner was a CGI preschool program called Uki, from a company called Universal Music Belgium. The long-necked, cuddly title character wakes up each morning with the typical curiosity of a three-year-old, eager to explore his surroundings. In addition to winning the ear of kids’ entertainment executives, Universal Music Belgium was also awarded free passes to next year's KidScreen Summit.

Albie Hecht delivered the keynote address, which ended the summit’s first day. He observed that the Internet is "where the most surprises and the most discoveries are going to be."

Dancing in the Ballroom
Some of the ballroom sessions that attracted the largest audiences (and were open to even freeloading journalists) gave industry insiders a chance to vent, or even do their own pitching. During his headlining Q & A session, Fred Seibert, MTV's first employee, a former president of Hanna-Barbera, and now president of Channel Frederator, said that today's animation landscape is "dull as dishwater." In an interview with Rita Street, president of Radar Cartoons, Seibert decried, among other industry policies, the pilot system. “Pilots are loaded up with all the things that execs think you have to have,” he told Street. "The first Bugs Bunny wasn't a pilot.”

To put his money where his mouth is, about 18 months ago Seibert and partners formed Next New Networks with the goal of creating and distributing “micro-television networks over the Internet.”

Stu Snyder, president and COO of Turner Animation, introduced the keynote speaker, Nickelodeon pioneer Albie Hecht, now CEO of the digital media company he founded, Worldwide Biggies. Noting the cold, steady rain falling outside the Hilton, Snyder asked to have next year’s summit in Atlanta. Was he kidding? No one seemed to know. But he wasn’t kidding when he introduced what he called the next big hit in children’s television, Star Wars: The Clone Wars. While well received by the audience, the clip he showed looked to this observer like a parody. “Prevent wars, we must,” says Yoda. “Where is Skywalker?” asks a deep-voiced James Earl Jones mimic.

The keynote address, which ended the summit’s first day, was in the form of a Q & A between Albie Hecht and E! Entertainment film critic Ben Lyons. It was no coincidence that a digital executive was the keynote speaker, as industry common wisdom, reflected in the summit agenda, now takes it for granted that that’s where the industry is headed.

“The experience we have to give kids is so much more robust now,” Hecht told Lyons. “The Net is where the playground is. That is where the most surprises and the most discoveries are going to be."

Hecht explained that Worldwide Biggies was looking to develop multi-platform properties like The Naked Brothers Band, which launched on Nickelodeon last year. The company is also launching an online game based on the movie The Princess Bride. “We’re about adding new engagement metrics,” he said, “about bringing character and story to the Web.”

“But there are no guarantees,” he emphasized. “I’m the guy who passed on The Smurfs. My [criterion] then was cool, and The Smurfs weren’t cool. But that’s still the [criterion], and today, with the overlapping Web, TV, cell phone, homework, friends is a big part of the user-generated experience. Friends tell you what’s cool.”

No Bankers in Attendance
The common denominator uniting everyone at KidScreen -- pitchers and pitchees alike -- seemed to be that they were happy to be in the kids’ entertainment business. “From my hotel room, looking out from the 25th floor, I could see right into a bank building,” said Channel Five’s Nick Wilson. “Thank god that’s not me.”

Adam Snyder is a freelance writer and the president of the Oscar-winning animation company Rembrandt Films. He has produced numerous children’s films, as well as the history of animation documentary The Animated Century. Rembrandt Films is also the exclusive distributor of several important animation libraries, including all the short films from Zagreb Film. The company’s latest DVD release is Worst Cartoons Ever!, hosted by Jerry Beck. He can be contacted at info@rembrandtfilms.com.