Netflix’s Tuca & Bertie creator Lisa Hanawalt brings her new animated series to life. Hanawalt currently works with another Netflix project, hit TV show BoJack Horseman, but the two shows are quite different with its leads and storytelling.
“I wanted to make a weird, surreal, warm, silly show about female friendship, about women in their 30s because I hadn’t seen a lot of that before,” explained Hanawalt. “A friendship where one friend is worried about getting left behind, and they’re kind of going in different directions, which often happens in this decade. Some friends are going off and getting married, they own a house and they have two kids. And then other ones are still trying to figure out how to pay their taxes and not be a weird, sloppy baby. But on the inside, we all still feel like a mess and we’re desperately trying to work and make money and get our shit together. It’s very different from being in your 20s. I wanted it to be this very silly, cartoony world but I also wanted to explore deep, rough topics, like early childhood trauma and harassment, men crossing boundaries and unreliable mentors and our relationship to other women who we feel like we should support. All that stuff is interesting to me.”
Hanawalt gets honest about what her show means for both genders that watch.
“Obviously, I’m a feminist,” said Hanawalt. “I’d have to be an idiot not to be. But I want people who are uncomfortable with that word to still watch it. I don’t just want women who already agree with me to watch it. I don’t want to just preach to the choir. I want men to get comfortable with the idea of women being funny and gross. I think that’s important, because we’ve been locked into these roles for so long, and it’s really boring. I mean, some people are really going to hate it, and that’s fine.”
The fear of cancellation always looming in her head, Hanawalt works to give Tuca & Bertie the story it deserves.
“I’m always very pessimistic with projects,” said Hanawalt. “I always assume after one season they’ll realize that I’m a fraud and they’ll cancel it. So, I kind of crammed everything I wanted to get out there into this season. But that said, I have so much more I want to do. There’s so much more I want to explore, with Bertie and Tuca. I feel like I only just barely scratched the surface of what’s really going on with these characters.”
Tuca & Bertie will premiere tomorrow on Netflix with 10 episodes. The series stars Tiffany Haddish as Tuca and Ali Wong as Bertie.
You can watch the trailer below.