Clarence
Created by	Skyler Page
Directed by	Martin Ansolabehere (art) Andrew Overtoom (animation) Raymie Muzquiz (supervising, Season 1) David Ochs & Niki Yang (supervising, Season 2–present)
Creative directors	Nelson Boles (2014–15) David Ochs (2015)
Voices of	Skyler Page (2014–15) Spencer Rothbell (2015–present) Sean Giambrone Tom Kenny Roger Craig Smith Katie Crown
Theme music composer	Simon Panrucker
Opening theme	"King of the World"
Ending theme	"Good Habits", performed by Saba Lou
Composers	James L. Venable Simon Panrucker
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	69 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producers	Skyler Page (2014–15) Curtis Lelash Jennifer Pelphrey Brian A. Miller Rob Sorcher
Producers	Keith Mack Supervising producers: Bob Boyle (Season 1) Yvette Kaplan (2014) Nelson Boles (2015–16) Stephen P. Neary (Season 2–present)
Running time	11 minutes
Production company	Cartoon Network Studios
Original release
Network	Cartoon Network
Release	April 14, 2014 (2014-04-14) – present

Clarence is an American animated television series created by Skyler Page for Cartoon Network. The series revolves around a young boy named Clarence and his two best friends Jeff and Sumo. Page, a former storyboard artist for Adventure Time and revisionist for Secret Mountain Fort Awesome, developed the series at Cartoon Network Studios as part of their shorts development program in 2012.

The series currently has 51 episodes, with the pilot airing after the 2014 Hall of Game Awards show on February 17, 2014. The series officially premiered on April 14, 2014 and was seen by approximately 2.3 million viewers, outperforming shows in its same demographic in the time slot. Critical reception has been positive, and its pilot was nominated for a Creative Arts Emmy Award.

In July 2015, the series was renewed for a second season, which began January 18, 2016.

The show focuses on the daily life of Clarence Wendell, a fun-loving and chubby 9-year-old boy, and his best friends: Jeff, one of Clarence's best friends who is more the intellectual type, and Sumo: Clarence's other best friend who is the most instinctual of their group and often takes drastic and crude measures when trying to solve problems. Clarence lives with his mother Mary, and her boyfriend Chad in the fictional city of Aberdale, Arizona. Each episode focuses on the daily-life situations and problems that Clarence and his friends encounter, and their everyday adventures and life experiences as kids. Other characters include students and faculty at Aberdale Elementary, Clarence's school. Certain episodes focus on the life of supporting characters, like the citizens of Aberdale and Clarence's classmates.

• Clarence Wendell (voiced by Skyler Page (episodes 1-32 and 35-36) and Spencer Rothbell (episodes 33-34 and 37-present)) - An optimistic, quirky and chubby 9-year-old^[1] boy who sees the world as an exciting place and wants to try it all. Everyone Clarence knows is usually wary of his ideas; nevertheless, he manages to get them into his plans anyway. As a 4th grader attending Aberdale Elementary School with his friends, Clarence casts as one of the "popular kids" because of his fun personality. Despite being overweight, Clarence performs well physically and is quite good at soccer. He loves Star Wars, pop-rock music, white chocolate and trying out new tricks on his skateboard. Periodically, Clarence tends to fall asleep in class, mostly because he stays up late, unbeknownst to his parents.
• Jeffrey "Jeff" Randell (voiced by Sean Giambrone) - One of Clarence's best friends, well-known for having a cube-shaped head representing his "square" personality. He was said to be autistic in the first few episodes, but the claim was immediately dismissed by everyone. Extremely intelligent, passionate and socially awkward, Jeff is downright one of the smartest characters on the show and displays exceptional intelligence with an IQ of 190. He yearns to be a social butterfly, but his superior intellect and strong, radical beliefs have led him to alienate himself from his peers(except Clarence, of course). He also likes watching game shows, from Jeopardy! to The Price Is Right, and sometimes plays along with them.
• Ryan "Sumo" Sumozski (voiced by Tom Kenny) - Clarence's second best friend who often takes drastic and crude measures when trying to solve problems. Unlike Clarence and Jeff, Sumo is the show's epitome of the "bad boy": An aggressive, scrappy and at times cocky young man who has issues with authority (similar to Bart Simpson). His unruly ways have made him a disruptive student at Aberdale Elementary School, where he is an underachiever, in contrast to Jeff, as they often lock horns with each other. Overall, Sumo is not very intelligent nor kind but is indeed a true friend to Clarence and Sumo and is available to whenever they need help.

• Mary Wendell (voiced by Katie Crown) - Clarence's mother who is always there to support her son no matter the difficulty.
• Chad Cooke (voiced by Eric Edelstein) - Mary's boyfriend (and later husband) who works at various odd-jobs and acts as Clarence's father figure.
• Belson Noles (voiced by Roger Craig Smith) - Aberdale's local bully who is more verbally abusive than physically abusive. In contrast to the sweet and goofy Clarence, Belson is cynical, snobbish, rude, egocentric, hot-headed and malicious towards others. Born into a well-off yet "broken" family, Belson is not as impressed by Clarence as any other kid would be and angrily demands that everything should be done HIS way. He is envious of Clarence becoming a beloved icon to the kids of Aberdale and relentlessly tries to destroy his reputation, only to have his plans backfire on him hilariously.
• Ms. Melanie Baker (voiced by Katie Crown) - The children's 4th grade teacher who idolizes Jeff and has zero tolerance for Sumo's shenanigans.
• Percy (voiced by Roger Craig Smith) - A short, wimpy boy who speaks in a weak voice and is friends with Clarence.
• Nathan (voiced by Damien Hass) - One of Belson's friends. He is a big guy who is shown as a klutzy dimwit, but deep down, is intelligent and sensitive.
• Dustin (voiced by Kyle Arem) - Another one of Clarence's classmates and Belson's friends who loves playing soccer almost as much as Clarence does.
• Mr. Reese (voiced by Donovan Patton) - The gruff yet dim-witted school secretary who is one of the few adults who understands Clarence.
• Ms. Shoop (voiced by Katie Crown) - The school's inattentive and eccentric recess monitor who cares less about the students an more about the rules. She detests Clarence and wishes to bring him to his knees.
• Chelsea Keezheekoni (voiced by Grace Kaufman) - A plucky young girl with braces who insists that she is superior to any boy, mainly Sumo.
• Breehn (voiced by Joshua Rush) - More of Jeff's friend than Clarence's. He, Chelsea and Jeff are the smartest students at Aberdale Elementary in the class and keeps himself well grounded at times, mostly due to his strict and persnickety upbringing.
• Emilio (voiced by Alberto Gonzales) - More of Sumo's friend than Clarence's who has an affinity for gross things.
• Kimberly "Kimby" (voiced by Isabella Niems)- A shy girly girl who is infatuated with Clarence, and has ever since "Clarence Gets A Girlfriend".
• Malessica (voiced by Ivy Bishop) - Kimby's best friend with brown hair and glasses. She used to be smitten with Jeff, but not anymore.
• Courtlin (voiced by Tayler Buck) - Kimby's African-American other best friend. She has a cheeky personality and is not afraid to speak her mind.
• Mavis (voiced by Spencer Rothbell) - A squat, red-haired girl who speaks in unintelligible grunts and is afraid of fire hydrants.
• Camden (voiced by Spencer Rothbell) - A red-headed boy with droopy cheeks and has a deep, nasally voice.

At their 2011 upfront, Clarence was announced along with various other series.^[2] The show was created by Page, a former storyboard artist for Adventure Time and revisionist for Secret Mountain Fort Awesome.^[3] He is the fourth creator on the network who graduated from the California Institute of the Arts,^[4] and at age 24, he is also the youngest.^[5] As part of their shorts development program in 2012, the show was developed at Cartoon Network Studios; two others, Steven Universe and Over the Garden Wall, also came from this initiative.^[6]

Page, together with creative director Nelson Boles, conceived the show at CalArts. It was further considered when Page became hired at Cartoon Network Studios. A crew of two or three polished the pilot episode; after it had been picked up, a crew of 30 to 35 writers, storyboard artists, revisionists, colorists and designers were employed. Meanwhile, animation is outsourced to South Korea through the Saerom Animation.^[7]: 20 Page explained that the hardest part of production was keeping pace, especially where once an episode is completed, one must start over. He called this "exciting", but "very challenging".^[7]: 21

According to writer Spencer Rothbell, the show was created with a naturalistic tone, similar to cartoons of the 1990s, combined with a more modern feeling. Given this naturalism, writers can reference works that have inspired for them or fit the genre of an episode. He ultimately felt that it was about "empowering kids and having fun".^[8] Rothbell also avoids "pigeonholing" into one type of story, and that while some plots are mostly character-driven, others are "based on one idea that we think is really funny".^[9] Inspiration also came from the shows Page watched as a child, which invoked more poignant and relatable situations. Despite this, elements of fantasy are allowed, and that conveying both incongruous to one another was one technique he particularly enjoyed. Boles noted that the art direction called for inconsistent character design to avoid having to fit model sheet with the universe perfectly—a result of what he dubs the Simpsons effect.^[7]: 20 Attention is also paid to background characters in order to expand variety in its plot and universe.^{[7]: 20–21}

In July 2014, it was reported that Skyler Page was fired from the show and Cartoon Network Studios.^[10][11][12] A Cartoon Network spokesperson confirmed that the series will continue despite his absence.^[13] Spencer Rothbell later became head of story and the voice of Clarence^[14] and creative director Nelson Boles became supervising producer and showrunner.

Clarence was originally previewed at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con International.^[15] Cartoon Network had commissioned twelve quarter-hour episodes, with the pilot episode airing after the Hall of Game Awards show on February 17, 2014.^[6] The pilot was nominated for an "Outstanding Short-format Animated Program" at the 65th Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards in 2013.^[16][a] The first episode, broadcast April 14, 2014, was met with an estimated 2.3 million viewers, outperforming shows in its same demographic in the time slot by double and triple digit percentages. Meanwhile, preliminary data identified it as the most watched series premiere for the network that year.^[17]

In Canada, Clarence premiered on Cartoon Network on April 14^[18] and on Teletoon on September 4, but it was later moved exclusively to Cartoon Network.^[19][20] The series premiered on October 6 on Cartoon Network in Australia and New Zealand^[21][22] and on November 3 on Cartoon Network in the United Kingdom and Ireland.^[23] In India, the series debuted on June 1, 2015 on Cartoon Network.^[24]

Critical reception has been positive. In a three-star review, Emily Ashby of Common Sense Media alerted parents of "a similar brand of absurdity and crudeness" as Adventure Time—though less severe—but praised the cast as "oddly likable".^[25] Nancy Basile of About.com applauded the dialogue for its lengthiness, and considered the relationships between the characters to be dynamic and genuine, with some comedy thrown in.^[26] Whitney Matheson of USA Today found Clarence to blend optimism and surreal humor in "just the right amount", and encouraged children and parents alike to watch its premiere.^[27] In Animation Magazine, Mercedes Milligan described it as "a breath of fresh suburban air" and a celebration of childhood.^[7]: 20 Nivea Serrao of TV Guide contrasted the show with most fantasy animated series.^[8] Brian Lowry of Variety called it "so quirky and idiosyncratic as to feel fresh", although it sometimes tread in "well-worn territory", but found the character designs unattractive.^[28]

The show gained considerable press after featuring a gay couple in the episode "Neighborhood Grill", with coverage in various tabloid and entertainment news sites,^[b] and in LGBT-oriented sites as well.^[c] The scene involves two male characters greeting each other with kisses on the cheek while at a restaurant. Rothbell originally had the couple kiss on the lips after receiving flowers from the other, but this went unapproved by the network. He added that the scene was a "minor throwaway moment", albeit "better than nothing", and anticipated that "one day the main character can be gay and it won't be a big deal".^[32] Joe Morgan of Gay Star News called the buildup to the scene "an old joke",^[37] a notion shared by Dan Tracer of Queerty, although he praised their portrayal "just as normal people".^[38]

• Official website
• Clarence at IMDb
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