Actress Melanie Chartoff, 71, of Los Angeles, holds two Rugrats characters that she helped make famous with her voice, Didi Pickles on the left and Didi's mother, Minka, on the right.
Actress Melanie Chartoff, 71, of Los Angeles, holds two Rugrats characters that she helped make famous with her voice, Didi Pickles on the left and Didi's mother, Minka, on the right.Photo: Contributed photo / Contributed photo
Melanie Chartoff, who despite a storied career on stage, television and movies, is most popularly known as the voice of Didi Pickles and Didi’s old school Jewish mother Minka Kropotkin in Nickelodeon's beloved '90s animated series Rugrats and its spin-off, All Grown Up!
Chartoff, 71, who now lives in Los Angeles and married for the first time six years ago, didn’t hesitate when a friend asked her to give a boost to the class of 2020 that has missed so much because of the ongoing COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic.
“I thought I would do what I can. I guess West Haven has had a harder run than when I was a kid,” she told the New Haven Register in an interview from her home in Los Angeles. “There’s not a lot of wealth, so it’s understandable.”
She moved to West Haven when she was about 6, attending local schools through high school.
Chartoff begins the video by introducing herself, then breaking into her Didi Pickles voice with a Didi figure in her hand and telling students they might know her better as the mom on Rugrats. She then holds up dolls of the other characters, doing their voices — and describing that she’s married to "handsome inventor" Stu Pickles and is mother to Dil Pickles, whom she gave birth to in the first Rugrats movie.
“All my dreams started in drama classes of Mr. Albright’s in West Haven High School,” Chartoff says in the video.
Chartoff, who this year also gave a virtual commencement address at her alma matter Adelphi University, tells fellow Westies that even though their commencement is virtual this year, “your dreams and your accomplishments and your diplomas are very real.”
Chartoff first attended the school in its current building as a sophomore, the year it opened and gave graduates a first-hand history lesson on the swamp it used to be.
“You know West Haven was built in a marshland and before it was solid cement and buildings it was just a swamp where all these creatures would come crawling out during a hurricane,” including sea fowl, snakes, toads, opossum and rats.
“But somebody had a dream to build a high school there and over a three or four-year period we saw that dream become a reality,” she continues in the video.
Chartoff also tells graduates: “Over the years other people who have walked in these hallways just like you have accomplished a great deal of what they dreamt up when they were at West Haven High School.”
Rugrats has won a daytime Emmy and the cast has a star on the Hollywood Walk of fame.
In auditioning for the voice role of Didi, a character who is often anxious and nervous sounding, Chartoff said she channeled her own loving mother, Frances Chartoff, who is now 96 and lives in Hamden.
“Mom loved it — especially when I told her I was using her voice,” Chartoff said of the show. “It was a very fortunate casting call.”
The first episode was created in 1989 and Minka joined the show in 1993. Chartoff auditioned on the telephone for the Minka role — conjuring memories of her two grandmothers.
Chartoff was asked to send a message to graduates by her friend Phil Liscio of West Haven. Liscio, a well-known Westie, along with his wife, Janet, are the founders of Westies Care, a public charity that gives scholarships and aids the community. They founded the organization in summer of 2009, beginning a scholarship program in memory of Daniel L. Liscio, their late, beloved son.
Liscio and Chartoff met when he sent her a friend request on Facebook, knowing of her local roots. Chartoff came to love the Liscios, the organization and told the Register she will be make a donation and encouraged others to do so as well.
“I’m a huge Rug Rats Fan and of hers,” Liscio said. “We wrote back and forth via Facebook and email, I asked her to do something as this class lost their principal recently, the school construction and of course COVID-19, no prom, last season, concerts, etc.”
Liscio envisioned Chartoff’s message would be part of the virtual commencement exercises, but West Haven High School Principal Dana Paredes said they put it in a less formal senior video that included goodbyes from teachers, and pictures of the seniors growing up from Kindergarten to the present. Chartoff’s message appears at the end of the senior video.
“I think the kids got a kick out of it since Rugrats made a return last year,” Paredes said. “The videos (commencement ceremony and senior video) contrasted nicely since the graduation was very emotional for many, while the senior video was upbeat and light hearted.”
A storied career
Chartoff, actress, comedian, voice actress and singer, first became famous for her comedy work on the ABC series Fridays, and in the sitcom Parker Lewis Can’t Lose, in which she co-starred for three seasons as the high-strung Principal Grace Musso.
She has performed on Broadway and other big stages — continuing her career today — and in the 1978 motion picture American Hot Wax, as well three Rugrats movies.
On ABC’s Fridays she became popular as the anchor on the show’s fake newscasts, and known for her comedic skills, including an impression of Nancy Reagan.
Through the 1980s Chartoff appeared in many television shows, including recurring role on Newhart and made two appearances on Seinfeld. She appeared in the 2006 season finale of Desperate Housewives.
Today she continues her acting career, writes for The Huffington Post, The Jewish Journal, Defenestration Magazine, and The Funny Times. She also performs her original material at comedy clubs.
Her signature line in emails reads: “With cellular brevity and eternal levity, Melanie.”
Cover photo of Melanie Chartoff's upcoming book, "ODD WOMAN OUT," to be released in 2021.
In an interview this week, Chartoff said she has a book of essays coming out in 2021 called, “Odd Woman Out.” The book also has a West Haven angle, as the stories begin around Edith Mackrille, Harry Bailey, WHHS and Savin Rock Amusement Park.
A Westie
Chartoff said growing up a few blocks from that marshland that became the high school was like living on a “wildlife preserve.”
“We played and dreamed outside in our yards, now kids play and dream inside their computers,” she said.
Chartoff said she may never have become an actor if not for a high school summer theater camp and teacher Frank Albright.
She was writing plays at a young age and performed in school plays at Mackrille Elementary School, Bailey Middle School and WHHS.
She got her first early paying gig as a teen in the New Haven area.
She delivered a commencement address virtually at Adelphi this year and told them in part what she told Westies — that their “accomplishments are real.”
Coincidentally the university didn’t hold commencement when she graduated in 1970 because of the unrest on college campuses caused by the Kent State shootings. On May 4, 1970, members of the Ohio National Guard fired into a crowd of Kent State University demonstrators, killing four and wounding nine students.
At the time she would have been graduating, Chartoff was leading a sit in, she said.
It’s not lost on Chartoff that although she’s classically trained in Shakespeare and Moliere, and has had a great career, that she is best known as a cartoon character.
But it’s rewarding when parents tell her the show was always on after school and kept the kids busy.
“It’s so nice to have that kind of impact,” for so little output, she said.
She said Rugrats was “hip” show with lots of double entendre.
In the virtual message to the Westie graduates of 2020, Chartoff also tells them: “I look forward to seeing all the things that you’ll make a reality out of the dreams that you started at West Haven High School.”
And she wraps it up with: “So go Westies, very proud to be a fellow graduate and I’ll look forward to all you accomplish.”
Nickelodeon is currently in the midst of reviving Rugrats for a new generation of audiences, with some of the original voice cast returning to reprise their respective roles, including Nancy Cartwright as Chuckie Finster.
More Nick: Nickelodeon and Paramount to Bring 'Rugrats' Back for the Next Generation of Kids!
Follow NickALive! on Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, via RSS, on Instagram, and/or Facebook for the latest Classic Nickelodeon, NickRewind and Rugrats News and Highlights!
No comments:
Post a Comment
Have your say by leaving a comment below! NickALive! welcomes friendly and respectful comments. Please familiarize with the blog's Comment Policy before commenting. All new comments are moderated and won't appear straight away.