Winter 1997: The film seems to hit rock bottom when Chris Farley -- the voice actor for the main character -- suddenly dies at the age of 33. Mike Myers is later cast to fill in for Farley.

Spring 1998: Most of the script is retooled and for the most part, production is back in the storyboard phase. Janeane Garafolo is replaced by Cameron Diaz as the leading voice actress. John Garbett steps down as the film's producer to be replaced by Aron Warner (Antz). A summer 2000 release is scheduled.

Fall 1998: Co-director Kelly Ashbury is transferred to direct DreamWorks' follow-up animated film Spirit, and is replaced by Victoria Jensen (Ferngully: The Last Rainforest).

Fall 2000: After almost three years, the first trailer is presented to the public. It is now obvious that the production team wouldn't be hitting their mid-2000 deadline.

Spring 2001: Now we're all waiting for the big May 2001 release date and there's been no sign of any marketing campaigns beyond the occasional trailer and movie poster...time will tell...

Many in the animation community hope Shrek's love story of an ogre and a princess can re-kindle the ailing animated feature film market. TM and © 2001 PDI/DreamWorks.

Hopefully, the industry's commitment to animated features will survive these growing pains, and from these setbacks and victories, the process of animation will survive the fact that it became Hollywood's latest craze. The above films, I suppose, should consider themselves lucky as they have managed to see the light of day, unlike Warner Bros.' The Incredible Mr. Limpet and Universal/ILM's The Animated Frankenstein Project. The last few years have been an incredible learning experience, not necessarily for the artists creating the films, but everyone else surrounding the process. Apparently, our party isn't one that is easy to join.

Evan Backes, the creator of the late Stay Tooned (www.staytooned.com), is now pursuing an interest with graphic design at Avant Guardian (www.avant-guardian.com).