Big City Greens, the acclaimed Disney animated series about the zany adventures of the titular Green family, returns with all new episodes. Despite defeating their nemesis Chip Whistler last season, fans can look forward to some of the biggest adventures yet for ragamuffin Cricket, older sister Tilly, father Bill, Gramma Alice and the rest of their friends and family.
Ahead of the premiere of Big City Greens Season 5, The Beat had the pleasure of chatting with creators and executive producers Chris Houston and Shane Houghton as well as Anna O’Brian, elevated to executive producer for Season 5 after serving as a storyboard artist, writer, and director for the first four seasons. During our discussion, the producers teased some of the big names set to appear this season and revealed some of their comedy influences.
Taimur Dar: The show has always had amazing guest stars but Big City Greens Season 5 really takes things to a new level. Among the recently announced guest stars, the one that stood out to me as the most unexpected and inspired was Stephen King. I’m reminded how you described Michael Bolton being underutilized for his comedic abilities when you had him as a guest star last season. I have no doubt you’ve seen the original Creepshow anthology film that King wrote and starred as the titular character in the hilarious segment “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill.” How did you end up getting such a literary luminary on the show?
Shane Houghton: Absolutely. Stephen King is a very funny human being. I know he writes horror but he’s a funny guy. Jordy Verrill is very funny and his cameo in It: Chapter 2. He knows how to do some fun winky cameos. He’s done ton of historic cameos. When it was coming around that we had an episode coming up about the haunted Kludge, Bill’s truck. I kept thinking, “We’ve got a haunted vehicle. This is so Christine, From a Buick 8, and Maximum Overdrive. How do we make this the most Stephen King related episode?” I’ve always been a huge Stephen King fan. There are Stephen King Easter eggs and references throughout the entire run of the show. All the way back to Season 1.
So I said, “Let’s pour it all in.” We cast actors who have been in multiple Stephen King adaptations. We had little references. He loves motorcycles so we had to have a motorcycle in the episode. He did a cameo in Sons of Anarchy. I really made it the most Stephen King-y episode. We said, “The cherry on top would be if we got the King.” I wrote a letter and basically said, “I’m a very passionate fan. I have this show and trying to make this episode the most appealing to you as a human being. Would you like to have a cameo in it?” To my surprise and pleasure, his team said “Yes.” He came in and knocked out this little scene. It’s so funny. He’s so funny. He nails it. It really is the cherry on top. That’s our Halloween episode. It will be out later this year. It was a real treat.
STEPHEN KING, OFFICER KEYS
Taimur Dar: Discovering the personal interests and fandoms of entertainers like that is exactly why I love doing press junkets. After hearing people praise his work for years, I recently binge watched Danny McBride’s HBO shows like The Righteous Gemstones. I’m very tempted to assume you’re also Righteous Gemstones fans since the actor who plays Keefe in Righteous Gemstones, Tony Cavalero, voices Wayne in Big City Greens. I’d love to know if Righteous Gemstones is indeed a show you enjoy and what other comedies inspire and influence the Big City Greens?
Anna O’Brian: We have many Righteous Gemstones fans on the crew. Megan Stalter is in this season who I think we’re all huge fans of. She just kills it. We have a lot of great comedy guest stars this season.
Shane Houghton: I think pretty much anything we or the writers or the board artists are watching or into just finds its way naturally into the show. Sometimes it’s a flavor of a joke or a style or a tone. Because we’ve been going for so long, we’re on Season 5, we’re always looking for influences and inspiration. It kind of pops up in the weirdest places. It depends on what we happen to be into at the time. I like when people’s personal takes and influences find their way into the show.
Chris Houghton: I think everyone on the crew is a big fan of I Think You Should Leave. Tim Robinson has voiced Gregley for a number of seasons. Actually, Gregley was a character who lived in the show’s bible for awhile without ever making it into the show. We couldn’t figure out the character. When I Think You Should Leave Season 1 first came out, the crew all loved it and instantly we were like, “This is the guy for Gregley.” Thankfully Tim said “Yes.” In Season 5 we have Patti Harrison. Fans of I Think You Should Leave will recognize her from the Shark Tank sketch. We really are just fans of comedy. If there’s someone out there who makes us laugh, we usually reach out and say, “Would you do something for us?
Shane Houghton: Have you seen Haha, You Clowns?
Taimur Dar: On Adult Swim?
Shane Houghton: Yes. That’s a show that’s so specific and so funny but we were all so tickled by it. Also the three boy characters have Cricket’s parted bowl haircut. We were like, “There’s some weird, shared DNA.” We have an episode “Remy Regatta” in this first batch in Season 5.
TILLY
Chris Houghton: [Haha, You Clowns creator] Joe Cappa came in and just gave us a couple of lines. It’s a really short cameo but really funny. It was delight. I actually saw him at a part recently and I got shy because I’m such a fan of the show. I forgot he was in Big City Greens and that could’ve been an opener to go talk to him at this party. But I got shy because I’m such a big fan and so many of us are on the crew. Last season we had the Smiling Friends guys for a brief cameo. I guess we’re just using our show to collect funny people. [Laughs]. It’s a pleasure whenever anyone says, “Yes.” Chad Michael Murray had this interview in Vulture last summer saying how much of a fan he is of Big City Greens and would love to voice a character. Coincidentally, the timing was just perfect that we need a voice for a literal “hot potato” in the upcoming episode “The Farmies.” It’s a potato with kind of a face on it that’s kind of hot. Who better than voice a hot potato than Chad Michael Murray. The stars aligned on that. It’s been great and amazing to look at our list of guest stars.
Taimur Dar: There’s this brilliant meta joke last season about how the show tells self-contained stories that keep the show accessible but also has serialized arcs that stretch over an entire season. It’s a difficult balance but you maintain it phenomenally in the show. Last season the big arc was the saga of Chip Whistler’s revenge plot, so what’s the arc for Big City Greens Season 5?
Anna O’Brian: When I came on as an EP, I think my first move was looking at Gloria and realizing she’s been living in the Green’s basement for three seasons. I was like, “We have to get her out of there.” [Laughs]. The very first episode Gloria makes a move and decides to move out. But she struggles once she realizes all her successes in life were with the help of the Greens and how much she’s integrated herself in that family and become an honorary Green. She gets on her own two feet and starts to date a little bit this season. She has a bit of an arc this season which I think will be very exciting to watch. She’s definitely a crew favorite and I think she’s become a fan favorite too. I think it’s super fun and different for the show.
GRAMMA ALICE, TILLY, CRICKET, GLORIA
Shane Houghton: One thing we learned from the movie, which Anna directed, was there was fun dynamic between Gloria and Nancy that we hadn’t really explored on the show before. We wanted to continue some of that in this season as well. There’s a couple of team-ups this season. Gloria is really the arc of this season but there is still plenty of Cricket, Tilly, Grandma, and Bill [on] wild, zany adventures. One of my favorites…did you ever have to do the Presidential Fitness Test?
Taimur Dar: Most definitely!
Shane Houghton: A seemingly arbitrary test. There’s a really funny episode with the kids at the community center and a beefy guy called Mr. Brawn comes in to test them but it’s the Mayoral Fitness Test. The mayor of Big City is overseeing this. It’s a very funny episode playing on a mundane thing, but like most episodes of Big City Greens it goes to an exaggerated and funny height.
Taimur Dar: Finally, as I’ve learned at this point, there’s always a weird and experimental episode towards around the halfway point of the season and then again towards the second half. So is there anything you can tease about the weird and experimental episode for Big City Greens Season 5?
Shane Houghton: I love that you picked up on that and I also love that you nailed where it comes in the season.
Chris Houghton: Very good sir! We like playing with different styles of animation and looks or different ways to produce an episode. Do we want to talk about the one we did for this season?
Shane Houghton: It’s a little far out from where we are but I don’t want to tease it too much. Chris, why don’t you drop the title?
Chris Houghton: It’s called “Crick Cast.” We’ll talk about it later. [Laughs]. I’ll tell you this, it was an episode where we went to our producer about. He’s in charge of the schedule and the budget of the show and we said, “We’re not sure if this is going to work, so at what point in the production schedule does it have to work or can we kill it and pivot to something else?” We’ve never really done that for an episode before.
Shane Houghton: Basically, we’re going to take a huge experimental swing. Do we have a safety net if it all falls apart?
Chris Houghton: If it doesn’t work, when are we screwed? We were all very pleased and relieved when it did work. Honestly, it exceeded our expectations. It’s a really funny episode. I can’t wait to say more and for fans to see it.
Big City Greens Season 5 kicks off with the first five episodes premiering Aug. 21 on Disney Channel (8:00 p.m. EDT/PDT) and next day on Disney+. Additional episodes will roll out throughout the remainder of the year and 2027.
