Dinosaurs chronicles the story of the highly-evolved and hysterically funny Sinclair family, who face typical family and contemporary issues with a hilarious Jurassic twist. Earl Sinclair (Stuart Pankin) is a bombastic, middle-aged Megalosaurus. A blue-collar dinosaur, Earl has worked as a tree pusher for 24 years. Fran (Jessica Walter) is Earl’s even-tempered Allosaurus wife. Their two adolescent children are Robbie (Jason Willinger), the 14-year-old with unconventional beliefs, and Charlene (Sally Struthers), the 12-year old, two-ton epitome of a material girl who never finishes talking or shopping. Completing the family are Baby (Kevin Clash), the attentiongrabbing newborn, and Grandma Ethyl (Florence Stanley), Fran’s mother who opposes Earl on everything. They’re joined by Roy Hess (Sam McMurray), Earl’s best friend, co-worker and a confirmed bachelor Tyrannosaurus, and B.P. Richfield (Sherman Hemsley), Earl’s ferocious Triceratops boss.
Based on an idea by Jim Henson, Dinosaurs is a live-action series which employs Jim Henson Productions’ puppetry and audio animatronics from Henson’s fabled Creature Shop. Combined with smart writing and hilarious characters, Jim Henson Productions’ ground-breaking puppet technology created a show which won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Art Direction (1991), the coveted Parents Choice Award for Television (1992), Parents Choice Gold Seal Award (1992), the Environmental Media Award (1991, 1993), Genesis Award (1991), the New York Film Festival Silver Medal for Family Programming Award (1992) and the Chicago International Film Festival Silver Hugo Award (1993). Dinosaurs’ vocal cast features all-time TV favorites Sherman Helmsley (TV’s “The Jeffersons”) and Sally Struthers (TV’s “All In The Family”), with a guest star list that includes Jason Alexander, Michael Richards and Julia Louis-Dreyfus (all of TV’s “Seinfeld” fame), Tim Curry (“Valiant”) and legendary comedian Buddy Hackett (“The Love Bug”).
Executive Producer Michael Jacobs offers his thoughts on Dinosaurs:
“Jim Henson had an idea about domesticated dinosaurs and his son Brian met with Bob Young and myself to see if a collaboration might result in finding out why dinosaurs finally became extinct. Was it a meteor? Was it the Ice Age? No. Those were trivial compared to what actually happened. We decided that it was getting married and having children that did them in! Earl Sinclair married and settled down with his girlfriend, Fran. They decided to raise their children instead of eating them. Earl worked at the Wesayso Development Corporation as a tree-pusher. He earned a salary and dreamed that his kids would someday appreciate him. Or at least his new baby might call him something other than “Not The Mama.”
Complete Third and Fourth Seasons DVD Details:
All twenty-two third season episodes
All fourteen fourth season episodes including seven that never aired
Audio Commentary on "Nature Calls" - Producer Brian Henson and Writer Kirk Thatcher
Audio Commentary on "Into The Woods" - Producer Brian Henson and Writer Kirk Thatcher
Creatures With a Cause: The Issues of Dinosaurs - Look at the controversial series finale.
