The creator of Zoboomafoo and Wild Kratts on his time at Duke and DLC, and the origin of his love for lemurs
By Sara Sorraia with Martin Kratt. Originally published in Duke Lemur Center Magazine in 2019.
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A Duke graduate and former work-study student at the Duke Lemur Center, Martin Kratt is the co-creator (with his brother, Chris Kratt) of three popular children’s television shows about animals: Kratts Creatures, Zoboomafoo, and Wild Kratts.
Zoboomafoo in particular is dear to the Lemur Center’s heart. Starring Jovian, a much-loved Coquerel’s sifaka living at the DLC, the series aired 65 episodes in just over two years (1999-2001) and taught millions of children about lemurs and primate conservation.
This fall, we had a chance to talk to Martin about Duke, the DLC, and the behind-the-scenes experience of filming Zoboomafoo.
Sara: You enrolled at Duke as an undergraduate in 1985. How did you discover the Duke Lemur Center? Did you know about it when you enrolled at Duke, or was it a “happy surprise” afterward?
Martin: I had no idea! But I did come to Duke for zoology. I was originally pre-med and thought I was going to be a conservation veterinarian. My first exposure to lemurs was the Duke Lemur Center. I took a primatology course with Patricia Wright,[1] and we’d go out to the Lemur Center. Also around that time, I got a work-study job at the DLC: I helped the technicians feed the animals and clean the enclosures. So I got to meet all the lemurs and see them close up – even Blue Devil, the first aye-aye ever born in captivity.
When did you decide you wanted to be a filmmaker instead of a conservation vet?
In my last semester at Duke, I took a film course and an amphibian ecology course. Part of the amphibian ecology course was going on weekends to catch salamanders all over North Carolina and Virginia, and I did my first film, Hellbenders, on the three-foot-long salamanders that live in the rivers. That won the Hal Kammerer film award at Duke, and that launched filmmaking for me.
When I graduated from Duke, I became a research assistant for Dr. Ken Glander,[2] working with him on his howler monkey project in Costa Rica. Chris and I made some of our first videos there and had the idea of making a TV show about wildlife for kids.
The second trip, we went to Madagascar with Dr. Wright – and we filmed all the lemurs at Ranomafana, including the sifaka that were there [Propithecus edwardsi, the Milne-Edwards sifaka]. We traveled via taxi brousse [bush taxi] to the Ankarana massif. We went to visit the indri in Andasibe, then down to Beza-Mahafaly where we filmed another type of sifaka [Propithicus verreauxi, the Verreaux’s sifaka] and ring-tailed lemurs. So we were immersed in lemurs as we were making another one of our videos, which we were pitching to broadcasters trying to get a show; and ultimately we ended up getting Kratts Creatures on PBS.
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For your second series, we love that you chose to star Jovian, a Coquerel’s sifaka, and introduced an entire generation to lemurs! At that time, lemurs were relatively unknown in popular culture. What was it that inspired you to choose a lemur as your co-star in Zoboomafoo?
It was working with lemurs while at Duke, and then going to visit them in their wild habitat in Madagascar, that led us to circle back to lemurs as an idea for our next television series. We chose a lemur because they’re so cute, they’re interesting, they’re personable. When Chris and I finished filming Kratts Creatures, we were like, “What are we going to do next?” And all our previous exposure to lemurs became the inspiration for Zoboomafoo. We wanted to do a show for younger kids who were getting their very first introductions to animals, and we thought a lemur co-star would be a great way to introduce kids to all these amazing creatures.
Jovian, pictured at the Lemur Center in 2014, was famous as “Zoboomafoo” – the star of the PBS Kids show by the same name, hosted by brothers Martin and Chris Kratt. Photo by David Haring.
Was there a moment when you thought, “We need a sifaka in this!”
Zoboomafoo was a mix of Jovian, who was living at the DLC, and the puppet in Animal Junction – they were edited together to make the character seem as real and lively as possible. The sifaka in particular was the lemur species most suitable to match up with a puppet.
So there was a practical consideration as well, with the creation of the puppet?
Oh yeah! The thing about the sifaka is, they have such a perfect face for a puppet; even the way they sit, it works so well. It’s hard to bring a puppet to life. Having it match the real lemur as much as we could, to suspend the disbelief, just really worked with the sifaka.
We’d ruled out, very early on, the idea of taking a real lemur off-site to film – not just the stress of traveling, but we also wouldn’t want him anywhere near the live snow leopard that would come into Animal Junction, or the black bear! [Laughs] Instead the puppet interacted with all of the live animals. There were emus that would peck at the puppet’s eyes, and falcons would land on its head. The puppeteer could feel the talons on his hand through the fabric! It was a lot of fun!
As you were filming on-set here at the DLC, what was that like?
We came to the Lemur Center and we built an enclosure – a big one – where about one-third of the set of Animal Junction could be inside. Then we put a tent over it. Jovian and his family moved into the enclosure for a while, so they became very comfortable with it. There were a lot of fun things inside: ropes for them to hang on, perches designed just for lemurs so they could leap around. It was a very cool three-dimensional space for the sifakas to play in.
We filmed so much of Jovian and his parents, Nigel and Flavia, jumping around. But it was mostly Jovian. And it was just really fun! It was funny what the lemurs would do: hang from their feet, grab your hair. I remember once when Jovian grabbed Chris’s nose with his foot – and those little moments of interacting with Jovian became a huge part of the show.
Jovian, age 18, free-ranging at the Duke Lemur Center in 2012. Photo by David Haring.
What do you think made Zoboomafoo so successful?
Our goal with Zoboomafoo was to give kids their first introduction to these amazing animals. We chose a sifaka as one of those really awesome animals that could help with those introductions in a fun way. We tried to create something that was playful, fun, a little unique; and with Zoboomafoo, we were able to get this really intimate, personal look at whatever animals wandered into Animal Junction. Zoboo was a great guide because he always saw everything from the animal’s perspective.
You and Chris have done so much to raise awareness of lemurs and other amazing, endangered animals and environmental issues. There are a lot of kids out there who want to be just like you when they grow up, helping save the world and the creatures in it. What advice would you give them?
There are so many ways to present wildlife and amazing animals in the natural world to kids! Wild Kratts, our new show, is so different from Zoboomafoo. We can do things with Wild Kratts that we could never do with Zoboomafoo. Because it’s animation, we can show a walrus using its pharyngeal throat sacs to float around and take naps in the Arctic sea. It would be extremely difficult to film that that in the wild and do that scene.
So I would say, there are so many great wildlife shows that can be made. In the world of animals, there is so much amazing source material to explore! Every episode we do, Chris and I learn something new about animals. For us, it’s continued learning – from the time I was in zoology classes at Duke and working at the Duke Lemur Center, up to now.
What’s the coolest thing you’ve learned recently?
We’d just finished a Wild Kratts episode on tardigrades[3] when we saw on the news that some tardigrades had crash-landed on the moon. Our whole episode is about tardigrades on the moon, and how amazing they are at surviving there. It was such a weird coincidence! For kids, our episode is going to be a first introduction to these incredible animals that are in every pond and drop of water and can survive dormant on the moon and in outer space. I mean, they’re amazing.
In an episode of Wild Kratts, the Kratt brothers’ newest series, animated versions of Martin (wearing blue) and Chris (green) search for golden bamboo lemurs in Madagascar. “Wild Kratts is so different from Zoboomafoo,” says Martin. “There are so many ways to present wildlife and amazing animals in the natural world to kids.”
Do you have a favorite animal?
Impossible to decide! [Laughs] We just got back from the Peruvian Amazon and saw, for the first time, the pink river dolphins. They’re so incredible!
And of course, we went back to Madagascar in the first season of Wild Kratts and made six episodes on lemurs: mouse lemurs, golden bamboo lemurs, sifakas, ring-tailed lemurs, and aye-ayes.
I love that the aye-aye is on that list.
Aye-ayes are amazing! The first aye-aye born in captivity was Blue Devil, right? I remember going into his enclosure to clean, and once he actually climbed down on me. He went out on my arm and looked at my watch, tapping it with his thin finger. He was so curious! I’ll never forget that. It was such a cool moment.
Wow, that’s incredible! Anything else you’d like to add before you go?
We’re just really happy that we’ve been able to support the Lemur Center’s mission of protecting and preserving endangered lemur species. It takes teamwork: all of the work the DLC is doing, scientists in the field from the Lemur Center and elsewhere, people working in national parks and reserves, Chris and me introducing kids to amazing endangered animals. There are so many ways to help endangered species, and lemurs are one of the most incredible groups of endangered species out there. It’s great work that the DLC and everyone else involved is doing to help lemurs.
[1] Patricia Wright, Ph.D., was hired by the Duke Lemur Center in the early 1980s to establish its colony of Philippine tarsiers. She traveled to Madagascar in 1986 at the request of Elwyn Simons (director of the Duke Lemur Center from 1977-1991), when she rediscovered the greater bamboo lemur (Prolemur simus, then thought to be extinct) and discovered a new species, Hapalemur aureus (the golden bamboo lemur).
[2] Kenneth Earl Glander, Ph.D., was director of the Duke Lemur Center from 1991-2001.
[3] Tardigrades are micro-animals also known as water bears; not to be confused with Loris tardigradus, the slender loris from southeast Asia which the Lemur Center used to house.
