It seemed like a great idea at the time—that time being the early ’90s. U.S. television networks’ Saturday mornings were still the domain of animated kids’ series, and the turnover rate was high. What if a cartoon featured the three biggest names in pro sports? Thus was Pro Stars born, a series that featured Michael Jordan, Bo Jackson and Wayne Gretzky.
The format was not a typical one: Every episode opened with live-action sequences featuring the principals displaying their greatness in game action and then answering questions from kids about the challenges of growing up and playing sports.
Thereafter, the animated characters arrived on the scene: a taller, more lithe version of MJ, a Hulk-ified Bo and a Spicoli-ish 99.
“Wayne was the goofball,” says Townsend Coleman, the actor who voiced Gretzky. “He was the one making the one-liners. Gretzky rode in the back seat of the Pro Stars’ rocket car, driven by Jordan. For whatever reason, he was always hungry—it’s not explained in the show. He provided the comic relief for the other two hard-charging, go-get-’em guys.”
Coleman never met Gretzky, but he was a fan of the game, going to see the Barons play when he was growing up in Cleveland.
“I wanted to play hockey with my friends, but my mother pushed me to be the figure-skating partner of my sister,” he says. “When I finally got my way and played with my friends, she refused to buy me hockey skates, so I had to play in figure skates. And the one goal I scored that season, I skated the length of the ice and put it in the net—my own net.”
Pro Stars wasn’t much more successful—it was cancelled after 13 episodes. Still, Coleman, who also voiced Michelangelo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, mourns the brevity of its run.
“The show had a good heart—a great heart. ‘Stars are here to help kids’—I liked that, as corny as that sounds. I liked that idea of helping kids through tough times in their lives.”
This article appears in the June issue of Sportsnet magazine.