Claude Brookes Discusses Animation Success

Animation is a game that may never go away as it affects children in such a way that when some become adults, they still watch cartoons. The correlation between keeping people entertained and even education through animation will never go away. Claude Brookes knows this too well. As the CEO of C To The B Productions, he’s been involved in the animation game for so many years that he contributed to over 500 television episodes and is on his way to doing 500 more.

With a well-rounded resume and a successful track record, Brookes continues to be creative and working with companies such as MTV, VH1, the Discovery Channel, and Paramount Network, his current venture is working with the world’s most liked hip-hop recording artist, Snoop Dogg. The Industry Cosign was able to speak to Brooks about several things including his latest project, Doggyland, a new innovative 3D animated series for children through his and Snoop’s Doggyland Media.

You’ve connected with hip-hop royalty in Snoop Dogg to bring the world an animated children’s series, Doggyland. How did that materialize and how has your prior experience prepared you for this project?

Well, ‘Doggyland’ and hooking up with Snoop Dogg came about almost 20 years ago. I created a show called ‘The Lyricist Lounge Show’ for MTV, and it was a hip-hop-based sketch comedy show, and Snoop was one of the guest stars on it, and we developed a relationship from there. At the top of COVID, another show I have called ‘Hip Hop Harry’, which is also a kids’ show, we were doing live Instagram chats on Saturdays, where we would talk to the character, talk to and interact with celebrities and influencers, as well as folks who were just fans. Snoop saw that, and it was getting a lot of shine, and he was like, ‘Hey, I want to be a part of one of those episodes.’ And when we did it afterward, he goes, ‘You know what, I’ve always wanted to do something similar to this, but for the kids, you know, for the kids and more on my brand. And let’s figure out a way to get that role.’ And so we, we put our minds together, along with October London, who’s also a co-creator of the project, and we developed ‘Doggyland’. So having already done ‘Hip-Hop Harry’, it really set me up in a big way to do ‘Doggyland’. And we wanted to just really, you know, give you a point of view from Snoop’s POV. The title tells you everything and we wanted to talk about real land on more social-emotional, you know, type topics, as opposed to it being cognitive. So we have great songs like ‘Everybody’s Different’, and songs about what it’s like to be a great friend, and the ‘Affirmation Song’, which was the number one kid song for 2023 and it’s still ranked in the top five.

Your resume spans over 500 episodes of television as an actor and also as an executive producer. How were you able to create such a bountiful body of work and how do you continue to create without burning out (Provided you haven’t burned out!)? What can we anticipate from you in the future?

Well, it’s funny you should say, ‘work without burning out’. I think the key to not burning out is having a great team. And we have a great team. It’s a small team on this project Doggyland, but everybody really kills it in a big way. On the creative side, the main person who kind of helps oversee all the stuff that happens creatively is Elijah Williams. And there’s a lot that goes into creating each one of these songs. So Elijah helps oversee the creative once the song is made, but the songs are made by our group of great producers, which includes Grammy-winning producers, so that’s why the beats and stuff sound really so current, as well as folks who write the lyrics and obviously the actors who do the singing. So we have to get all the songs made, which that’s one process. And then, after the songs are made, a treatment has to be done for each thing. And then from there, it goes out to get animated. And that’s a whole ‘nother process. So it’s almost like putting together a complete TV show for each one of these two minute pieces.

What you can anticipate for the future, specifically for Doggyland, we’ll be, you know, doing feature films with it, as well as getting on some of the other bigger kinds of platforms that you may know, the bigger ones you’ve heard of. Snoop and I really wanted to make sure that everybody has access to Doggyland, which is why we started this off on YouTube, because most folks do have access to YouTube, and it doesn’t cost them anything. That was our main goal, we’re also on Kidoodle and Happy Kids, which are also free platforms as well.

With Doggyland, you’ve created episodes that have featured songs related to the recent election (“Election Day”) and also the most recent holiday (“Thanksgiving Song”). How important is it to recognize important dates on the calendar and will there be other ones that we should look out for?

Most definitely. By having songs that kind of hit big, and are current– themes that come up, like Father’s Day and Mother’s Day, we do those types of songs as well, where we highlight just the relationship that our characters have with their mothers and fathers –it kind of speaks to our audience in a big way. We’ve come to see that there’s a big onus of having, you know, dads in the children’s lives. So we hit those big men benchmarks, you know, things that may hit on Black History Month, all of those. Part of why we do those is we get a big response from schools all over the country where teachers use our videos as part of their curriculum, so they have day-and-date stuff that really helps in a big way. And we love seeing the responses we get back from the teachers and parents. You know, there’s not a day that goes by that we don’t get something in the form of an email or definitely on social media. We’re flooded all the time, but we get emails from, you know, teachers and parents saying that what we’re making really has helped shape their kids and shape their future. And it’s everything from affirmations to brushing your teeth. And we got one email, which is really funny, where the lady said her son, she couldn’t really get him to understand the importance of brushing his teeth until he saw Doggyland’s “Brush Your Teeth” video, and now he brushes his teeth all the time and wants to do it longer than the required two minutes. The lady asked ‘Can you do a song that explains you should stop after doing it for two minutes?’ lol

You’ve also had success with another children’s show, Hip Hop Harry, which, like Doggyland, incorporates hip-hop. Evidently, you have roots and/or a deep interest in the genre. How were you able to marry the children and hip-hop genres to make it successful?

Like I said earlier, you know Hip Hop Harry, which was done back in 2005, still exists. It’s still very much so, you know, part of the culture out there. So Hip Hop Harry was rooted in Hip-Hop, and that’s by me doing The Lyricist Lounge Show before Hip Hop Harry. I realized early on that hip hop can be used as a narrative and, more importantly, as a learning tool, right? Because the rhyming is a staple in learning. Dr Seuss’s ‘Cat In The Hat’ shows you that rhyming is a learning technique. The call-and-response nature of rap is also a learning tool. ‘When I say green, you say, Go!’ ‘Green, go, green, go!’ Just taught you that green means go. And when you have all that kind of like already inherently happening in music and in songs, you just kind of tilt some to be a learning tool for this age set, which is kind of like toddlers up to 10 years old or even past that. Because with Doggyland, it’s co-viewing, quad viewing, everybody in the family really gets into it. I knew in a big way that rap works for teaching. And then you throw Snoop Dogg on top of it, oh my gosh… Everybody knows Snoop Dogg, and he really wanted to do something in this area so he could have something to give back to his grandkids. His grandkids really dig into what we’re doing, and just kids in general. He’s a big advocate of the next generations coming up. He has a youth football league where it doesn’t get talked about a lot, but a lot of those kids, over 1000s of those kids kind of going to college. I don’t know the exact number, but there’s a bunch that are in the NFL and this is something that he has supported, just from his own resources for years. He also has a special, special needs version of the Youth Football League. So we want to talk to all types of kids of all ethnicities, and we feel that Hip-Hop and rap do that in a really fun and engaging way.

You didn’t ask this question, but I do want to elaborate on our engagement. It’s not only about the songs and rhythm that draws you in, but there’s also choreography, like TikTok choreography that you’ll see throughout all of our videos. And we’re finding that the kids, as well as their older brothers and sisters, are doing videos where they emulate the dance moves. And that is another layer of learning. Because as you’re doing these dance moves, you’re singing along. It’s getting you out of your seat, so it’s making you exercise, but it’s also helping you retain what the messaging is about.

What advice would you give to someone who has a passion and wants to make it a successful career?

Well, you hit it on the head by saying the word “passion.” In order to have a really successful career, you really do need to have passion for it. Delving into something that you have a passion for will inherently make you go “I’ll do whatever it takes to follow through, to see my dream come true”. And by having access to the internet and YouTube, you can look up folks who are doing what you want to do, and a lot of people will have done interviews and talked about their process of how they got to where they are. And you can, you know, pull little pieces [from that] that you think will help you. Put it in your head, but also jot it down. Make a note of it. Put it in, whether it’s in your phone or if you’re a parent and you’re asking your kid what they want to be or do. Show them examples of other folks who are doing it and just kind of like, jot down a couple of key notes and things that they’ve done, and if you do a little bit of something every day to go after your dream or passion, guess what? It all adds up, and you’ll get there, and your dream may not look exactly how you expected it to look when you arrive, but it’ll become a new version of your dream.

Claude Brookes Discusses Animation Success With Projects Like Hip-Hop Harry and Doggyland