As an epilogue of sorts to the tale of 6TEEN’s creation, here are a few interesting tidbits straight from Jen Pertsch herself!

Stay fresh,
Brendan

6TEEN was originally called “The Mall” until the creators heard the theme song by DNA Music called “Sixteen” which inspired them to change the series title. That song later went on to win an Emmy Award – yay Don and Anthony!

Creators Tom McGillis and Jennifer Pertsch frequently took business trips to the mall for “research” purposes. After a long day “researching”, their only way to unwind are shopping expeditions at “The Mother Ship”, a.k.a. Holt Renfrew.

The character “Jen” was modeled after Jennifer Pertsch, who was a avid student athlete in high school. But Jen Pertsch shops MUCH more like a Caitlin.

The characters in the show reflect the people McGillis and Pertsch observed while hanging out in various Toronto malls for research purposes, including ‘the face suckers’—teenagers whose idea of hanging-out is making-out—, and overzealous security guards called ‘rent-a-cops.’

The lowest wage Jennifer Pertsch ever received was $4.15/hr at a resort in Muskoka. It was the hardest job she ever had, but she loved it. Our newest animated show, Stoked, draws on her experiences there as a waitress.

Tom McGillis earned a whopping $3.85/hr in one of his first jobs at a fast food chain.

During focus group research, the 6TEEN production team asked teens to describe their perfect weekend. One participant said “getting locked in the mall with my friends.” This comment inspired our first Christmas episode, “Deck the Mall”.

In the episode called, “Khaki Girl”, the VP of the Khaki Barn conglomerate looks exactly like Tom McGillis.

A lot of Jonesy’s megalomaniacal behavior is based on Jennifer Pertsch’s experiences with ex-boyfriends… and Jason, the lead singer of boy band “Dog Toy” was designed to look like her husband Jason (much to his horror).

The whole 6TEEN cast look exactly like their characters – this was not planned – it is just a strange coincidence.

It’s time for another installment of Jennifer Pertsch’s look back on the creation of 6TEEN! This week: Time For a Field Trip!

Stay fresh,
Brendan

It is worth noting how appropriate it is that we “had” to do our research at malls as Tom and I LOVE to shop together.  Whenever we needed a break, we went shopping… and we’re the world’s worst enablers. We both still have outfits that we remember buying on those trips!  Although we think of ourselves as pretty hip, the trick was going into the teen stores, like Roots and Jean Machine, to watch teens interact and not coming out with clothes that were – ahem – a little too young for us.
 
We also shocked our writers by dragging them out of our writing room one afternoon on a “field trip” to the mall. But how can you write for mall rats when you haven’t seen them in action and observed the dynamic? How often do you order a drink from a teen at the food court and stop to think of what their day has been like working there? Frappucinos in hand, we formed a strange little band as we trudged through the mall, spying on the ever-present teens (shouldn’t you be in school?), studying store designs, video taping the action and gathering ideas. It was like going to the zoo – as an adult, you have to open your eyes to the things you often tune out when shopping! This is the playground of the teen.
 
To get in touch with our silly, fun, teen sides we realized we had to take our research a step or two further.  We not only met with classes of teens and sat on rec room floors with our “focus groups” watching teen shows with popcorn and listening to their thoughts, but went to every teen flick that came out together (Freaky Friday, Mean Girls, Thirteen Going On Thirty, etc.) in the last year.  Here are Tom and I, thirty-somethings, sitting beside 200 sixteen year-old girls in the theatres and probably looking like the oddest couple in there but laughing just as hard at all the jokes.  There is a teen in each of us just screaming to get out, which is why I think we connect so well to the audience!

Jen

This week we continue our look at how 6TEEN came to be. Jennifer Pertsch regales us with: Of Greeter Gods and Men!

Stay fresh,
Brendan

Tom and I originally had an idea for a series that would be about teens and take place partially in a giant shopping mall, so we decided that the best place to do research and look for ideas would be at The Eaton’s Centre.  We used to meet at the food court and laugh our butts off as we watched teens, talked to them, and took pages of notes. The idea for “the face-suckers” came from one of those scouting missions… as we tried to eat our food court munchies and discuss story ideas, we couldn’t help but be distracted by the teenaged couple next to us who were slobbering over each other for about thirty minutes straight. Gross! 

Then there was the ever-present tension between the rent-a-cops and the teens which inspired the character “Ron Rent-a-Cop”, an ex-Marine on a power trip who’s suspicious of anyone under twenty-one. In fact, all of the stores in 6TEEN were inspired in some way by stores in the mall. The Penalty Box is modeled after the cavernous, all-in-one sports stores and features a sports-crazed manager who makes everyone call him “Coach” and uses an in-store penalty box to punish employees for infractions. 

The store at the top of our cool chain is directly modeled on a clothing chain that we won’t name here – but suffice to say that when Tom and I shopped there (and dropped two weeks worth of minimum wages in twenty mintues), we were floored by the amount of attitude that these highlighted, bronzed, sixteen year old Jennifer Aniston-meets-suburbia clones can summon up to throw at paying customers. In fact we’re quite certain that the half-naked, stunning “Greeter God” at the front is under direct orders to give nothing but dirty looks. We also capitalized on the “everybody wear this!” phenomenon in teen clothing by throwing our most individual character, Nikki, into The Khaki Barn to shake things up a bit. 

We had so much fun on these trips that we decided to set the entire series in the mall – the characters never leave.

Jen

To be continued…

Ever wonder just how 6TEEN came to be? Sure, we’ve shown you the progression of the characters designs and dropped a few hints, but I’m talking about going way back, to the very beginning. Executive Producer and co-creator Jennifer Pertsch spills the story in the first installment of 6TEEN’s Secret Origin! This week: How Tom Met Jen!

Stay fresh,
Brendan

The story of 6TEEN goes way back. Tom hired me to replace him as Michael Hirsh’s executive assistant about seven years ago – and for a while, we had to share an office.  We got many noise complaints while we were still situated in the legal department because we used to make each other laugh so hard all day! We bonded over sugary cereal and laughing at how pathetic we were as we scarfed down the leftover sandwiches from the boardroom or snapped up tickets to any party Michael was too busy to attend.  We attended the opening of more than a few envelopes!
 
It’s not easy being at the bottom of the food chain, but it definitely gave us tons of material to draw from.   It’s so fun to laugh at now because it’s something almost everyone experiences at some point in their lives.  The funniest thing is that I remember we took pride in the fact that we weren’t the LOWEST on the hierarchy – the assistants to people who worked under our boss were considered (by us) to be unofficially ”lower” on the rung than we were - so at least we had that to cling to.  This was an idea that we applied directly to 6TEEN, creating the hierarchy of cool stores to work at.  Right from the start we envisioned a really fashion-conscious girl stuck wearing the most hideous uniform and working in one of the least cool stores to work at - a giant lemon that opens hydraulically.  Only one store ranks lower on the food chain of cool – Wonder Taco – and the poor soul that works there doesn’t stand a chance of being cool.

Jen

To be continued…